Posted: March 20, 2008 5:55 PM
Michigan Re-Vote Unlikely
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Michigan state legislators ended their meetings Thursday without approving a re-vote proposal and left for a two-week recess that will keep them away until it is too late to prepare a similar proposal for a June 3 vote.
“Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, R-Rochester, said Democrats never reached agreement or crafted a viable bill that could be considered on the Senate floor,” the Detroit News reported.
Democratic candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton, who won the initial Michigan primary in January, has been pushing for either a re-vote or seating the original delegates won, and she has been pushing rival Sen. Barack Obama to support a re-vote as well. “It is critical that we figure out a way for the people of Michigan and Florida to have their votes and their voices count,” Clinton said in Indiana Thursday, according to CBS News. Both states, which Clinton won, were stripped of their delegates as punishment for holding early contests.
“I do not understand what Senator Obama is afraid of, but it is going to hurt our party and our chances in November,” Clinton said. “So I would call on him, once again, to join me in giving the people of Florida and Michigan the chance to be counted as we move forward in this nominating process.”
While Sen. Clinton, who campaigned Wednesday in Detroit, has been pushing hard for both states’ representation, Obama’s team has raised concerns about the costs and fairness of holding new contests.
Obama proposed that he and Clinton split the 158 delegates from Michigan, where his name did not appear on the ballot, the Associated Press reported.
Challenges for both Michigan and Florida’s re-vote proposals centered primarily on who would pay. State legislators feel that because tax-payers footed the bill for the first rounds of voting, they should not have to endure the costs again. The states looked to the Democratic National Committee for funding.
“DNC chairman Howard Dean, who has taken a hard line in his dealings with the two states, promptly rejected their entreaties,” the Washington Post reported. “The national committee, he said, needed every available dollar it could raise to wage a general election campaign in the fall.”
Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell and New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine then proposed having private donors pay for a Michigan re-vote. State legislators were divided over the proposal, however. Given that Rendell, Corzine and eight of the ten private donors are all Clinton supporters, legislators were worried about undue influence.
“Their letter to (Michigan Gov. Jennifer) Granholm creates the impression that a Michigan do-over would be a Clinton-financed contest designed to save her candidacy,” wrote the Post’s Dan Balz.
While there is still time to reach an agreement on some form of Michigan’s representation at the Democratic National Convention, a June 3 re-vote is highly unlikely.
-- By , NewsHour with Jim Lehrer | Comments | Link
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Lest we forget, CLINTON SIGNED THE SAME AGREEMENT not to campaign and not to seat the MI and FL delegates as Obama did. But, that's beside the point. Legislators in MI knew the penalty for holding an early primary. They proceeded anyway. And then to call it "civil disobedience"? Try IRRESPONSIBLE. Now, Clinton blames Obama? LUNACY!
Let's obviate an election, then, when it seems to be to our advantage, try every trick to rewrite the rules a posteriori. Those are Republican tactics, Republican ethics. We don't need another Republican president. Repudiate the Clinton poseurs.
There is a big grassroots movement happening in Florida and michigan to have the people fund a revote at http://floridamichiganrevote.com/ it is a new sit getting a lot of buzz. It is time for one voice one fight one win.