Why Did David Nichols Speak Out On Facebook And In E-Mails About Tomblins SOS File? by Jack Swint.
More information is coming out of the WV Secretary of States Office after we reported of a confidential inside source who provided documents that reportedly linked acting Governor Earl Ray Tomblin to business partners with questionable national political fundraising ties across the globe.(see links below)
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It appears that these stories have struck a sour note with David Nichols, who reports directly to SOS Natalie Tennant. His public speaking out on both Facebook and in E-mails may be walking a fine ethics line for himself and Tennant since this man is the states “Election Manager” here in WV. David Nichols is speaking out in Tennants defense claiming that the documents in question (found in Earl Ray Tomblins file) are nothing more than human error.
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Why would the state elections manager even speak out on problems in the WV state corporations divisions?? Did Natalie Tennant know what he was doing and or did she put him up to it?
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Nichols began posting Facebook comments onto longtime Democratic Party Member Margaret Kerr Beckwith’s account. Mrs. Beckwith had posted a link to our story about Tomblin and the SOS office. Several of her 600+ friends had already written remarks on her Facebook story when Nichols began by sarcasticly commenting on Tuesday, March 15th at approximately 6:11pm. “My, my...look how much trouble can be caused when one document out of 100,000 gets indexed and attributed to the wrong person.”
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As the next 24 hours passed, he made a total of 5 postings on Beckwiths Facebook still using his own name and discussing the Tomblins documents linking the governor to “International Network Solutions LLC.” This author replied to his postings on Beckwiths Facebook. Then direct e-mail correspondence began in which Nichols elaborated in detail to what he felt caused the records to be placed in Tomblin’s personal business file at the SOS office.
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In short, here is what Nichols claims to have occurred:
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“…This is not an official response from the SOS office. As you pointed out, I work in the Elections Division. I was made aware of the situation last week by the Director of the Corporations Division. She explained to me that it was an indexing error. Their process for dealing with hard copies is much the same as I work with hard copies in the Elections Division. When a hard copy of a document is received (corporation documents, campaign finance filings, candidate certificates of announcement) it is scanned into the system as PDF document. The system itself does not read the information on the document.
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In order to connect it to a corporation or individual, a SOS employee must bring up that document and index it to the corporation or individual. If the document gets indexed incorrectly a search of our database will return documents that may not be truly connected to that search.” (Thus the disclaimer at the bottom of the search page)
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Nichols goes onto explain that these types of errors also occur in the election division. “This actually happened with a couple of candidates/PACs in the 2010 election cycle. At each of the 6 campaign finance disclosure filing periods, my division receives around 700 filings. We have a very short amount of time to scan, index and post those documents to the website. My staff is very good, but sometimes errors occur. It is human nature. We did have at least one instance last year in which one candidate's filing was indexed to another's. Once the error was pointed out to us, we corrected it.”
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When asked about the odds that the INS records could incorrectly end up in the acting governors personal business files; Nichols said, “I look at the fact that it happened to Tomblin to be more proof that can happen to anyone. And I don't mean to imply that this is the ONLY error in 100,000 records. Humans are involved and people make mistakes. There is no particular malice involved. People just make mistakes. Running a database search for John Q. Public (where John is anyone who has filed paperwork) could return an error. If you have filed this type of paperwork it could happen to you.”
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I replied, “If the SOS feels that is what occurred,(just an error) maybe she should have explained in a memo, press release or some type of response instead of just deleting it after so many people had already seen it from the story. That along with everything else looks odd at the least. But, that’s not my call.” Nichols agreed but also said that, it was not his call to do so either.
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No Expectation For Privacy or Anonymity
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Throughout the exchange of Facebook comments, and then subsequest E-mails between WV News and Nichols, he never asked for anonymity for his opinions and writings. In fact, he made it a point to makesure his name and job title were known. He knew, or should have known that his comments on Margaret Kerr Beckwiths account would be read by anyone of her 600+ online friends and their friends and so on and so on. His writings were also read by members of both the Democratic and Republican Party of WV.
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Our last correspondence with Nichols was to notify him that we were going to update the story and explain that the SOS office claimed the business files that ended up in Tomblins personal business SOS file was allegedly just an “index” error.
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Then, in his final e-mail response on Wednsday, March 16th at 8:40pm Nichols turned direction and wanted to be annonymous.
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“Just please don't attribute anything to me. I am not authorized to talk with media about anything without prior approval and I most certainly didn't have that in this case. As a matter of fact, I would probably be in big trouble if the communications division knew I had spoken to you at all. I just have trouble on occasion with keeping my big trap shut.”
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In Closing
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First, keep in mind that David Nichols reports directly to Secretary of State Natalie Tennant, who is also a candidate for WV Governor in the upcoming election. There is already a grey area insomuch as Tennant is both running for governor while still the chief election officer in the state. As it stands, she can not have any direct involvement in the election process (which includes even being allowed in the same area votes are being cast or counted.) So who takes her place? David Nichols??
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Here you have the state election manager speaking out in defense of the SOS about information that is not even related to his department. He openly wrote about errors that also occur to candidates in the election process. Next, he agrees with this author that even though it isn’t his decision, Natalie Tennant should have explained in a memo, press release or some type of response instead of just deleting it after so many people had already seen it from the story.
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Nichols knew that he shouldn’t have been discussing/commenting on what did or did not cause the “International Network Solutions LLC” documents to be placed in Tomblins SOS file. He actually admits it...“I am not authorized to talk with media about anything without prior approval and I most certainly didn't have that in this case. As a matter of fact, I would probably be in big trouble if the communications division knew I had spoken to you at all. I just have trouble on occasion with keeping my big trap shut.”
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We stand behind our related stories (links below) and the facts presented. At the least, David Nichols confirms that the documents in question were indeed in Earl Ray Tomblins SOS file and then removed after our story. How the documents really ended up in Tomblins SOS file is not yet known.
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Finally
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As we reported last week, several prominent politicians and state officials voiced their concern about Natalie Tennant’s ability to effectively run the Secretary of State’s Office. Now, one of those same elected officials could only say…
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“Why on earth would the Election Manager even get involved in something that happened in the Corporation Division? Did Tennant put him up to it?”
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End Of Story
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Jack Swint - Publisher
WV News
WestVirginiaNews@gmail.com
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NOTE: If anyone would like a PDF copy of Nichols Facebook comments and or e-mails please send your request to: WestVirginiaNews@gmail.com
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Links
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Original Story On Earl Ray Tomblin
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Story On Secretary of State Deleting Documents
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Help Us Keep Reporting Government & Corporate Corruption In WV.. Make A ..Donation ..To WV News (lick on link)
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