The Nader/Gonzalez Campaign Asks -- Where Was McCain? AWOL for the Senate Domestic Spying Vote
Thursday, July 10, 2008 at 12:00:00 AM
News Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Chris Driscoll - 202-360-3273, chris@votenader.org
THE NADER/GONZALEZ CAMPAIGN ASKS, WHERE WAS MCCAIN? AWOL FOR THE SENATE DOMESTIC SPYING VOTE
WASHINGTON, July 10----Where was Sen. John McCain? In one of the most important Senate votes of the year, he was not present.
The U.S. Senate Wednesday voted for a bill that established new warrantless eavesdropping powers and grants retroactive immunity to telecom companies for cooperating in illegal warrantless wiretapping on Americans; a vote the Nader/Gonzalez Campaign has condemned and urged voters to reject.
So where was Sen. McCain? Why did he miss the vote?
We called McCain's Senate Offices in Washington D.C. to find out and got the following robotic response repeated three times:
"Why didn't Sen. McCain vote on the FISA Bill?"
"He was not present for the vote."
"Was he out campaigning?"
"He was not present for the vote."
"How is he going to register his prior stated support for the bill?"
"He was not present for the vote."
"So you're not allowed to say anything but, 'he was not present for the vote'?"
"No."
A call to Sen. McCain's national campaign headquarters received a slightly less robotic--but still uninformative--response: "I can't comment on Senate votes… You'll need to call his Senate office… He was doing a town hall meeting in Ohio… No, he didn't talk about FISA at the town hall meeting… You can look at our campaign website and at our Senate website; you might find something there."
Instead of being present and fulfilling his responsibility as a U.S. Senator for this important vote, the McCain Campaign put out a statement Wednesday on Sen. Obama's FISA flip-flop, but didn't mention that Obama flipped in McCain's direction, in favor of what we believe to be unconstitutional domestic spying and immunity for telecoms.
Was Sen. McCain deliberately dodging the vote?
Citizens deserve an explanation from Sen. McCain about why a campaign event in Ohio four months before the election was more important than being there for the vote.
The Nader/Gonzalez Campaign addresses these and other issues Obama and McCain have taken "off the table." For a full list of topics, see votenader.org.
