April 26 DC Special Election

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:
Jeff, I really respect you and this blog (I practically live on it), but you are misinformed about how campaign law works at the detriment to Sekou Biddle, who is a good person getting a bad rap here.

Biddle deserves exactly the rap he is getting.

Anonymous wrote:Petitioning is an important first step for candidates to prove that #1) they have some base of support; and #2) they can follow the letter of the law. The law leaves it up to the candidates to police one another in petitioning, and if they didn't do that any joe schmo could get on a ballot by getting each of his friends to forge a bunch of signatures from voter rolls, or by trolling around the malls in Virginia and getting the signatures of people who don't even vote in DC. Challenging signatures is an important part of the process to hold candidates accountable. It is completely unfair for you to question the motives of candidates who do it. That aside, the fact that Weaver had to return change of address cards means that the challenges WERE valid - the people that signed the petition were not registered to vote at that address. He fixed the problem and the Biddle campaign withdrew their challenge because it was resolved, not because they were wasting his time.

Biddle abused the challenge process with regard to Weaver. The law requires that specific signatures be challenged. Biddle appears to have chosen signatures randomly on the theory that -- as Biddle's consultant Tom Lindenfeld said -- "it's a numbers game". Do you believe Biddle had any basis to believe that Weaver's wife's signature was not legitimate? Do you think he had a reason to believe Che Brown's signature was not legitimate? On what basis could Biddle have believed that his own signature was invalid? Why did he dispute blank lines (btw, he won those challenges, but Weaver wasn't counting them in the first place). Basically, Biddle had no clue which which signatures might not be valid. He figured if he threw a dart at the petitions enough times, he would hit enough invalid signatures. He was wrong.

Anonymous wrote:
I find it upsetting that you are more upset about Biddle challenging the signatures than you are that Mara forged signatures.

This is something you have imagined and has no basis in fact.

Anonymous wrote:I am upset by how many conclusions you jump to about the integrity of the Board, the integrity of the process, and the integrity of the challenge, when you have so little information on how it all works.

I am upset that you are putting words in my mouth. All I did was report what happened with Mara and describe the optics of how his being tossed off the ballot might look to Republicans. I am not a Republican and that would not necessarily be my view. I never questioned the integrity of the Board or the process. Moreover, there was a second challenge against Mara. So, Mara's issues are not all owed to Biddle. Also, at this point, there are only allegations of forgeries. If Mara is actually removed from the ballot due to forgeries, I wouldn't be upset.

I have said in multiple posts that I think Sekou Biddle is a good an honorable man. I think that in ordinary circumstances he would be an excellent Council Member. But, these are not ordinary circumstances. Moreover, sometimes good people make bad choices. Biddle has tied himself to the establishment. There is no denying that he is Kwame Brown's man. Brown's father is on Biddle's payroll for Christ's sake. Brown's former spokesman is Biddle's spokesman. Our City is at a critical point. Do we really want someone who owes his political success to Kwame Brown on the Council? I really think that if Biddle were operating according to his own values he wouldn't have challenged Weaver's petitions. Or, at least the challenge wouldn't have been so frivolous. But, when a guy challenges his own signature, you know that he is not acting with integrity. He is going along with what his establishment advisers -- Kwame Brown's dad and Tom Lindenfeld -- are telling him. If he does that sort of things now, why shouldn't we expect him to do it as a Council Member?

[Anonymous]

He challenged signatures that were on pages with an Illegal witness, which resulted in some blanks and well known names. The integrity argument is unfair. Biddle has years of experience proving his integrity. What lacks integrity is gaming the system and then making hay about getting caught. But unless you want to take up the job of policing the petition process or better fund the board so they can do it themselves, you can't hold it against the campaigns for forcing each other to follow the law through challenges.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:He challenged signatures that were on pages with an Illegal witness, which resulted in some blanks and well known names. The integrity argument is unfair. Biddle has years of experience proving his integrity. What lacks integrity is gaming the system and then making hay about getting caught. But unless you want to take up the job of policing the petition process or better fund the board so they can do it themselves, you can't hold it against the campaigns for forcing each other to follow the law through challenges.

This is incorrect. I have seen his challenges. You can see the challenge of Biddle here:

http://martinaustermuhle.com/four26/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/mcqueen-weaver.pdf

He did not challenge entire pages. He challenged individual signatures from individual pages.

When a candidate makes a mockery of the petition process and ends up challenging his own name, you absolutely have the right to question it. Biddle challenged 1416 signatures. Ultimately, only 271 were found to be invalid. Clearly, Biddle's team had no idea whether the challenged signatures were valid or not.

I am curious why you are misreporting Biddle challenge. Are you just guessing what happened or is someone providing you this information?

[Anonymous]

I am not the PP who has been defending Biddle, but I have sat and spoken with him at parties; I have friends whose kids went to school with him; I know he is well-liked in my neighborhood. A guy like that is going to have people defending him and looking for the best spin on what they hear about him.

I started out assuming I would support him, figuring he was the best bet to beat Orange. But after the way he got the appointment, the bundle of bucks he's pulling in (and where they are from), and the scatter-shot challenges, I don't know who I'll vote for.

