The Monroe County Democrats will not censure Independent candidate for Bloomington City Council Marty Spechler.
The county Democrats considered censuring Spechler during their Aug. 26 meeting because of his move to run for the city’s District 3 seat as an independent.
Spechler, who previously served on the Bloomington City Council as a Democrat, is currently a Democratic member of the Bloomington Township board.
According to Indiana Democratic Party rules, “an elected official who renounces the party or switches to another party may be publicly denounced,” or censured.
Spechler, who refers to himself as a moderate Democrat, made his case at the Aug. 26 meeting.
He says he is not running as an Independent because he is disillusioned with the Democratic Party – only because his preferred candidate dropped out, and at that point, it was too late to register as a Democrat.
He added that he believes the party threatened him with censure because they think he will take votes from the official Democratic candidate for District 3, Ron Smith.
“People – especially in my district, but all over Bloomington – they don’t like this unfairness, this kind of dirty politics,” Spechler says. “They don’t like it. They will vote against it. I know that and they should know that – that this is dirty. This is mudslinging.”
A party news release explained why the Democrats declined to censure Spechler:
“At this time, Mr. Spechler has not labeled himself as a Democrat on his campaign literature for Bloomington City Council, despite previously and currently serving as a Democrat in an elected office. Should Mr. Spechler refer to himself as a Democrat in writing on his campaign literature on his social media page, or elsewhere, MCDP shall consider censure.”
Spechler says if the County Democrats decided to censure him, he would “just laugh.”
