SEIU Members Allege Election Fraud

These days, whenever we hear about "election fraud," it is usually used in the same sentence as the word ACORN. However, now, a local union of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU)--the same union that is seemingly joined at the hip with ACORN--is being accused of "[m]ultiple violations of law and irregularities" in an election to choose the local's leadership.

According to blogger Adios Stern:

the folks down at SEIU 221 had themselves an election. Boy was it a doozy, too. Out of a total voting population of 7600 or so eligible members, only 750 (that's roughly 9% of all eligible members) decided to cast a ballot. The results, not surprisingly, favored the incumbent Stern-appointed president and her slate...

However, that is not the end of the story. A group of SEIU members are calling for a new election stating (in part):

Many members did not receive mail ballots, notice of election, and/or the candidate statements voter information booklet, which were supposed to be mailed to all members of Local 221. Many members who did not receive said election materials report that they have not changed their address and have received other mailings from SEIU Local 221, including a mailing done by the Unity Slate to campaign for this election. Mailings for candidates/slates were done by Select Mailing, using member name and address data provided by Local 221.

Matthew Fitch stated in an email of July 22, 2009, that 7137 mail ballots were mailed out (fewer than the 7,692 members reported in the local’s 2008 LM-2) and that 652 of these were returned by the post office. Thus, it appears that 1207 members in good standing did not receive a mail ballot. It is likely that these same members also did not receive the mailed notice of election and did not receive the mailed candidate statements voter information booklet (which also contained the notice of in-person polling locations and their dates and hours of operation). With only a total of 750 ballots cast, this 1207 number would clearly be determinative of the outcome.

To read the entire post, go here.

It seems the union doesn't fall far from the ACORN in this case.