McCotter: Signatures 'Clearly Not Sufficient to Make the Ballot'

Former U.S. Rep. Thaddeus McCotter testified Oct. 11 that he was unaware that photocopied petition signatures for his reelection had been submitted until Secretary of State Ruth Johnson contacted him to inform him he would not make the August primary ballot, according to the Plymouth Observer. 

The scandal thrust McCotter's political career into a tailspin. He quickly aborted plans to run as a write-in candidate after the scandal first broke and resigned his seat in July.

McCotter testified he was on a delegation trip to Hawaii when Johnson and his chief of staff each called him to report the irregularities, the report said. McCotter testified that Johnson told him many of the lines on the petition nominating forms appeared broken and lifted from another source, the report said. 

McCotter was called as a witness, the report said, during a three-hour preliminary examination Oct. 11 for two of McCotter's staffers, Paul Seewald and Don Yowchuang, who will learn Oct. 23 if they will stand trial in the scandal.