Posted on 05/18/2010 8:57:29 PM PDT by MurthasFatHead
JOHNSTOWN — Republicans today accused Democrat congressional candidate Mark Critz of “illegally campaigning” inside Cambria County polling places.
The Pennsylvania Republican Party and the campaign of Tim Burns, Critz’s GOP opponent in the 12th Congressional District, said Critz was witnessed inside polls in Westmont.
Critz’s campaign did not deny that he had been inside some polls but maintained that nothing improper or illegal occurred.
“Mark did no electioneering within polling locations,” Critz spokeswoman Holly Shulman said. “These are nothing more than desperate attacks which we’ve seen from Tim Burns throughout this campaign.”
The Burns campaign circulated a photo purportedly showing Critz inside a polling place in Westmont.
And the state GOP committee quoted a section of the Pennsylvania Election Code saying “no person, when within the polling place, shall electioneer or solicit votes for any political party, political body or candidate.”
“Get out of the polls, Mark!” Republican Party spokesman Mike Barley said in a statement issued to reporters. “Your presence breaks the law, intimidates voters and election workers and could influence the outcome of this election.”
The Burns campaign questioned whether Critz had a “poll watcher certificate” that would have allowed him inside the voting place. Critz’s campaign did not say whether the candidate had such a certificate.
Sally Winder, judge of elections in the Westmont No. 5 precinct, said Critz entered the polling place, shook the hands of a few poll workers, and was told he had to leave. He complied, she said.
Fred R. Smith, Cambria County election supervisor, said Critz should have been asked to leave the precinct.
Although Smith reported receiving one phone call from a man who was "out of control" over Critz allegedly being in a Westmont precinct, he had not received any complaints that Critz improperly campaigned inside the precinct or interfered with anyone who was voting or waiting to vote.
A person could lodge a formal complaint with the county board of elections. Smith said he was unsure what, if anything, would be done about such a complaint.
Handing out pork chops and bacon sandwiches at the polls was a good idea.
This type of district has more residents on the gravy train than employed.
Look at the Armstrong County numbers. There is clearly something wrong. If I were auditing it I’d have to say it looks like someone altered numbers except they didn’t bother to be consistent about it because the primary numbers reflect what was suspected but the special election numbers suggest a sizable number of Republicans crossed over and voted for Crtiz. Republican Turnout was significantly higher in this county than Democrat turnout as normal yet Critz pulled out a victory? McCain Won this county, Russell won this county, even Murtha in 2006 never amassed the percentage win that Critz did in this county against Diana Irey and if tonight had been the general election for Senate the Republican would have easily won.
It may be explainable because of the Russell Burns conflict but it just looks strange.
Similar things will be said in Massachusetts, after all D’s win their Congressional Seats, at the conclusion of the November 2 election. I want to be wrong about this, but I don’t believe that I’m wrong about this prediction. I, also, believed that the D’s would retain the Pennsylvania 12 Congressional Seat, just from the 2 to 1 ratio that the D’s continue to hold in this area.
Critz’ response: “Hey, it worked for obama, so I figured it was legal!”
WEll, of course. He’s a Democrat. Next question.
Sing it/
I believe that this is the most important post of the day and it needs to be put up as a vanity.
I thought about this for a few hours and this is an operation chaos move that went wrong. Folks wanting Burns to lose the Special Election and Russell to win the primary and run against Critz. So, they voted for Russell and Critz.
Now in the cold like of day.. this tactic sucked but at the time it may very well have seemed smart.
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