To Frank Smith’s Blog,

As I continue to investigate the “workings” of the Working Families Party, I am amazed at some blatant facts that have never been brought to the attention of the Connecticut voter. It is clear from the information that I have found, that the Democrats, as the majority party in Connecticut, undoubtedly, did not have the best interest of their constituents in mind. Let me share some facts with your readers. Then you all can decide for yourselves.

Recently, at the end of August 2009, portions of Connecticut’s Public Campaign Financing law were ruled as unconstitutional. In the courts explanation as to why, I found the following paragraph that caught my attention:

Case 3:06-cv-01030-SRU Document 383 Filed 08/27/2009 Page 1 of 138

The state hastens to add that, due to the cross-endorsement of major party candidates,

12 additional Working Families Party candidates would be eligible for partial or full CEP grants

in 2010. March 4, 2009 Proulx Supp. Decl. ¶ 33. The director of the Connecticut Working

Families Party, Jon Green, testified at the March 2009 bench trial, however, that getting

candidates elected on the Working Families Party ticket is not the principal goal of the party and

that the party will likely continue to cross-endorse in the future, rather than take advantage of

CEP eligibility. 03/12/09 Tr. at 303-04, 313, 340-41 (testimony of Jon Green).

Now that you have read that paragraph, the interesting point is that the Working Families Party makes no bones about the fact they are not interested in getting people elected on their party ticket, but only to cross endorse candidates that they see as supporting their issues (“to push for ever more government control of the economy” and to pursue “the ultra-Left’s familiar anti-capitalist redistributionism.”) When votes on the WFP’s ballot line help a candidate that they’ve endorsed to win, then they can hold that politician accountable to the WFP.

Now you’ll probably wonder how this can be legal. Well, the Working Families Party is a third party with a twist, fusion voting.

Fusion voting lets one party (like the WFP) “cross endorse” the same candidate as another party. The votes from each party are tallied separately, but then combined for that candidate’s total. Here is another interesting fact that I found:

The cause of electoral fusion suffered a major setback in 1997, when the U.S. Supreme Court decided by 6-3 in Timmons v. Twin Cities Area New Party that fusion is not a constitutionally protected civil right.

So, where is Fusion legal today? In the following states – Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Mississippi, New York, South Carolina and Vermont. Fusion tickets are most commonly used in New York and Connecticut!

Now remember, with fusion voting, voters have the option of voting for candidates on the line of any party that has endorsed them. Votes for each party are tallied separately, but added together to determine the winner. So why then is this still legal in Connecticut if the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that fusion is not a constitutionally protected civil right?

Fusion is legal in Connecticut because of Connecticut’s Public Finance Campaign Law. Let’s remember that New Britain’s elected Democratic state reps helped to pass this law. So that is why Tim O’Brien, who is running for mayor this year, has no problem with accepting the endorsement of the Working Families Party. Oh by the way, Congressman Chris Murphy also had accepted the endorsement of the Working Families Party in the last election. So here is the law that our Democratic friends helped to write, probably with the support of Attorney General Blumenthal.

On July 5, Connecticut SB 131l was signed into law. It expands the ability of two parties to jointly nominate the same candidate. Fusion has always been legal in Connecticut for qualified parties, but since 1981 it has not been legal for unqualified parties. In Connecticut, a party must have polled 1% in the last election for any particular office, for it to be a qualified party for that particular office. A typical minor party in Connecticut is ballot-qualified for a few offices and not for most offices.

Therefore, under the old law, a minor party could only cross-endorse the nominee of another party, if that minor party had polled 1% of the vote for that office in the last election. But under SB 1311, if a party is ballot-qualified for just one office anywhere in the state (assuming that office is up for election that year), then it may engage in fusion for any statewide office. It may also use fusion for a U.S. House race if it is qualified for any state legislative race inside that U.S. House district. And if it is qualified for a statewide office that is up that year, it can use fusion for any office in the state. Thus, the Green and Libertarian Parties will be able to use fusion for all offices in 2010, since they polled over 1% for a few statewide offices in 2006.

So now that you have the facts, make your own judgments about the Working Families Party and the people that accept their endorsements!

Craig Diangelo