Letters to the Editor: $100 million in campaign spending doesn’t show you care about the people who pay it
Editor’s note: This is the third in a series of letters from readers to the editor. Each one contains a link to an online, open-source document about the candidates’ positions on critical issues important to North Country voters.
BECAUSE OF THE DISCURSIVE nature of the negative campaign being waged against the candidate for the open seat in District 2, I’ve chosen a different example for this week’s letter than the one from the past. Last week, I called on the incumbent, John Hulsizer, to resign after it became clear he lied during the deposition of a party committee staff member about her involvement in a campaign to elect a political opponent.
The committee member, Joi Williams, is accused of receiving $100,000 in campaign contributions from former committee member and campaign manager Eric J. Brown and, during the years when Brown was involved in another campaign to elect another person, Williams was allegedly involved in a campaign to elect a new party committee chairman. The people who have filed defamation charges against Williams say she is the one who lied during her deposition, a claim she and her lawyers vigorously dispute. I don’t have all the facts ready yet, but I believe based on what I know of the situation and what they are now alleging against her, that the charges may be valid.
I have a theory about why Williams and Brown decided to be involved in the campaign to elect someone to represent District 2 and, I will share that theory here, but first I need to address the issue of whether or not she had a right to be involved in the campaign from the time it started as a committee to the time when it ended as a committee.
Williams filed a nomination from the start, according to the North Country Election Commission, with the understanding from the committee that she would not be asked to run in the general election. That was in 2007, when she first asked the Election Commission to appoint her to the committee, but that application was denied because she had not been properly nominated by the commission.
As she has described it in interviews, Williams didn’t believe she was the right person for the committee. She felt there was insufficient time to prepare properly, and to her that meant she needed to get out of the way. (This didn’t turn out to be that easy. Williams says she did a better