Politics & Government

Maher: I'm Victim of a Scheme to Defraud Voters

The democratic candidate for the 13th legislative district says that a survey that went out was used to deliberately confuse voters.

Pat Maher, who received 60 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary for the 13th Legislative seat, says that she is the victim in a scheme to confuse voters that "she is not the democratic candidate."

According to Maher, three days after winning the primary on Sept. 13, a survey was sent out to the district, mentioning herself, Joseph Spinola and Norma Gonsalves, R-East Meadow, as the three candidates for the legislative seat.

Maher said "the survey talked about the Republican candidate Gonsalves in a very positive manner," and at the end of the survey, residents were asked who they would vote for, with Gonsalves and Spinola being the only two options provided.

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In this week's issue of the East Meadow Herald, all of the local races are listed, but the 13th L.D. race features Norma Gonsalves vs. Joseph Spinola -- that mistake has since been corrected in the paper's online edition.

The same day that the East Meadow Herald printed the story online, many of Maher’s political street signs were stolen, she said.

Find out what's happening in East Meadowwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“It’s clearly a scheme to confuse the voters as to who the Democratic candidate really is in the 13th L.D.,” Maher said. "The Democratic voters rejected my opponent in the primary, and the opposition is trying to confuse Democrats and other voters about the general election."

Gonsalves says that this is the first she's hearing of any survey.

"This is the first I am hearing about it," Gonsalves said. "If there was a mistake made, it was probably that the survey was created beforehand and not corrected."

The 13th Legislative District includes the communities of East Meadow/Salisbury, and portions of North Bellmore, North Merrick and Levittown.


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