Fortunately, there are several people in the running, including Biddle, who I think I can easily live with if they win. Another forum or two will determine where my vote goes, but it will probably be close to a toss-up as I go to the voting place.

[Anonymous]

Hey everyone! Just wanted to share An Almquist's Facebook page with you! (Running for Ward 4 SBOE)

She's looking like a contender!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/An-Almquist/170089006376746

[jsteele]

Yesterday I received a call from someone saying that he would like to ask my opinion about the upcoming special election. I asked him for whom he worked and he said, "Vincent Orange". He asked for whom I would vote if the election were held today, "Sekou Biddle, Vincent Orange, or Jacque Patterson?" LOL, Patterson is not on the ballot at this point and their are several other candidates. I am actually undecided right now, so I told him "none of the above". He said "thanks" and hung up. So, I guess Orange is spending some of his money to identify his supporters.

[jsteele]

This evening the DC Board of Elections rules that Jacque Patterson would not be on the ballot. This is consistent with the Board's previous rulings. In addition, the Board ruled that Pat Mara will be on the ballot, despite finding that 180 signatures were forged. The forged signatures were not counted and many other signatures were tossed out as a result of challenges. But, in the end, Mara still had more than the required 3,000 signatures.

Patterson will likely appeal to the Courts. The primary issue he is disputing involves the format of the challenge by the Biddle camp. The law regarding petition challenges states that the challenge should contain the name, sheet and line number of the signature and the reason for the challenge. Biddle's challenges only included the sheet and line numbers and a numeric code referencing the reason for the challenge -- the name was omitted. The Board ruled that this omission was acceptable because it was still possible to determine which signature was being challenged. Patterson has frequently quoted Biddle campaign consultant Tom Lindenfeld who said when announcing the challenges, "Rules is rules."

Biddle's camp used the same format in their challenges of Weaver and Mara. In Mara's case, the format actually proved problematic because when the Board scanned his petitions, one page was defective and the pages numbers after page 335 were off by one. It therefore became difficult to determine which signatures were being challenged. The Board resolved this by only considering challenges up to page 335. The irony is that Mara ended up with 3,166 signatures. Challenges were not accepted for pages 336-377. Nearly 500 signatures on those pages were challenged. Therefore, had Biddle completed the challenges per the instructions, he probably would have succeeded in preventing Mara from getting ballot access.

[jsteele]

Well, just as soon as I posted the above message, Jacque Patterson announced that he was ending his campaign. So, no court challenge and no write-in campaign. He ended his campaign with class. I'll give him that. He will be chairing the Ward 8 Democrats endorsement meeting this weekend. I suspect that we will get some indication then who he will support. I suspect that it won't be Biddle.

[jsteele]

A couple of updates from today:

1) Somebody shot holes in the DC GOP's office windows over night. It may have been an air pistol or air rifle or even a slingshot.

2) Vincent Orange kicked off his campaign with -- shocking to me -- Doug Sloan as his campaign manager. The gay marriage issue may start to be an issue in the campaign. Previously, Orange was not on board with same sex marriage. This week he attended the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club's endorsement event and announced that he was a "changed man" and now supported gay marriage. But, he failed to get the endorsement, which went to Biddle. Sloan ran against Eleanor Holmes Norton during the last primary. At that time, he was endorsed by the National Organization for Marriage, an anti-gay marriage group. He also received considerable support from NOM. So, given Orange's previous leanings and Sloan's recent NOM dalliance, Orange could emerge as the "traditional marriage" candidate. Although that was a losing position last election.

[jsteele]

Another update. Jacque Patterson, who lost his nominating petition challenge and was kicked off the ballot, has endorsed Vincent Orange. This is a bit of a surprise to me. At this point, I feel rather stupid for having written off Orange earlier. Reading between the lines of Patterson's tweets, it seems that his primary goal is beating Biddle. Whether that is because he is convinced Biddle is too closely tied to Kwame Brown, or because he believes Orange is the best prepared to get things back on track (as Patterson claims), or because Biddle got him kicked off the ballot is anyone's guess. At any rate, this will give Orange a fairly solid base in Ward 8 where Sandy Seegars also supports Orange. Marion Barry, however, is supporting Biddle.

At this point it appears that Biddle, Weaver, Lopez, and to an extend Mara are all fighting for the same votes. Brown and Vincent Gray support Biddle, but it's not clear they can really do much for him publicly given their current circumstances. I'm not sure any of those candidate have much appeal east of the river. As a result of how things are shaping up, this election may be someone divisive.

I am going to try to turn my attention to analyzing voting patterns to see from where the votes are likely to come and then guess who is likely to get them.

[Anonymous]

There is a forum on Tuesday, 3/22, in Takoma (Promised Land Baptist Church, 4th & van Buren, NW, 7:30pm) sponsored by our neighborhood association. Biddle, Lopez, Mara, and Page have said they'll come, and I wrote Orange's campaign manager to check whether Orange will come. I don't know anyone in Weaver's campaign, but I hope he'll show up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a forum on Tuesday, 3/22, in Takoma (Promised Land Baptist Church, 4th & van Buren, NW, 7:30pm) sponsored by our neighborhood association. Biddle, Lopez, Mara, and Page have said they'll come, and I wrote Orange's campaign manager to check whether Orange will come. I don't know anyone in Weaver's campaign, but I hope he'll show up.

