Beto O'Rourke frequently voted for Republican legislation, analysis reveals

[RandySF]

60. Author Dave Sirota fired from campaign for involvement with racist attack against Latino candidate.

Philadelphia mayoral candidate Dwight Evans yesterday accepted the resignation of his campaign manager and fired the deputy manager after learning that the deputy was linked to a bogus Web site apparently intended to hurt a rival candidate.

Evans, a state representative from West Oak Lane, denounced the phony Web page as an example of "dirty tricks," said he knew nothing about it until after it appeared, and said he had apologized to the target of the ruse, John White Jr., a rival for the Democratic
nomination for mayor.

"I do not want this race to be about race," Evans said during a news conference in City Hall courtyard.

The Web page, which purported to be the official site of White's campaign, highlighted a remark made by White in an interview with Al Dia, a Spanish-language weekly in Philadelphia. The quote reads: "The black and the brown, if we unite, we're going to control this city."

White has said that the quote, drawn from a lengthy interview published Feb. 3, was substantially accurate but did not convey his meaning, which was that blacks and Latinos could wield more political clout if they worked together. The fake site made the statement appear to be the credo of White's campaign. It appeared on numerous pages within the site, in large letters. E-mail messages were sent to journalists, alerting them to the site. Several rival candidates said the ruse appeared designed to hurt White by making him appear threatening to white voters.

White called attention to the subterfuge Thursday, after the Daily News published an article that quoted White's comment to Al Dia and described the page as the candidate's official site. Evans and White's other rivals all disavowed any role in the prank.

Evans said yesterday he had learned that his deputy campaign manager, David J. Sirota, of Huntingdon Valley, was "associated" with the person who registered the site with Internet service companies -- Robert J. Richman, 23, of Cambridge, Mass. The two are friends who were classmates at Northwestern University and who share an affinity for Web design. Sirota, owner of a Web design company, bills himself on his own page as a political consultant and Web guru. He has designed sites for U.S. Sen. Bob Graham (D., Fla.), U.S. Rep. Joe Hoeffel and other politicians.

Evans said he had fired Sirota for "overzealous behavior." He said he believed that Sirota had not created the bogus page but had discussed it with Richman.



http://crab.rutgers.edu/~goertzel/bogusweb.htm