ROYSTON, GEORGIA – A week’s worth of anonymous mailers apparently weren’t enough for those claiming Republican John Wilkinson is part of some elaborate conspiracy by “Former Governor Roy Barnes and President Barrack Obama to sneak a Democrat in to the Senate”.
Voters in the 50th State Senate District were hit by phone at home yesterday by two automatic campaign calls, robo-calls, again from an anonymous source.
Listen to the Robocalls now at our News Talk 810 Facebook Page
The first came just after 2:30 pm. A bad Bill Clinton impersonator claimed he was calling from “democrats for action” with an urgent plea to vote for John Wilkinson because he was only running as a Republican “ cause the district is so conservative.”
There is no such campaign committee or group on record with the Ethics Board. There used to be a non-profit by that name registered in the 1990s but the Secretary of State’s office reports they were dissolved in 1999.
The second call began hitting homes about an hour later. This one featured a woman claiming to be from “Conservatives United” and referenced the early call. “The Democrats sent out a robo-call just hours ago finally confirming the truth…” then they repeated the false claim that John Wilkinson is a democrat that we heard in the earlier call and saw on those mailers sent from Lewis Bailey’s address in Young Harris earlier in the week.
Again, there is no such campaign committee or group on record with the Ethics Board and no such entity registered with the Secretary of State’s office.
The phone number of the first call, 404-567-5455, traces to Sandy Springs in Atlanta but we’ve been unable to track it any further. The number is reported on telemarking complaint websites as having been a nuisance in the past calling for campaigns and other issues. The Public Service Commission regulates the industry and currently has 115 such companies listed. It has to be one of them or someone spoofing a different number to cover their tracks.
The Rick Austin Campaign says it wasn’t them, “It is not from our campaign. We have not done any robocalls on a Sunday throughout this campaign and didn’t do one today. We don’t know where these are coming from.”
Therefore, according to Georgia law, these are illegal robocalls unless they came from “recognized charitable or religious organizations or political pollsters or candidates for public office.”
We’ve heard nothing from the Wilkinson camp about this latest attack however News Talk 810 has learned that similar calls went out in Georgia’s 28th District yesterday as well. Republican Duke Blackburn’s senate campaign has been the focus of identical attacks. Both senate districts are caught in the middle of a power struggle between the Republican Senate Caucus and the Lt. Governor.
