Petition circulators demanded payment for signatures collected. A campaign employee said the scene smacked of dirty politics.
By Michael Currie Schaffer Inquirer Staff Writer
Ralph Nader's presidential campaign this week abruptly abandoned the Center City office that housed its efforts to get on the Pennsylvania ballot, leaving behind a mess of accusations and a damaged building.
The office, on the 1500 block of Chestnut Street, was emptied Thursday after a raucous scene the night before. Police were called as dozens of homeless people lined up to collect money they said they were owed for circulating petitions on the candidate's behalf.
Many of the circulators were never paid, according to outreach workers and interviews with several men who had collected signatures.
"A lot of us were scammed," said Ed Seip, 52, who said he collected more than 200 signatures for Nader.
Nader has until Monday to collect the 25,697 petition signatures required to be on the presidential election ballot. Dan Martino, the campaign's Pennsylvania coordinator, said he believes the campaign is on track to meet that goal.
The quest has drawn national attention because many Democrats believe Nader, who is running as an independent, could drain enough support from John Kerry to throw Pennsylvania's 21 hotly contested electoral votes to President Bush.
Nader has succeeded in New Jersey, where the state Division of Elections has ruled that his name will appear on the ballot. A spokesman for the New Jersey Attorney General's Office said the deadline for filing challenges to a person's candidacy was Monday, and none was filed.
In Pennsylvania and elsewhere, Nader's campaign has accused Kerry supporters of resorting to dirty tricks to keep the candidate off the ballot.
John Slevin, a ballot-access contractor hired by Nader to run the Pennsylvania petition campaign, said all circulators would be paid. And he speculated that the accusations and chaos at the office were the result of political trickery.
"That's the only explanation for it," Slevin said.
He cited both the unexpected arrival of large numbers of homeless people looking for petition work and the calls he received from city officials about payment complaints as examples of possible partisan efforts to derail the campaign.
Slevin began hiring petition circulators two weeks ago with classified advertisements in newspapers and on the Internet.
Petition circulators were told they would be paid from 75 cents to $1 for each valid signature. Half of the money was to be delivered at the end of the day and the balance paid by check the following Wednesday.
But people who showed up Wednesday described a chaotic situation. Lines moved slowly as Slevin and one assistant, protected by armed guards, vetted the petitions for obviously forged signatures. Many in line were shouting and claiming they had been underpaid. As tensions grew, police were called.
By day's end, many left without being paid. Those who returned the next day found the office empty.
Slevin said he would mail checks to the addresses people had given when hired. He said he had not planned to move out of the office until the end of the month but would no longer be working there.
One petition circulator has also lodged a complaint with Lance Haver, the city's consumer advocate.
"They trashed the place," said Lee Brahim, a co-owner of the building where Slevin had rented an office for the month. Brahim said people had urinated in garbage cans and broken a stairway railing.
The 2-week-old effort to collect signatures using hired petition circulators also faced scrutiny last week after reporters witnessed several circulators repeatedly signing each other's forms and telling signers that they could use whatever name they wanted.
Slevin said circulators had been instructed to obey the law.
But one disgruntled circulator said they had not known the rules. "Everyone in the mission was just passing them around from person to person," said Michael Reed Jr., 21, who said he had not been paid.
Under Pennsylvania law, only registered voters may sign ballot petitions, and only once. Flawed petitions can be challenged in court, leading to a candidate's removal from the ballot.
Democrats plan to challenge the petitions after Nader turns them in next week to make sure the signatures are proper.