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Thursday, February 7, 2008

Dirty Tricks Update

posted by on February 7 at 12:45 PM

In regard to Dan’s earlier post about the specter of shadowy robocalls urging people to vote in Washington’s meaningless Democratic primary, here’s what we know so far:

• The Washington State Democratic Party had no knowledge that this was happening, and seemed suitably angry about it. Spokesman Kelly Steele told me, “We’ll be on the lookout for this kind of thing.” He added that they’ll aggressively pursue any information they receive.

• The Secretary of State’s office says that they also had no knowledge about these calls, and that they’re absolutely not part of some kind of public service announcement campaign.

• The campaign office of Washington for Obama had no idea the calls were going out, and referred me to the national campaign office for comment.

Calls are out to the national press offices of both the Clinton campaign and the Obama campaigns. We’ll let you know when we have more. In the meantime, if you get a shady robocall and have the presence of mind to digitally record it in real time (or, more likely, if you get one on your answering machine and can make a digital recording of it) please let us know.

RSS icon Comments

1

You've already used the phrase "calls are out" / have a call in

You're already posting like the big boy wanabees!!! Aww

Posted by Non | February 7, 2008 1:14 PM
2

Damn, I'm pretty sure I got one of these but I hit the delete button too quickly. It was someone urging me to vote in the democratic primary though. Came from this # 703 469 2008

Posted by scharrera | February 7, 2008 1:28 PM
3

@2 - Sorry, I don't buy it: http://www.hillaryclinton.com/help/contact/

Posted by Levislade | February 7, 2008 1:31 PM
4

Top Google hit for 703 469 2008: HillaryClinton.com - Contact Us

The number report itself is heresay at this point, though, and suspect since the first report mentioned the caller ID number being blocked.  Any staffers able to confirm or refute this?

Posted by lostboy | February 7, 2008 1:32 PM
5

FUCK the state Democratic party. They're a bunch of funking hypocrites. The caucuses are the most undemocratic thing I've ever seen. I have to work on Saturday, so I'm completely disenfranchised.

When the D's joined the R's to file suit against the state open primaries, I pledged never to give the D's a dime. This just reinforces it for me.

Posted by I Got Nuthin | February 7, 2008 1:33 PM
6

Interfering with elections is illegal and can lead to jail terms.

FYI. For accurate caucus info check out WA.BarackObama08.com (think that's it, worst case use www.wa-democrats.org/caucus for locator)

Posted by Will in Seattle | February 7, 2008 1:39 PM
7

could it have been the fire fighters robo-calling to help get votes so their cash gets pushed thru?

Posted by Starwood | February 7, 2008 1:45 PM
8

FUCK. Between the Democratic Party's fuckups and the increasingly intense Obamaton/Clintonista animosity, the Democrats are poised to do what they always do - take a potential victory and piss it away.

EVERYTHING was pointing in the Democrats' favor this time. What's it gonna take?

Posted by tsm | February 7, 2008 1:56 PM
9

So guys, only one report of one call? anyone else get this?

My guess is the first report is made up, up the homefry that that submitted the report heard his robo call wrong...

prove me wrong? anyone else hear this call?

Posted by INORIGHT? | February 7, 2008 2:06 PM
10

republicans are such sore losers.

(and yes, they WILL lose, this year)

Posted by michael strangeways | February 7, 2008 2:10 PM
11

#9.

I got the call. I telecommute and it came in on a line I largely use for business after hours, so I pretty much guessed it would be Saturday related (since I've had the same landline number in the five years I've been a Seattle voter) and answered.

As soon as I heard the word "primary" in the message's pitch, which was almost immediately after the call started, I listened for anything to identify it. I got Nada. It had no party identification, no Hilary, no Obama, zip. Its language was very typically "get out the vote," but obviously factually inaccurate since I'm a yellow-dog Dem and they never said who to get out the vote FOR.

I honestly don't know who it came from and am not a tin-foil hat kind of guy, but getting something that misleading disturbs me only as a participant in a democracy, not as a Democrat.

Truthfully, the Washington GOP may have just bought a really bad phone list and it was a mistake.


Posted by Paul | February 7, 2008 2:26 PM
12

@2:

Nice try.

Posted by Babaloo | February 7, 2008 2:58 PM
13

703-469-2008 is recorded as a missed call 2x on my phone

Posted by LH | February 7, 2008 6:08 PM
14

called it back, it's the clinton campaign. i can't confirm the message is that i vote in the primary.

Posted by LH | February 7, 2008 6:10 PM
15

i received 2 calls today from that same number that i didn't answer. no message was left. i called the number back 5 minutes ago after reading this and the outgoing message identifies it as the clinton campaign (call it yourself). 2 minutes after i called the number i got another call from the number and picked up, dead air. i'm gonna call it again and see if it'll result in another return call.

Posted by LH | February 7, 2008 6:21 PM
16

Just because you're getting calls from the Clinton campaign does NOT mean they are the deliberately misleading calls mentioned in the post. The two are not yet proven to be connected in any way.

Posted by Fnarf | February 7, 2008 7:14 PM
17

yup - false alarm. i got another call. they are NOT saying to vote in the primary. someone is either mis-informed or leading us on. the robo-call simply says to go to caucus and then asks you to id who you are going to support (i.e. push 1 for clinton, 2 for obamba)

sheesh.

Posted by LH | February 7, 2008 8:30 PM

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