Shenanigans in Washington State Part II

When the Washington GOP stopped the vote of caucus results at 87% and declared John McCain the winner, the action seemed premature. John McCain and Mike Huckabee were separated by less than 2% with Ron Paul right behind both of them. Well over at the Brad Blog, it looks like they are piecing together the story:

And yes, the process overseen by the state's GOP chair Luke Esser "the Suppressor" --- where Huckabee led McCain for the bulk of the day as returns were coming in, only to stop the counting at 87% once McCain took a 242 vote lead --- was anything but transparent.

Seattle's NBC affiliate KING 5 is now questioning the reported vote totals out of Snohomish County:

KING 5 News has determined that there are inconsistencies in the "votes" being counted and reported by the Washington State Republican party.

Throughout the vote reporting process, State Party Chairman Luke Esser has said the party is reporting the presidential preferences of the delegates who were elected at the caucuses. But today we learned that Snohomish County, the third-largest county in the state, reported the preferences of all caucus attendees instead of the elected delegates.

One Snohomish County caucus chairman told KING 5 that the delegate preferences are "dramatically different" than the attendee counts.

The Snohomish County Republican Party does not have the delegate preferences from many of its caucuses and is working to obtain them.

The rest of the piece deals with "Esser the "Suppressor" and his ties to, you never would guess it, John McCain.

Click here to read the whole thing.