One of the issues with the Democrat’s abject failure to run a caucus was clogged phone lines. Russians apparently hacked the number and gave it to Trump supporters who called it to complain. Democrats couldn’t send in their votes.
New Hampshire Democrat Kathy Sullivan doesn’t mention Russians. She has the 2002 NH phone jamming scandal (probably Russians), and Republicans to blame.
A number to call in Caucus results was discovered online. It was shared by 4chan (and others), not exactly Republicans. And people did call it. But I have some news for Ms. Sullivan. Even this mattered (it did not) not all Trump Supporters are Republicans. A lot of them are independents, first time unaffiliated voted, even an increasing number of Democrats.
Blacks, Hispanics, women.
We should also note at this point that the only reason to use the call-in line to submit results was is if the app wasn’t working. Republicans didn’t have anything to do with the app or any of this.
The New York Times found instances where vote tallies did not add up, where state delegate equivalents (the traditional measure used to determine the winner) were awarded incorrectly, or where raw results should not be possible.
It’s the latest headache for Iowa Democrats, who ran Monday’s caucuses and still have not reported an official winner.
Wait, There’s More!
- Changes to caucus rules this year included locking in support on the first alignment for candidates who met a 15% viability threshold, meaning that it should be impossible for candidates who met 15% on the first alignment to have a smaller number of votes on the final alignment.
- The analysis found at least 10 instances where a candidate viable on the first alignment lost support on the final alignment, which would not be possible under correctly-followed caucus procedures.
- In at least 70 precincts, there are more votes recorded for the final alignment than on the first alignment, which should also not be possible since no more caucusgoers are allowed to join a precinct after the start time at 7 p.m.
- Candidates who won more votes received fewer state delegate equivalents in at least 15 precinct sites, and a few were awarded more state delegate equivalents than they were allotted.
Ms. Sullivan is using misdirection to distract from the real issues. It wasn’t that counties couldn’t report their votes it is that the results were inconsistent, incalculable, or simply wrong.
If Republicans were preventing the reporting of wrong results Democrats should be thanking them?
The telephone reporting problems added to other issues, notably a smartphone app that did not work for some people and that also had a coding problem that prevented results from being reported properly, pushing more caucus volunteers to the phone lines.
The Trump campaign denied any affiliation with people clogging phone lines on Monday night.
“We don’t know anything about this, but perhaps Democrats should consider using an app that works,” communications director Tim Murtaugh said. “It’s laughable that they would try to blame Trump for their own incompetence.”
The real takeaway here is that the so-called experts at everything, who want to meddle in every corner of your lives, ruined something as simple as a caucus.
It is a warning to America, and it reaffirms something I say often. Democrats destroy everything they touch.
