Some Coloradans Angry Over Late-Night Candidate Robocalls
DENVER (CBS4) - A Libertarian candidate for the Colorado Senate is accused of making robocalls in the middle of the night.
Some CBS4 viewers complained that they got a phone call in the middle night that woke them up.
"It woke me up at like 1:25 a.m.," Rebecca Loy said.
Loy saved the message on her cellphone.
"There's only one anti-war candidate in this year's Senate election, Gaylon Kent," the message said.
"I had nothing to do with this whatsoever," Kent told CBS4.
The Libertarian from Steamboat Springs spoke to CBS4's Howard Nathan via Skype. Kent said he has caught lots of heat from people whose phones kept ringing until 4 a.m. on Sunday.
"When I listened in the morning at like 6:30 when my kids wake up, I was appalled that it was a politician," Loy said. "I was pretty sure someone was dead."
"I need every vote I can get and I'm not going to get those votes by annoying people," Kent said. "I value my sleep as much as anybody and I was distressed that people were woken up at odd hours."
Kent said some robocalls went to Philadelphia and Virginia.
"I had nothing to do with this, I did not pay for it, I did not authorize it," Kent said. "I'm a one-man campaign staff, so nobody did this on my behalf either."
Loy said she won't vote from Kent after getting the call.
"I will be honest, the publicity is not bad," Kent said.
The end of the recording mentions the Libertas Institute from Colorado. Their website says, "The robocalls for Mr. Kent were issued by an independent group that was not associated with Mr. Kent's campaign … normally calls are restricted to reasonable hours, however, due to a programming error calls continued through the late night hours."
