Bush Campaign spokesman Ari Fleischer last week issued a statement that called Palm Beach County "a Pat Buchanan stronghold" (which would help explain the graph above) and criticized the Gore Campaign for making an issue of "these routine and predictable events." The stronghold claim is challenged cogently on the web page of Professor Christopher Carroll of Johns Hopkins University. Moreover, ABC News last week reported:
In an afternoon press release and news conference, campaign officials called Palm Beach county a "stronghold" of Pat Buchanan. They made this claim, according to the release, based on the fact that "16,695 voters in Palm Beach County are registered to the Independent Party, the Reform Party, or the American Reform Party."
An analysis by ABCNEWS, however, shows that the Reform Party, for whom Buchanan is running, accounts for only 337 of the 16,695 registered voters for the three parties.
The Independent party has 16,336 registered voters in Palm Beach and the American Reform Party 22. The Independent Party claims no connection whatsoever to Buchanan or the Reform Party, though a party official says it's possible some members might have voted for him.
When confronted with the facts above, Bush campaign spokesman Ari Fleischer told ABCNEWS the distinction between the Reform Party and Independent Party didn't matter. Pat Buchanan ran as an independent (small "i"), so people in the Independent Party might be more inclined to vote for him, he suggested.
When asked to provide proof there was a connection between the party and Buchanan, or whether Buchanan ever campaigned for Independent Party members, he said, "the press release speaks for itself."