Watchdog Group Files Complaints Over South Carolina Primary

Source: NY Times

June 15, 2010 | By BRIAN KNOWLTON

The unemployed South Carolina man whose surprise victory in last week’s Democratic primary race for a Senate seat has drawn intense scrutiny now faces another obstacle. A watchdog group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, on Tuesday filed formal complaints with federal and state election officials (pdf) asserting that he and three other candidates violated election law.

The group questioned (PDF) whether Alvin Michael Greene, an unknown who with little apparent funding beyond his unemployment checks had managed to pay a $10,440 filing fee, might have been “induced” by an unknown party to run. He defeated a much better-known opponent, Vic Rawl, and is slated to face Senator Jim DeMint, a Republican, in the fall.

“Paying candidates to run for office and concealing the sources of campaign funds undermines the integrity of the electoral process and threatens our democracy,” Melanie Sloan, the executive director of the watchdog group, said in a statement.

In a telephone interview, Ms. Sloan said that she had no evidence pointing to anyone having paid Mr. Greene to run for office. But, she added, it seemed highly curious that someone in the candidate’s financial position would have spent more than $10,000 to file, then failed to hire a staff, stage any campaign events or spend anything on campaigning.

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Read more: http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/watchdog-group-files-complaints-over-south-carolina-primary/

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Republicans can cross-over vote in SC primaries. No doubt, this is a plant that bloomed!!

While the SC AG’s office will not pursue this, FEC is legally bound to examine the CREW complaint.

VIDEO: Keith Olbermann Interviews Alvin Greene
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x474208


Related News Releases

* CREW ASKS SOUTH CAROLINA AG TO INVESTIGATE WHETHER ALVIN GREENE WAS INDUCED TO RUN AND FILES COMPLAINT WITH FEC // 15 Jun 2010
http://www.citizensforethics.org/node/45215

# 6/15/10 - CREW FEC Complaint Against SC Candidates // 329.5 kb
PDF: http://www.citizensforethics.org/node/45199

Get CREW posts on Facebook: http://www.citizensforethics.org/

VIDEO: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x475907

See
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4430261

Which machine tallied those votes hardly matters. Paper ballots would havedne the same thing. It is an open primary, subject to shenanigans!

While they certainly could have, I don't think the GOP could get the word out to individual voters to switch party ballots and vote for someone they'd never heard of without word getting out.