He says it's being put on Orange's schedule.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a forum on Tuesday, 3/22, in Takoma (Promised Land Baptist Church, 4th & van Buren, NW, 7:30pm) sponsored by our neighborhood association. Biddle, Lopez, Mara, and Page have said they'll come, and I wrote Orange's campaign manager to check whether Orange will come. I don't know anyone in Weaver's campaign, but I hope he'll show up.

He says it's being put on Orange's schedule.

This is partly update and partly reminder for anyone interested in the 4/26 Council election. Tonight is the Takoma forum, 7:30 pm at Promised Land Baptist Church, 4th & Van Buren, NW -- go to Whittier and then south on 4th to avoid one way streets. We expect at least Biddle, Lopez, Mara, Orange, Page, and Weaver (4 dems, one rep, and one s/g). Haile sent regrets; I don't know about Brown and Douglas.

[jsteele]

Thanks for the reminder. I'm going to try to attend.

[jsteele]

Clarus has apparently just released poll results that are being posted on Twitter by Freeman Klopott. With regard to the At-Large election, 49% of voters are undecided. Support for candidates is as follows: Orange 28%, Biddle 6%, Mara 6%, Weaver 3%, Lopez 3%, Douglas 2%.

A poll in early February had 43% undecided, Orange: 32%, Biddle 12%, Mara 6%, and Lopez 3%. Jacque Patterson who is no longer in the race also had 4%.

So, if both of these polls are to be believed, it appears a chunk of Biddle supporters have moved to undecided as he lost 6% and undecideds increased 6%. Orange also lost some support so maybe some of those undecideds are his former supporters as well.

I attended the Takoma forum last night and here are a few of my impressions:

Tom Brown and Dorothy Douglas just don't seem to have the organization or money to be competitive. Neither made a particularly strong impression either.

Allan Page is also severely under-financed and the Statehood/Greens are pretty marginalized these days. He also failed to stand out among the other candidates.

That leaves five candidates that I think have some sort of a chance. With 8 candidates at the forum, there wasn't a lot of opportunity for the candidates to distinguish themselves. So, that left fairly minor points to go by.

Lopez was notable for the direct manner in which he answered questions. He frequently gave a "yes" or "no" answer that left no ambiguity and then elaborated on his position. He also took shots at Biddle and Orange, referring to them as a "rubber stamp" and "recycled politician" respectively. His strongest point is his repeated reminder that you can can't keep doing the same thing and expect different results. He says electing him would be different and that he would demand better results and accountability. Lopez was one of the few candidates who supported tax increases, saying he supported progressive tax increases.

Mara didn't run from the Republican label, though he lengthened it to "socially-progressive, fiscally-conservative Republican" rather than simply "Republican". He stressed that being a member of another party naturally made him more independent than the others (though Page could make the same claim). Mara's strongest moment might have come with regard to the historic Takoma Theater. This is an issue of great importance to the residents of Takoma -- and something with which Ward 4 residents Biddle and Lopez are very familiar -- but Mara, who is from Ward 1, was unfamiliar with the topic. Rather than simply blowing a lot of smoke, Mara stated that he would have to learn more about the issue. I don't know that answer won him many fans in the audience, but it was impressive to see such an honest response. He also handed it with good humor -- noting the natural smoke-blowing tendency of the candidates -- by saying that by the time it was Biddle's turn to answer he would be offering to spackle the building himself.

Weaver tended to give the most original answers. He also supported raising taxes by adding more tax brackets. Alone among the candidates he questioned the revenue projections of Natwar Gandhi -- suggesting they were too optimistic. His positions tended to be pragmatic with a common sense approach. One suggestion that I would have for him is that he learn to work the room a bit better. Forums are not only a chance to present your positions, but to connect with voters. He needs to shake a few more hands and can learn from Orange and Tom Brown in that regard.

Biddle is the most confounding candidate. Here is a guy that I would love to support but he just can't escape from the shadow of Kwame Brown. I think the "professionals" with whom he has staffed his campaign may actually be hurting him. Many of his answers came off as overly-scripted, as if they had been focus-group tested and campaign consultant approved. They were guaranteed not to ruffle a single feather. In contrast, when issues came for which he wasn't prepared and he had to fall back on his authentic ideas, he was much stronger (for example, about the ANC law and Takoma Theater).

Orange is not fooling around. I think he is tired of losing elections and is not planning to lose this one. He showed great command of the issues. If he had a fault, it was his continually taking credit for any positive thing that ever happened in Ward 5. He tended to ignore the time limitations on answers and, frequently, the question as well in his quest to make sure he was able to say what he wanted to say. He certainly left the impression that he would be well-prepared for the Council. I was surprised that other than Lopez's remark he didn't get more criticism for his connections to big business and his reliance on funding from outside the District.