BY BRIDGET THORESON
Journal Times | Posted: Monday, June 16, 2008 12:00 am
A local Democratic delegate is standing by her announcement that she will vote for Sen. John McCain in November.
Deb Bartoshevich of Waterford, Racine County's lone Clinton delegate to the national convention, said she was surprised by the huge reaction given to her comment, which was reported on a newspaper Web site Friday.
"I just didn't expect it to be like this," Bartoshevich said. "It's been nonstop."
A dramatic response came from the Wisconsin Democratic Party on Friday night, when state party members voted at their convention to challenge her status as a delegate to the Denver convention in late August, when Illinois Sen. Barack Obama is expected to get the party's presidential nomination.
The resolution said Bartoshevich violated a Democratic National Committee rule requiring delegates to support the party's nominee and not any other candidate, and asked the national party's credentials committee to refuse to seat her at the
convention.
If the move is approved, Democratic aides said she would be replaced by an alternate who already had been elected.
"It's extremely important that we send a message that Democrats in the state of Wisconsin will never support somebody who supports John McCain for president," state party chairman Joe Wineke said to cheers among the hundreds of party activists.
Bartoshevich, who was unable to attend the state convention, read that party members had voted to strip her of her status. She has been contacted by attorneys specializing in political law looking into whether that could happen, she said.
"Understandably, there are people that are upset with me," Bartoshevich said. "I had thought that Hillary was the better candidate, but everybody's entitled to their own opinion."
Bartoshevich said she continues to support Clinton, who she will vote for at the convention.
"I'm very dedicated to her," she said. "I support my candidate that I was selected to be a delegate for."
Since Friday's announcement, Bartoshevich said she has been inundated with e-mails and phone calls from the national press, from other delegates and from people who have expressed their support.
She said she hoped this year's tight race makes the party re-examine its selection process.
"I just think the Democratic process for selecting a nominee is flawed," Bartoshevich said. "I don't think anybody in the Democratic Party believed that it would be this close."
For now, she said, she just has to wait and see whether her spot at the convention will be taken away.
"Everybody has the right to change their mind. Everybody has the right to express how they feel," Bartoshevich said. "This is why we live in America, this is what we call democracy."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.