Bernie Sanders’ campaign pink-slipped their National Data Director for his role in last month’s controversial voter data breach, then promptly claimed that the DNC was personally involved in the scandal. Now they’re questioning the motives of Microsoft’s partnership with the Democratic and Republican parties for the upcoming Iowa Caucuses.
Break out the tinfoil hats, folks. We’re going all the way down the rabbit hole.
In June, Microsoft announced that it would support the 2016 Iowa caucuses by utilizing a newly created “mobile-enabled, cloud-based platform that will facilitate accuracy and efficiency of the reporting process.” The “first-of-its-kind technology component to caucus reporting” will provide caucuses throughout the entire state with a mobile app for each political party to securely report and compile voter results for tabulation at party headquarters.
Microsoft maintains that their involvement is purely to create a fair, impartial contest:
Microsoft is providing technology and services solely to administer and facilitate a neutral, accurate, efficient reporting system for the caucuses. We are proud to partner with the Iowa Democratic and Republican parties to ensure accurate results on caucus night.
This is elementary brand-awareness activity for a corporation like Microsoft, but Sanders Campaign Coordinator Pete D’Allesandro doesn’t buy it. “You’d have to ask yourself why they’d want to give something like that away for free,” he said. Noting Microsoft employees’ support of rival Hillary Clinton, Sanders’ aides have questioned the Iowa Democratic Party’s decision to partner with the multinational corporation versus a software company based in Iowa.
So of course the Sanders campaign has created its own independent reporting system to double-check the voter results collected and reported via Microsoft’s app.
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