Getty The Iowa Democratic Party hung up on a precinct captain on CNN.
An official with the Iowa Democratic Party hung up on a local precinct captain as he tried to report election results in the middle of a live interview on the air. You can see video of the moment later in this article.
Shawn Sebastian, Story County Precinct 1-1 Secretary, was speaking with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer while he was on hold with the Iowa Democratic Party. While on the air, the Party suddenly came on the line but that was only briefly. Sebastian then told Blitzer that he was hung up on.
Watch the video:
Unreal. A precinct secretary was on hold on the hotline for an hour and they took him off hold as he was talking to CNN. He didn’t respond fast enough and they hung up on him.
Sebastian said on CNN that the party’s new results app “didn’t work,” so it was recommended he call in with the results. Blitzer asked Sebastian if he had received any confirmation of what was going on. He said he hadn’t and that the hotline wasn’t responsive either. At that point, a party official appeared to come on the line and then hang up.
“They hung up on me,” an incredulous Sebastian told Blitzer.
On Twitter, Sebastian defines himself this way: “Progressive Iowan, @WorkingFamilies, @CCIAction. #MedicareforAll, #GreenNewDeal, #FreeCollegeforAll. Formerly Director of Fed Up, advocating full employment.”
In addition, according to Fox News, during an initial conference call with the campaigns about the delay in results reporting, an official with the Iowa Democratic Party hung up on all of the campaigns, and a campaign staffer referred to the call as “crazy.”
Here’s what you need to know:
Sebastian Says He Thinks the Results are Accurate
Shawn Sebastian
On his Twitter page, Sebastian posted a string of other messages about what was going on in the Iowa Caucuses. “Just want to clarify something: These results are accurate and I believe when we get the results to the #IACaucus they will be *accurate*,” he wrote. “Every person in the room saw every stage, agreed to the accuracy of every count, and there’s a paper trail for every person’s choices.”
Earlier, he wrote:
“I am the caucus secretary for Story County Precinct 1-1. I’ve been on hold for over an hour to report the results. We have 6 delegates
First Alignment
@BernieSanders – 111
@ewarren – 82
@PeteButtigieg – 47
Delegates
Sanders – 2
Warren – 2
Buttigieg 2.”
He also brought up the demographics of Iowa in a tweet, writing, “The technical difficulties reporting the results of the #IACaucus has just caused a delay, but eventually we will find out the results. The real problems with the #IACaucus started before we got in the room. Iowa is a 90% white state.” He added, “So yes, the app, the wait times on the hotline, and the delay in results are all bad. But eventually we will get accurate results. The biggest problems with the #IACaucus are structural, predictable, and baked in before any of us even got into the room last night.”
Democrats Initially Blamed Quality Control for the Delay
GettyBernie supporters at the Iowa caucuses.
At first Democrats said the results were delayed because they were doing “quality control.” That wasn’t sitting well with some people on Twitter, especially Bernie Sanders voters still stinging over how they believe Democratic Party insiders treated their candidate in 2016.
Here’s what the Democratic Party had to say about “quality control” checks, according to NBC News: “We are doing our quality control checks, making sure the numbers are accurate. People are still caucusing, we’re working to report results soon.”
Then came news via a reporter for The Hill that results might not come in on February 3 at all. And they didn’t.
A new Iowa Democratic Party statement then read, “We found inconsistencies in the reporting of three sets of results. In addition to the tech systems being used to tabulate results, we are also using photos of results and a paper trail to validate that all results match and ensure that we have confidence and accuracy in the numbers we report. This is simply a reporting issue, the app did not go down and this is not a hack or an intrusion. The underlying data and paper trail is sound and will simply take time to further report the results.”
NBC pointed out that 80 percent of the vote was in at the same point in the evening in 2016, which was fueling some of the consternation on Twitter by people concerned the process is “rigged.”
Nate Cohn, who is a political analyst for The New York Times’ Upshot page, wrote on Twitter, “…the Iowa Democratic Party saying ‘quality control’ definitely raises my eyebrows. This year, they’re getting all the results for the first time. And I wonder whether they’re finding out that people just aren’t doing this right a lot more often than they thought.”
Around 9 p.m. central time, he also indicated: “By this time, nearly 80 percent of the total vote was counted in the Iowa Democratic caucus in 2016, at least based on the data we have saved from last time.” Here’s how CNBC put it: “Developing: Iowa State Democratic Party spokesperson tells @NBCNews that it is putting caucus data through quality control procedures out of an abundance of caution and currently has no timetable for when any results would be released.”
Security Measures Were in Place to Prevent Hacking in Iowa But the Democratic Party Is Using a New App
Bernie supporters at the Iowa caucuses.
According to the New York Times, for the first time ever in the Iowa caucuses, those attending have to fill out a “presidential preference card” to indicate who they want; the cards, The Times reported, are “individually numbered and have other security features,” so there’s a “paper trail” of results.
The Times added that the Iowa Democratic Party is using a new app that was described as a “fancy calculator,” to help tabulate results, which are then sent to the HQ of the Iowa Democratic Party. Once those results come in, according to the Times, they are reviewed for outliers and anomalies.
Sure enough, Democratic officials told CBS News of the delay in results that “officials are combing through the information coming from the caucuses for any discrepancies that could be related to human error.”
READ NEXT: Iowa Caucuses Live Results.