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HomeNewsArchivesWhat the Web Revealed (Or Didn't) About the Delegate's Race

What the Web Revealed (Or Didn't) About the Delegate's Race

From my perch here in Arlington, Va., I was curious as to who is running against Donna Christensen for the V.I. delegate’s seat. I decided to see what I could learn without lifting a phone or flying to the islands; instead I would check on my computer.

This is what I found.

There were four candidates in one listing. I started with a Congress-focused web site called Congress.org. It has lists of all the candidates for all the seats in both the House and the Senate all over the nation. I clicked on the U.S. Virgin Islands and got the full list of all four candidates, but the uneven nature of the race was immediately evident.

There was a photo of Christensen, the Democratic candidate, and links to her profile, contact data and issues material. There was a similar treatment from Vincent Danet, the Republican candidate, but instead of a picture there was this notation “Photo Currently Unavailable.” As to the other two there were just these notations: Guillaume Mimoun (No Party) and Jeffrey Moorhead (No Party) and no pictures of either.

Three in another. Since candidates for office these days typically have websites, I checked with Google. I found them for Ms. Christensen, Mr. Danet (with a picture and substantial text), and Mr. Mimoun (with a nice video). In this one Mr. Mimoun was identified as the Green Party candidate. But no webpage for Mr. Moorhead, though there was lots of material on a former GOP member of the House from California, Carlos Moorhead.

Only two made FEC financial disclosures legally required of all federal candidates who receive more than $5,000.
Then I checked with the Federal Election Commission website to see what the candidates had done in reporting contributions. Just two were listed, Ms. Christensen, with net receipts over the 2009-2010 election cycle of $214,841 and disbursements of $191,948; and Mr. Danet, reporting $4,090 and $4,040 in the same categories; the other two either did not raise any money, or were ignoring the reporting laws.

None. The ever reliable Election system of the U.S. Virgin Islands, a governmental entity that I showed in an earlier report spends twice as much per voter to run elections as does the system here in Arlington, had no electronic information at all.
“Www.vivote.gov is currently under maintenance. We should be back shortly.”

That was the e-message on Oct. 6.

Editor’s Note: The Source attempted to contact Elections Supervisor John Abramson Jr. for an explanation of why the site is down less than a month before the election. Abramson was unavailable for comment.

Editor’s note: This has been updated to indicate only two candidates made FEC financial disclosures legally required of all federal candidates who have received more than $5,000, clarifying and correcting its original text suggesting only two candidates meet legal requirements.

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