Sunday, March 9, 2008

Caucus chair uncovers discrepancies - Top Stories

Caucus chair uncovers discrepancies - Top Stories

Volunteers who worked the Jester Center caucus on Tuesday are suspicious of at least one of the caucus lists, the precinct chairman said late Thursday night. At least three students who signed the list verified that the candidates attached to their names were not the candidates they voted for.

Government senior Ray Skidmore, precinct chair for the voting precinct that includes all UT dorms, said one of the caucus volunteers on Thursday noticed almost identical handwriting on one of the caucus sheets. Volunteers were recounting the caucus numbers Wednesday and Thursday, Skidmore said, just to double-check before turning them in today. Information from all caucuses - forms and the official delegate counts - are due to the Travis County clerk's office today by 6 p.m.

When recounting, the volunteer noticed a whole list had Sen. Hillary Clinton written in similar handwriting in the presidential preference column for each of the six voters on that list. Skidmore started calling each of the voters on the list when he reached finance senior Ronesha Holmes, who told him she did not write Clinton as her preference; Holmes said she was instructed to leave that line blank.

Even one discrepancy threw up a flag of suspicion, Skidmore said.

As he continued calling people on the list Thursday, he found that two other students, history and pre-med sophomore Abigail Cheney and government sophomore Adam Aldrete, said they did not fill in a presidential preference and that Clinton was not who they would have listed.