BY INDEPENDENTS WHO CIRCULATED PETITIONS
by Stacy Wiedmaier
A website published Aug. 16 is alleging irregularities in the collection of nominating petition signatures for four independent Platte County candidates on the November ballot — Dale Brouk, Kevin Robinson, Holly Cayer and Chris Kendall.
Each have been certified as independents after withdrawing from the Republican primary, then gathering enough voter signatures to be placed on the November general ballot with no party affiliation.
Brouk is running for presiding commissioner, Robinson for auditor, Cayer for collector and Kendall for treasurer.
It is not clear who launched and is operating the website, no group has publicly claimed ownership. The site calls for residents to contact candidates running against the four petitioners, raising questions about its political connections.
Platte-research.com accuses both the candidates and the people who circulated their petitions of “signature harvesting” and notes that 570 of the signatures, or about 11.5%, submitted by the candidates were collected at six local senior-living facilities, including a memory-care unit. It questions whether some residents of the facilities fully understood what they were signing. The site says the average age of signers was above 80, with the memory-care residents averaging approximately 85.
The site also alleges other irregularities, including duplicate signatures, discrepancies in names and dates and petition affidavits that were notarized but not signed. It is divided into seven separate pages, including: overview, evidence, people, “Vernon’s Story,” investigations, documents and timeline.
The site particularly focuses on Melissa Moran, Brouk’s campaign manager and a senior-care business owner. It says Moran collected and swore affidavits for 976 signatures, exactly 244 for each of the four candidates and that 42% of the signatures she collected came from senior facilities.
The site also says 84 residents signed petitions for all four candidates during the same sitting. It argues that some of the signatures appear visibly unsteady, but that none of the petition pages used the procedure Missouri law provides for voters who cannot sign their names themselves.
Moran, who said she has hosted events in senior communities for the past 18 years, said the visits began as civic engagement gatherings planned months earlier.
“The plan was to go to the communities to make sure our older adults are registered to vote and were included in this important civic process,” Moran said. “They live vibrant lives and have always been a significant part of elections. They’re among the highest population that votes.”
Moran told The Landmark this week that, “memory care communities were not invited nor participated, as they have separate secured entrances, dining rooms, activities and staff.”
There is a disclaimer at the bottom of each Platte-research.com webpage that states, “Everything on this page described as a record fact appears on the face of documents filed with the Platte County Board of Election Commissioners, or on correspondence actually sent to the officials named. The allegations quoted above are exactly that — allegations referred to law enforcement and state agencies for investigation. No charges have been filed and no agency has announced findings.”
The site publishes, in full, Platte County resident Rachel Kautz’s July 26 letter to Platte County Prosecuting Attorney Eric Zahnd “requesting a criminal investigation into exploitation of elderly and vulnerable persons, forgery and false signatures and election fraud through false affidavits.”
The site states that “criminal referrals have been made” to three additional state agencies, including the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, the Missouri Secretary of State and the Missouri Attorney General’s Office.
The site also notes that the Platte County Federated Republican Women have sent their own letter to Zahnd, “signed by all four of the organization’s officers, demanding an immediate and thorough investigation.”
Zahnd responded to this demand by explaining that his office is not an investigative agency.
“If an investigative agency undertakes an investigation and forwards investigative reports to our office, we review the reports to determine whether any laws were violated,” Zahnd told The Landmark. “Or if there was a conflict of interest, we would seek a special prosecutor to review the matter.”
Lisa Cox, communications director for the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, told The Landmark Friday afternoon that she was “not familiar with this yet but am looking into it.” She responded again on Monday saying, “I’ve talked with our team and the attorney general’s office or secretary of state’s office would be best suited to handle this investigation.”
The Landmark contacted the Missouri Secretary of State and the Missouri Attorney General’s Office but did not receive a response by press time.
The four candidates submitted hundreds more certified signatures than required to be placed on the ballot.
In the site’s documents section, 14 exhibits are published showing the “unaltered scans” of pages filed with the Platte County Board of Election Commissioners. At the bottom of this site’s page, it states, “Get the records yourself. Every document on this page is a public record. No transcription has to be taken on faith — the complete filings can be requested directly.”
When reached for comment by The Landmark, board of elections director Wendy Flanigan said Laura Waldon, the Republican candidate for county auditor, made the sole Sunshine request for the documents on July 17 and Waldon received the petition pages July 24. Flanigan said her office has received no other inquiries.
