Reform Party to Confirm Names of Ballot Recipients

Just three weeks before its nominating convention in Long Beach, the Reform Party said it will double-check the names of thousands of people who received ballots in the party’s mail-in primary.

Reform leaders are investigating whether front-runner Pat Buchanan broke party rules by having ballots sent to supporters who did not ask for them. They have threatened to disqualify Buchanan if he does not comply with the audit.

Buchanan’s sole challenger for the Reform nomination, physicist John Hagelin, had previously offered to audit the lists of more than 500,000 names himself, but party leaders decided late Tuesday to create their own four-member panel and will hire a firm to do the audit. Hagelin’s list of supporters will also be checked.

Michael Farris, president of the party’s nominating committee, said he has received at least a dozen reports of ballots being mailed to former Buchanan contributors, who wondered why they received a Reform ballot. Only people who signed a petition for a candidate, belong to the Reform Party or requested a ballot are eligible to vote in the primary.

“Leading up to the submissions of lists, we have basically trusted the candidates . . . that everybody’s following the rules,” Farris said. “I sincerely hope the investigations will prove that everybody’s following the rules.”

The winner of the primary will be announced Aug. 11 at the convention. Only a vote of two-thirds of the delegates could overturn the results of the mail-in primary.

A Buchanan spokesman declined to comment Wednesday.