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Title: Maine’s Ron Paul delegates refuse compromise on national GOP convention
Source:
Bangor Daily News
URL Source: http://bangordailynews.com/2012/08/ ... op-negotiations-to-seat-ron-pa
Published: Aug 22, 2012
Author: Christopher Cousins and Seth Koenig
Post Date: 2012-08-22 23:28:15 by Hondo68
Ping List: *Ron Paul for President* Subscribe to *Ron Paul for President*
Keywords: None
Views: 3724
Comments: 13
PORTLAND, Maine — A national Republican committee has found that Maine’s GOP convention was not conducted legally and therefore 20 delegates pledged to support Ron Paul won’t be seated at the party’s national convention which begins next week, according to state party Chairman Charlie Webster. The Committee on Contests, which met Wednesday in Tampa, concluded that many rules were broken during the chaotic May convention in Augusta, Webster said. Two longtime Republicans challenged the results, arguing that lax credentialing and security at the state convention allowed unqualified participants to cast votes. The content committee called on Republican leaders and Paul supporters to work out a compromise or it would choose Maine’s delegates, Webster said. The committee suggested that 10 pro-Paul supporters and 10 supporters of Mitt Romney represent Maine at the convention, according to Webster. This is similar to agreements reached with other state delegations that backed Paul, a Texas congressman and libertarian-leaning conservative. The 20 delegates who support Paul could challenge the committee decision on the convention floor, although they aren’t likely to get access to the floor without reaching an agreement with the contest committee. Brent Tweed, who was chairman of the state convention and is a delegate who supports Paul, said Wednesday evening that no ruling had been reached by the contest committee but that he expected one soon. Stavros Mendros, a Paul delegate and former legislator from Lewiston who arrived in Tampa on Wednesday, also said he had not heard of a ruling from the committee. He said the Paul delegates are not interested in compromise. “We were all duly elected,” he said. “Lots of people support us. The governor supports us.” “Ron Paul won Maine,” Mendros said, adding that refusing to seat his delegates would further embarrass the Maine GOP. Earlier Wednesday, Matthew McDonald of Belfast, a Paul-backing Maine delegate, said it would give the national party a black eye to reject nearly an entire state’s delegation, and noted that Gov. Paul LePage has promised not to attend the convention if the Maine group isn’t seated. “We've as a whole delegation said, "No compromise: Seat all of us or seat none of us,” McDonald told the BDN on Wednesday. “I think you'll see when it goes in front of the credentials committee tomorrow, they'll look at the facts. And the facts are that a Republican governor would boycott a Republican convention.” He added that many GOP state lawmakers are among those on a petition calling for the Paul delegates to be seated at the convention. “I believe the people on the credentials committee to be sane, logical people, and the facts will fall where they are, and there will be no reason for any of us to have to give up our seats,” McDonald said. “I think they'll make the judgment to seat the Maine delegates who were fairly elected.” Webster took blame for problems with the state convention, noting that turnout was much higher than expected and convention planners were not prepared for it. Maine Republicans and Romney supporters Peter Cianchette and Jan Martens Staples had urged the Republican national party not to seat the Paul supporters at the Florida event, arguing that the May state convention at which they were elected was not properly run. Repeating a strategy employed by Paul supporters in other states, the candidate’s backers rallied a large turnout at the Maine GOP convention and were able to secure a near sweep of the convention delegates elected to represent the state at the national convention. Cianchette and Staples later challenged the results with national Republican officials, claiming in part that lax credentialing and security at the May state convention allowed unqualified participants to cast votes in the affair. Similar challenges have been lodged regarding the Paul contingents from other states, but as of Wednesday afternoon, Maine’s delegation was the only one in the country that had not reached an agreement on how many of the disputed delegates will be recognized at the national convention. Ashley Ryan, a Paul supporter who was elected Maine’s new Republican national committeewoman during the controversial state party convention, said Wednesday afternoon that her group is rejecting any compromise. Ryan said the state’s delegation has turned down offers by the Romney campaign and Republican party officials to seat 12 of Maine’s Paul supporters while replacing the remainder of the disputed delegates with Romney backers. “As democratically elected delegates, we're not really interested in taking the deals that they offered us,” said Ryan, who arrived in Tampa for the convention Wednesday. “It's really insulting to us. You don't offer an innocent man a plea bargain, and that's essentially what's happening here. I think we've been very clear with the RNC and the Mitt Romney campaign that we're not interested in any compromise, because we were elected by the Republicans of the state of Maine.” National GOP officials and the Mitt Romney campaign forged a deal that would allow some of Paul’s delegates from Louisiana and Massachusetts to be seated. NPR reported that pro-Paul delegations from Iowa, Nevada and Minnesota already have been credentialed for the convention and that a deal has been struck for some of Paul’s delegates from Louisiana and Massachusetts to be seated, but not all of them. The Paul campaign hopes that it can have enough delegates seated to place Paul’s name into nomination during the convention, which would allow him to make a speech. Earlier this month, Webster offered a compromise to the Paul delegates. His deal would have let them attend the convention but obligate them to vote for Mitt Romney if Paul doesn’t have sufficient support to be nominated for president. The Paul supporters rejected that plan. Last week, Maine delegates who back Paul sought an injunction against the Republican National Committee to stop it from investigating whether they were legitimately chosen to represent the state at the GOP convention.
