Supervisor of Elections: Member of 'Dean's Dozens,' MacKenna, grabs early lead
By JEFF TESTERMAN
Published September 1, 2004
TAMPA - Howard Dean backer Rob MacKenna, one of two proponents of paper trail electronic voting, had the early lead over Steven Henley on Tuesday night in the race for the Democratic nomination for Hillsborough supervisor of elections.
"If this lead holds up, it's a real testament to the message we've been trying to get out that every vote counts," MacKenna said Tuesday night.
The primary winner faces Republican incumbent Buddy Johnson on Nov. 2.
The platforms of both Democrats were strikingly similar. MacKenna and Henley both stressed the need for a verifiable paper trail for the county's touch screen voting machines, purchased since the disputed 2000 presidential election.
Both candidates favored increasing voter registration and improving voter turnout by expanding early voting.
The differences seemed to boil down to recent experience each brought to the race.
MacKenna, 33, a computer systems designer with Eckerd Corp., was Florida organizer for Howard Dean's campaign for the Democratic nomination for president. When Dean's campaign failed, MacKenna became one of "Dean's Dozens," candidates for local office who had the endorsement of the former Vermont governor's political machine.
Henley, 37, a technical analyst for Syniverse Technologies, a Tampa telecom company, emphasized his involvement with Free Venezuela Inc., a nonprofit that promotes awareness of political issues in the South American country. Henley said he gained experience this year as an official observer of Venezuelan elections, where paper trail producing Smartmatic machines were used.
Henley, who qualified to run by petition by collecting more than 6,000 electors' signatures, used personal loans to help finance his campaign and outspent MacKenna by almost 2 to 1.
MacKenna won the endorsement of local editorial boards, including those of the St. Petersburg Times, Tampa Tribune, Florida Sentinel Bulletin and La Gaceta.
