Help For Voters

To All Congressional Candidates:

GOTCHA!

Project Vote Smart’s Great Divide Ranch, MT--VoteEasy, a powerful interactive, automated research system that gives each voter instant confirmation on which congressional candidates agree with their own positions on the issues, has begun today. (Link to VoteEasy at www.votesmart.org)

Unknown to the candidates, over the past year Project Vote Smart has applied thousands of research hours examining each candidate’s political history (voting records, public statements, backgrounds and actions) and is now exposing their positions on each voter’s questions, even when they refuse to answer the same questions put to them by Project Vote Smart and national media in the 2010 Political Courage Test. Each position is anchored in the candidate’s own words and public record.

“This is fact-checking on a massive scale and it is not popular with either major party,” said Richard Kimball, Project Vote Smart President. “It is easier to catch a greased pig than it is to catch a candidate with a straight answer to a straight question,” he said. “In fact, one Democratic congressional campaign told us the DCCC would withhold their campaign funds if they provided Vote Smart with answers, while the NRCC had one of their attorneys contact us and threaten legal action if we did not remove their candidates’ positions on the issues.”

VoteEasy converts thousands of research hours into just seconds, enabling any voter in any state to Vote Smart. After typing their zip code, users can answer the same key issue questions their congressional candidates were asked by Vote Smart staff and national media. Then they can watch the candidates squirm as their yard signs advance and recede relative to how the trail of evidence they have left suggests their agreement or disagreement. This candidate match-up helps voters cut through the campaign manipulation and identify the candidates most like them on key issues. If a voter questions why a candidate’s yard sign has moved, they may simply click on their picture and the candidate’s record will be instantly revealed.

Fearing opposition research, most modern candidates now refuse to answer basic issue questions posed by citizens, Project Vote Smart, and major media. “We are turning opposition research on its head to serve the will of each voter,” said Kimball. “Any candidate who thinks our research is in error is welcomed and encouraged to exchange their own answers for ours on VoteEasy.”