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#1. To: hondo68 (#0)
Yawn, ron paul lost now please get on with your life and stop the nonsense. The goal is to DEFEAT OBAMA, not your dreams of a "purist" conservative candidate. Ask the famous constitutionalists ron paul, is it "majority rule" or rule by a less then handful of people. I like you hondo but shit man you're doing obama's work for him. Try posting an anti-obama article instead of all the anti-romney stuff. Obama's the enemy of the united states and i'm voting for the one man you can defeat him. You should too.
By putting a *clone* of o'bungler in... THAT'S your logic, yeah? Twit.
Not much point in that, if he's replaced with something as bad, or worse. That hopey changey stuff with a flakey lib president doesn't work, as you may have noticed. How about the GOP quits trying to steal a handful of delegate seats that don't even really matter, just in an attempt to make Mitt's support look stronger than it really is? He's a weak candidate, but the GOP is probably stuck with him, unless they come to their senses and dump him real quick like. The Romney crew is behaving like sore winners. Really petty stuff, makes them look weak, and just dumb. It's pretty clear that they don't want to change for the better, or even hear about it. Kicking the can down the road is not an option. Real reforms are needed. I'm not voting for the joker, that's like asking for a kick in the ass now, and another one in 4 years.
Obama's watch stopped on 24 May 2008, but he's been too busy smoking crack to notice.
The goal is to defeat the RNC and replace it with a conservative party. Until that happens, you will only have leftists to choose from. Just like this year. Also, you didn't answer my question in that other thread, after I answered yours. "So, you're voting for a Massachusetts liberal then?
"If men through fear, fraud or mistake, should in terms renounce and give up any essential natural right, the eternal law of reason and the great end of society, would absolutely vacate such renunciation; the right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, it is not in the power of Man to alienate this gift, and voluntarily become a slave." Samuel Adams, Rights of the Colonists, 1772
sorry guys say all you want but with me it's ABO
sorry, didn't think i had to. I'll vote for anyone who has a chance of defeating obama.
What a chicken-shit answer.
No offense, but that's insane. You just said that you'd be willing to vote for someone worse than Obama, why?
Obama's watch stopped on 24 May 2008, but he's been too busy smoking crack to notice.
to me there is NO ONE worse then obama
Hey, I can live with that. I can even respect it. It's your decision and you have to make it. It's the bedwetter conservatives who think time will stop and the country will sink into an abyss if we don't replace one socialist with another that gets on my nerves.
"If men through fear, fraud or mistake, should in terms renounce and give up any essential natural right, the eternal law of reason and the great end of society, would absolutely vacate such renunciation; the right to freedom being the gift of God Almighty, it is not in the power of Man to alienate this gift, and voluntarily become a slave." Samuel Adams, Rights of the Colonists, 1772
Personally, i've always wanted Paul Ryan to get the nomination. I was surprised romney picked him but grateful. Of all these political hacks, he's been the only one to come up with a budget and a plan. As a business person, i've got to go with the man who has a plan to try and fix this mess. The other hacks do nothing but talk bullshit.
Paul Ryans plan to balance the budget in 40 years was kind of lame. Rand Paul had the real plan.
I would expect rand to some day do what his father never could and that's become president. I'd vote for him in a split second.
#2. To: calcon (#1)
The goal is to DEFEAT OBAMA...
#3. To: calcon (#1)
The goal is to DEFEAT OBAMA
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#4. To: calcon (#1)
The goal is to DEFEAT OBAMA
#5. To: We The People, hondo68 (#4)
#6. To: We The People (#4)
Also, you didn't answer my question in that other thread, after I answered yours.
#7. To: calcon (#6)
I'll vote for anyone who has a chance of defeating obama.
"I am relying on my personal experience with Morons, which have been universally positive." -jwpegler
#8. To: calcon, *Yukon neo-Progressive Vermin* (#6)
I'll vote for anyone who has a chance of defeating obama.
"We (government) need to do a lot less, a lot sooner" ~Ron Paul
#9. To: hondo68 (#8)
#10. To: calcon (#5)
sorry guys say all you want but with me it's ABO
#11. To: We The People (#10)
#12. To: calcon (#11)
Of all these political hacks, he's been the only one to come up with a budget and a plan.
#13. To: A K A Stone (#12)
Rand Paul had the real plan.
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