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Article published Nov 15, 2003
GOP's 'Answer' still no
Tony Taylor
Staff
Writer
Gov. Mark Sanford said Friday that state Republican Party
leaders were right to reject a deal that would have provided 5,000 volunteers
for the Democratic presidential primary."If it has to do with precincts and
primaries, the governor is going to defer to the chairman of the Republican
Party to make that decision," Sanford said through his spokesman, Will Folks.
"He's made his decision, and we support it."State Democratic Party Chairman Joe
Erwin lashed out Thursday at Republican leaders for derailing a proposal that
would have allowed high school students to work as volunteer poll workers during
the primary.The offer was made by Freedom's Answer, a Washington, D.C.-based
nonprofit group founded by President Clinton's press secretary, Mike McCurry,
and Republican strategist Doug Bailey.Bailey said the organization's goal is to
increase voter turnout while promoting political activism among high school
students.Since Freedom's Answer is nonpartisan, Bailey said both parties must
agree before the group will train volunteers.Luke Byars, executive director of
the state Republican Party, said Republicans had no interest in agreeing to a
proposal that would help the Democrats."Why would we want to sign off on
something like that? That would allow them to recruit volunteers so they don't
have to spend money and theycan spend it against us later," he said.Byars
suggested the Democrats were trying to blame Republicans because they likely
will not have enough money to pay for their presidential primary."Joe Erwin has
shown he clearly has not raised enough money to hold a primary, even though he
has been in office six months," Byars said. "He's planning to offer every excuse
for not having the primary. If they can't have that primary, they're going to
blame it on us."Erwin would not disclose how much money Democrats have raised,
saying the information would aid the Republicans.Erwin said allowing Freedom's
Answer to help in the Feb. 3 presidential primary was bigger than money or
partisan politics."These are kids we've got to get invested in democracy," Erwin
said. "It doesn't matter if they're Republican, Democrat or Independent. We've
got to get them involved in the voting process."Democrats tried to close the
2000 Republican presidential primary after the Republicans said they would not
open precincts in black neighborhoods.The Democratic Party filed a complaint
under the federal Voting Rights Act, which forced the GOP to open all of the
state's 1,914 precincts at a cost of more than $500,000.The GOP originally had
budgeted $150,000 for the primary.If the Republicans had to pay, then so should
the Democrats, said Rick Beltram, chairman of the Spartanburg County Republican
Party."In the year 2000, we had to do this thing by ourselves," Beltram said.
"We paid for ours in addition to the Democrats suing us every time we turned
around."Byars suggested the Democrats would not have the resources to staff all
the precincts."It could cost them up to $500,000 to hold the primary this year,"
Byars said. "They're potentially looking at a lot of money."Erwin said Byars had
no knowledge of the Democratic Party's financial situation."How does he know?"
Erwin said. "He wrong. He has no idea what he's talking about. It's sad."Albert
Smith, chairman of the Spartanburg County Democratic Party, agreed with Erwin
and said the Democrats plan to put the incident behind them."We're going to put
on a Democratic primary, no matter what it costs us," Smith said. "We're not
asking for help from anybody."Because of the political squabble, Freedom's
Answer may refrain from participating in South Carolina politics in the
future."We asked both parties not to get into a shouting match," Bailey said.
"We regret we could not work in South Carolina and regret it has been raised
publicly because it hurts the program."Tony Taylor can be reached at 562-7219 or
tony.taylor@shj.com.