Dirty Tricks Mar Wisconsin Recall

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is resorting to dirty tricks to avoid being recalled in today’s election, according to his opponent Tom Barrett’s campaign.

In an email sent to campaign supporters last night, Barrett’s Finance Director Mary Urbina-McCarthy wrote that “Reports coming into our call center have confirmed that Walker’s allies just launched a massive wave of voter suppression calls to recall petition signers.”

The message of the calls was “If you signed the recall petition, your job is done and you don’t need to vote on Tuesday.”

Anti-Walker voter Carol Gibbons independently confirmed the story, telling Salon’s Josh Eidelson that she received a call saying that “if you signed the recall petition, you did not have to vote because that would be your vote.”

Using misleading robocalls to convince even a small portion of the electorate to stay home could swing the entire election. As Dean Debnam, president of Public Policy Polling, said on Sunday: “if Democrats turn out in the same numbers that they did in 2008 Tom Barrett will win a surprise victory. And if they don’t Scott Walker will survive.”

Walker spokesperson Ciara Matthews told Eidelson that

Any accusation that our campaign is making those calls is categorically false and unfounded. Once again Mayor Barrett and his campaign are trying to falsely attack Governor Walker with absolutely no evidence. This is a desperate move by Mayor Barrett to avoid addressing his lack of a plan to create jobs in Wisconsin.

This is not the first allegation of dirty tricks against Barrett’s campaign. Last week, many Wisconsin voters reportedly received spam messages imploring them to call Barrett’s campaign headquarters in an effort to shut down his campaign’s phones.