Activists Demand New Michigan Caucuses

Grassroots activists in Michigan laid out charges of election-year electioneering and demand new caucuses be held this month to choose 156 Democratic delegates (including 28 Super Delegates) and 60 Republican delegates to their National Presidential Conventions this summer in full compliance with rules mandated from headquarters in Washington D.C.

Below are excerpts of the news release issued by Taxpayers United Michigan Foundation:

“For nine months, Michigan’s 7.2 million registered voters have been shoved aside as officials from both the Michigan Democratic and Republican Parties embarrassed grassroot citizens by grandstanding in national news media for ‘Michigan relevance’ which they mistakenly anticipated by their shift to an Early Open Michigan Presidential Primary Election on January 15, 2008,” said Bill McMaster of Taxpayers United in the State Capitol press room in Lansing yesterday.

“Recent developments in the Federal District Court of Judge Nancy Edmonds in Detroit, and in the recently corrected and published position of Michigan Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land, have cleared the way to replace the meaningless and wasteful $10.4 million unconstitutional statewide Presidential Preference Election with the conduct of a caucus by each political party. That method was routine in Michigan during past four-year cycles and unchallenged by unelected national political party enforcers in Washington,” McMaster noted.

“Grassroot citizens knew Public Act 52 of 2007 unfairly violated every voter’s US Constitutional right to secrecy of the ballot and equal protection of the laws from the moment state legislators disclosed last October they’d concocted the Michigan Early Open Presidential Primary Election in secret and Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) signed it into law.

“Another reason the January 15, 2008 date was chosen was the undeclared relevance of legislators intending to add a legislative initiative to amend Term Limits in our Michigan Constitution on the same statewide ballot. Only the dragged out court fight on the Michigan Presidential Primary delayed the proposed Term Limits amendment from being timely scheduled for January 15. It would have extended the terms in office of many sitting state legislators. Citizen volunteers in Taxpayers United helped kill that scheme. Despite 51% of Michiganians voting independent; the five ‘minor’ political parties being closed out from voting on January 15, 2008, and Obama and Edwards not even being listed on the Democratic Party official ballot, both Democrat and Republican officials heralded the Michigan Presidential Primary as ‘guaranteed’ to force the Democratic National Committee to reinstate 100% of the Michigan delegates they’d stripped of credentials to the August National Democratic Convention in Denver, and 50% of the Republican delegates chosen to participate in Minneapolis in early September this year.

Gov. Granholm, U.S. Senators Carl Levin (D) and Debbie Stabenow (D) jointly rigged the Primary by endorsing Hillary Clinton well before January 15.

The Michigan Republican Party must convene a caucus this month because Mitt Romney beat McCain 2-1 and the Republican National Presidential Convention delegates selected from each of Michigan’s 15 Congressional Districts were committed to Romney as a result of the now invalidated January 15 Primary.

To see the remainder of the news release, including a letter Bill McMaster, TUMF chairman, wrote to Michigan Secretary of State Terri Lynn and Director of the Michigan Bureau of Elections Christopher Thomas, click here.

-- Bob McCarty Writes