M i t t Report: News, Editorials, Videos, & Bloggers, For Mitt Romney & The 2008 Presidential Election

HUCKABEE BUYING SIGNATURES TO GET ON THE VIRGINIA BALLOT

Mike Huckabee has always been the most vocal about Romney 'buying' his support. At Ames, he accused Romney of buying his support, at CPAC, the same thing. Now apparently Huckabee has taken up the practice of buying support himself and he is now trying to hide it.

On Monday the website Too Conservitive had a post by a Vincent Harris, who is officially "coordinating Governor Huckabee’s petition drive in NOVA," promising to pay those who would work for Huckabee to obtain signatures 50 cents per signature. Just hours later however as the word spread, the language promising to pay money for the signatures was deleted. Luckily, Mitt Report saved a copy of the orginial text. The language earlier in the day looked like this:

"I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend.
I am in the state for a couple weeks coordinating Governor Huckabee's petition drive in NOVA. If anyone wants to help (50 cents a signature!) please shoot me an e-mail to vincent.harris@explorehuckabee.com"

The language now looks like this:

"I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend.

I am in the state for a couple weeks coordinating Governor Huckabee's petition drive in NOVA. If anyone wants to help please shoot me an e-mail to vincent dot harris @explorehuckabee.com"

It appears that Huckabee is buying his signatures and now is trying to cover it up.

For someone who is always boasting about his 'grassroots' support that does not need to be bought, Huckabee appears to be struggling with just that in Virginia. With minimal support of volunteers, Huck is resorting to purchasing each signature. While it may not be unorthodox to pay people to gather signatures, it is notable for two reasons: (1) Given Huckabee's vocal accusations of Romney buying his support, he appears hypocritical; and (2) it signals Huckabee's weak grassroots support and organization.

This is going to be a continual struggle within the Huckabee campaign. The only place he is currently a viable candidate is in Iowa. Due to low funds and low polling elsewhere, he is forced to invest all his limited resources there. His grassroots support and overall organization is mediocre at best in other states and is unlikely to grow much between now and January 3rd which may mean more antics like this in the future.

With the deadline to file the requisite number of signatures to get on the Virginia ballot being December the 15th, and with most of the major candidates filing early this week, it appears that Huck has a real issue on his hands. If he can't find the grassroots support from volunteers, he may just have to offer more than 50 cents per signature if he is going get on the ballot.