If Steve Christopher Has The Signatures, Where Are They?
An editorial in the Dispatch raises a very important point about Republican Steve Christopher’s claim that Jennifer Brunner lost some of his ballot petitions:
Where are the signatures?
Christopher claims that he has copies of 2,000 signatures, yet he hasn’t released them.
And to quite honest, I’ve yet to hear a Democrat say that having Christopher in the race would’ve been a bad thing. Personally, I feel quite the opposite.
UPDATE: ProgressOhio has posted the paperwork from Christopher’s filing.
You may want to note that he has responded to very specific discrepancies by the people who collected the signatures and posted copies that match their recollections. Oddly they are in DIRECT conflict with what the SOS is calming.
http://www.stevechristopher.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=16&Itemid=18
Brunner's claim is that she processed all the petitions that she received. Even posting all the signatures won't disprove that claim. The point is that if you can't produce all 2,000 signatures you claim to have, your complaint doesn't have a leg to stand on and should be dropped immediately.
The fact that you've distorted this makes me even more skeptical of the complaint.
And, while I don't think it was intentional, I'd just like to clarify and disclose that you are the Brian Miller who posts the items you link to and works on the Christopher campaign. Is that correct?
...but this looks less like a Brunner "conspiracy" or foul-up and more like amateur hour for a Tea Bagger candidate and staff. My hunch is they misplaced/lost some of their own part-petitions by accident until after Feb. 18 filing deadline. Then after finding them, they now can copy and post petitions to their own site and answer Progress Ohio's FOI request.
It will all come out in the wash in court when they compare the "found" 240 petitions with the time-stamped petitions filed with Brunner. Doubt seriously the SOS or the bi-partisan local boards would screw up 200 petitions or conspire to knock Christopher off ballot. Besides, as you indicated, a little Tea Bagger competition in the primary for DeWine would not be a bad thing for Dems. Maybe Christopher will win against Brunner in GOP Supreme Court like Jon (no Kettering water bill for months) Husted did.