Wis. Dems Withdraw Extra Dem Candidates From Recall Primaries

A volunteer waits to gather signatures for a recall petition against Sen. Alberta Darling (R) outside of a polling station at Village Center in Shorewood, Wisconsin, Tuesday, April 5, 2011.
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Wisconsin Democrats have announced that they are withdrawing a counter-measure that they had launched against the fake “Democratic” candidates that were put forward by the state Republicans in order to force primaries in the upcoming recalls: Their own extra “placeholder” candidates, who were officially being filed in order to make sure all the primaries happened on one day.

This past weekend, the Dems announced that they would not run fake Republicans in order to force GOP primaries, as a labor-backed progressive group had urged, but would instead put in extra Democrats in addition to the official ones. The filing deadline was this past Tuesday, and extra Dems did indeed file in addition to the fake Democrats, but there still remain certain formalities in order to finalize the candidacies — which the Dems are now declining to do.

Now, the Dems have announced that since fake Democrats had qualified in all six recall races targeting incumbent Republicans, thus ensuring that all the races will have primaries on July 12 and general elections on August 9, they are withdrawing their own superfluous Dems. “The goal of the placeholder candidacies was to create an insurance policy against further Republican attempts to exploit the recall election schedule through dirty tricks and cynical plots,” said a press release from state Dem chair Mike Tate.

The Dems had said they would run the extra Dem candidate in each of the six primary races, in order to put all the races into August on their own terms — not just the ones where Republicans would plant a fake candidate in order to jumble up the calendar.

Keep in mind that this confusing situation all began when Republicans declared a strategy to plant fake candidates in the Democratic primaries — which they have called “protest candidates” — in order to delay the general elections from July to August, and make trouble in the Dem primaries while the GOP incumbents run unopposed. (Examples of the fake Democratic candidates include an 82-year old former Republican state legislator, and a 25-year old GOP activist, among others.)

Also, it turns out that the scheme to launch these primary elections, instead of holding the general elections right away on July 12, will cost local governments throughout the state over $400,000.

Here is the full press release:

DPW: Dems to End Placeholder Candidacies in Recall Elections

MADISON — The Democratic Party of Wisconsin announced today it will not put placeholder candidates on the recall election ballots this summer.

“The goal of the placeholder candidacies was to create an insurance policy against further Republican attempts to exploit the recall election schedule through dirty tricks and cynical plots,” said Tate. “We’ve already seen how low the GOP was willing to go to keep their grip on power when they ran Republicans as fake Democrats to force sham Democratic primaries. Given their past behavior, protections against more Republican manipulation of the process were needed.”

As of Friday morning, all six fake Democrats pushed by the Republican Party to force phony Democratic primaries have submitted to the Government Accountability Board the final paperwork — the statements of economic interest — required to have their names placed on the ballot. With the primary and general elections schedules for the recalls now set, placeholder candidacies to ensure those dates actually occur are no longer needed. The DPW will therefore not file the final remaining forms required to put placeholder candidacies on the primary recall ballot.

“This ridiculous Republican stunt to run fake Democrats is a transparent ploy to confuse voters and delay democracy – all while needlessly wasting hundreds of thousands of taxpayer money,” said Tate. “It’s also a stunning admission of how incredibly vulnerable these six GOP senators are as a result of their extreme overreach and radical agenda that guts education and health care while showering big corporations with huge tax cuts. Despite their best efforts to delay and avoid, these six Republicans will be held accountable by the people of Wisconsin this summer, and recalled from office.”

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