Voters Beware: last minute mud-slinging likely

Sammamish voters beware: last minute mud-slinging is likely in the form of robo-calls and mailers for the city council election November 8.

By now most if not all of the voters will have received ballots in the mail from King County for the election. As I noted right after the August primary, the mud-slinging whispering campaign has already begun and it was centered on trying to take down Ramiro Valderrama. I’ve previously detailed the petty issues and the one, unfounded serious charge so I won’t go into them again here.

But I can tell you that mailers and robo calls are almost certain to take the unfounded serious charge and try last-minute efforts to further trash Valderrama.

The robo-calls are likely to be anonymous. The mailers may be, too, or labeled with a pseudo-political action committee (PAC) that in reality is tied to the people who have been behind the whispering campaign in the first place.

A legitimate PAC files with the state’s Public Disclosure Commission and has its name and top five contributors on the mailer, along with a detailed contributor listing filed with the PDC. A pseudo-PAC won’t likely have any of these or may have a “name” that doesn’t check out with a PDC filing.

So I urge voters to beware of hit-piece mailers and robo-calls–and to disregard their messages accordingly.

Also beware of pseudo-PACs that endorse when in reality these PACs are nothing more than “fronts” for the candidates and their supporters.

Also be on the lookout for anonymous fliers hand-delivered or mailed. These, too, should be rejected out-of-hand.

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