Russell Pearce: Unfit for public office of any kind

According to a front page story in the East Valley Tribune, it appears that Republican Representative Russell Pearce (LD-19) seems unwilling to let voters have an unaffected vote in their opinion of him. A Republican web site had posted a poll asking which candidate GOP voters preferred for CD-5; Jeff Flake or Russell Pearce. Upon learning he was behind, Pearce sent an email to a "couple" of his supporters (more likely mailing lists) with this subject: "I am behind in the poll," followed by detailed instructions on how to cheat the poll and roll up his numbers. According to the Tribune story, he instructed recipients to "Pass this to people you trust," an obvious recognition that this was not an honest way to participate in an opinion poll. For some reason it took Pearce three hours to realize he "made a mistake." Gee, I would have thought that notion should have crossed his mind at the beginning, but it didn't. Pearce then sent another email asking folks to ignore the poll. Unfortunately (or fortunately, in our view) for Mr. Pearce, that damage has been done.

There appears with Mr. Pearce an uncanny ability to not think, shoot first and apologize later. Voters may recall last year when Mr. Pearce forwarded an email containing quotes from the Neo-Nazi National Socialist Alliance to his supporters and then sending a follow-up email saying it was a mistake. His excuse was "he didn't read it thoroughly." Some people question Pearce's naiveté and there is recent evidence that his connections to extremist groups are more than meets the eye. Now Pearce plainly demonstrates that when he doesn't like public opinion, he drafts his "supporters" to "fix" the election. Is this really the type of person we want in --any-- elected office? Is Russell Pearce the type of representative we want in Congress? Does this demonstrate a person of integrity? Does this show a willingness of Russell Pearce to accept opinions of him that are not to his liking? No, it does not. This plainly shows that Russell Pearce has neither the temperment, the integrity nor the respect for the voters to be an elected public servant.

Attempting to fix an election or a poll is as undemocratic and unpatriotic and is unimmaginable and unforgivable for any public servant. Russell Pearce has demonstrated he is clearly unfit for public office.