The Kane Ultimatum
Never mind all of the chaos and confusion, division and anger resulting from Saturday’s sham election in Greensboro. The Whatleyites are popping champagne corks and giggling at the “fringe” types.
Chairman candidate John Kane has issued a video documenting his effort to try and salvage something for the party from the Saturday mess.
In the video, Kane says he proposed five points for Whatley and his team:
- Conduct a full investigation into the voting app that was used — transparency on how it was financed, details on development and testing. Kane noted that evidence exists showing voting occurred from locations in Wisconsin AND Florida, despite the party documents stating voting must be conducted in person at the convention.
- Conduct a canvass of Saturday’s vote in order to instill some sort of confidence in the process. In addition to some out-of-state and out-of-town voting, there is evidence registered GUESTS got to vote. Spreadsheets released by the state party even show a 219-person undervote in the chairman’s race. WHY was there such indignance over the idea of paper ballots and a paper trail to document the vote?
- Allow Kane to identify three experts to oversee the inspection of the source code used in the state’s general election voting. (According to Kane, this is allowed under the General Statutes but has been ignored by Whatley for four years.). Kane said Whatley opposed this. Whatley reported conceded that Kane could pick one and Whatley could pick two.
- The NCGOP appropriate $100,000 — which Kane himself would match – to a legal fund for cleaning up the state’s voter rolls once and for all. Whatley rejected this because his 2023-2024 budget reportedly just got approved Saturday.
- Allow Kane to oversee a committee to ensure proper staffing of voting precincts across the state for 2024 and beyond. Whatley said Kane could HAVE this all to himself.
In the video, Kane said Whatley described Saturday’s “election” as “done, final, closed and won’t be reopened again.”
Kane closes the video promising to “keep us posted on his next steps.” (Do I smell lawyers? *Sniff, sniff.*)
Was it an “ultimatum” – or an Olive Branch (as described by Kane)?
I go with John’s description. Whatley caused all the division, alienating at least one third of the delegates.
It is a huge concern for 2024 if a signigicant segment of our party sees it operating by banana republic methods, which is exactly what happened on Saturday. There is no confidence that any of the votes were counted properly. Whatley has caused this division by his power plays to remain in office. Electronic voting is inherently corrupt and should be permanently banned from our conventions. Whatley owns this mess. With NC a critical state for 2024, Whatley has allowed his power trip and ego trip to badly divide our party. He is totally unfit to be chairman. But I am sure Whatley’s political godfather, Thom Tillis, is happy he stills holds the title of being the de facto chairman.
Good statement, Mr. Kane. Here is one from me. NO MORE ELECTRONIC VOTING!!! Thank you, Mr. Kane, for your efforts. You are confirming that I was right to second your nomination.
One more thought. If it is this bad now, just think ahead to when AI may be so entrenched in everything we do that the machines will make the decisions for us. This is one more reason to abandon ANY electronic means of voting, before it gets to that point.
Isn’t it interesting that the first time electronic voting happened in NC was also the first time Whatley wandered in and won?
These are all quite reasonable requests. Three of them are directed at critical election security measures for the 2024 election that were key campaign issues for Kane, and it is good to see that he is keeping his policy focus even after the election result. Two are directed at internal party election integrity which is also important in creating a climate of trust in the party that will be important for party unity going forward. Our party does not need another dumpster fire like this last convention election process and clearing up the major flaws is the first step on that. While I might have gone farther and asked to elimiate electronic voting in the future, Kane has stuck to the very basics on this issue.
The ball is in Whatley’s court.
In the video, Kane said Whatley described Saturday’s “election” as “done, final, closed and won’t be reopened again.”
I assume a court of law could ‘reopen’?
The NC gop and the national gop have the same notion, no matter HOW BAD we are; they will NEVER pull the dem lever…..The conservatives will always default to us and return in 2/4/6Y to be ignored and screwed over again…
Since there are certain functions performed by the NC Republican Party and its officers, a quo warranto proceding can be brought in Superior Court to determine who was legitimately elected. The last time I recall such a lawsuit being filed was to decide the true outcome of the Cumberland County Republican convention in 1973. That one never went to trial. It was settled by the chairman declared elected by the county convention resigning and the plaintiff in the lawsuit being installed as his replacement, while the other officers and executive committee remained in place. Filing such a lawsuit is going nuclear, and usually all other means to settle such disputes are examined first. Then in 1974, the NC Federation of College Republicans lawyered up to defend itself against an attempt to remove its elected leaders by a pure power play from the Holshouser faction which controlled the party apparatus and the NC Young Republicans who were working with them. The late Charlotte lawyers H. Joseph Beard coming forward to defend the Collega Republicans was enough to back the Holshouser crowd off without the need for litigation.
Correct. Some have argued that as a “private entity” or “club”, the law doesn’t apply. But political parties have a direct role in the public domain by being responsible for the appointment of board of election personnel, etc.
Leave the 2 party corruption! Independent voters take over the electorate! TIME TO STOP THE POLITICAL CORRUPTION BOTH PARTIES! MAJORITY BOTH PARTIES ARE LIFELONG POLITICIANS AND HAVE NO ALLEGIANCE TO THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!
As an NC GOP delegate from Moore County, I voted in the “app” for Kane after about 20 failed attempts. I listened to advice from various state politicians I know, however after examining both Whatley and Kane, my opinion is that Whatley is not a leader in the true sense of the word. Whatley’s reaction to this mess is evidence of my suspicions. The entire affair was a mitigated disaster and one that I hope is not repeated. This was my first convention experience and I have to say I was disappointed. Now as a software developer myself I could have predicted the problems. The app obviously was not stress tested. No consideration for bandwidth availability in the hotel. No way to restrict voting to just the convention floor. With a VPN I can be anywhere in the world. And from what I understand folks who were not delegates were able to vote. The app needs to be independently examined. As far as election integrity – I never want to hear Whatley talk about that topic ever again.
Multi-tasking is not my strong suit – should have read
The entire affair was an unmitigated disaster