GOP using auto calls, Dem leader says
2006-10-03
Source: Billings Gazette
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rss feedThe head of the Montana Democratic Party said he received an illegal automated phone call from a Republican group, igniting an issue that has been percolating since early in the 2006 Senate race when Democratic candidates placed such calls.
Dennis McDonald, chairman of the Montana Democrats, said he received an automated call known as a "robo-call" urging him to vote for Republican candidates by absentee ballot. McDonald said it was obvious to him the caller was a machine, not a person.
The call came around the time last month when Montana Republicans were running paid, live calls encouraging absentee voters to vote for Republican candidates.
Brock Lowrance, a spokesman for the Montana Republican Party, said the party paid for actual phone calls. Jeff Larson, of FLS, the company contracted to make the calls confirmed to the Gazette State Bureau that the Republicans paid for and received live calls, not robo-calls.
"The Montana Republican Party does not do auto-dial calls," Lowrance said. "We don't do it. It's illegal and we follow the law as compared to admitted law breakers Jon Tester and John Morrison."
Automated political phone calls have been illegal in Montana since 1991, although the law is rarely enforced. No one has ever been charged with breaking the law, although thousands of political automated calls have been placed in Montana since the law passed.
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