Voters say McGuire didn't level with them

By GAIL SCHONTZLER Chronicle Staff Writer

Benjamin Bennett said he had a "horrible, sinking feeling" when he read Friday that a young white separatist had qualified as a candidate for the Bozeman School Board.

"I feel so taken for a ride," said Bennett, 33, an advertising agency owner.

Bennett was one of 39 people, living in some of the most liberal voter precincts in Bozeman, who signed the candidate's petition for National Alliance activist Kevin McGuire.

Bennett said three or four Sundays ago, McGuire and a buddy wearing a cowboy hat and long coat appeared at his doorstep. McGuire was soft-spoken, looked nice and neat, and seemed timid.

"I was impressed that somebody so young was trying to be on the School Board," Bennett said. "I asked why he decided to run. He said, 'I want to try to help the School Board evolve and do things for children.' ... He never said, 'I intend to educate children against homosexuals and Jews.'"

In an e-mail to the Chronicle on Thursday, McGuire wrote that he was running to promote white racial identity and pride and to oppose the public schools' acceptance and encouragement of homosexuality.

Messages left for McGuire by phone and e-mail Friday, asking if he had misled petition signers, were not answered.

Bennett said he had participated in the Martin Luther King Jr. Day march. It drew more than 1,000 people, who demonstrated support for diversity and tolerance and opposition to the National Alliance, which had been dropping leaflets in local neighborhoods.

After reading about McGuire in Friday's Chronicle, Bennett called the Bozeman School District to ask if he could remove his name from the petition.

Steve Johnson, assistant superintendent and school elections clerk, said he checked on the law and concluded that nothing would allow changing the petition after it was submitted and validated.

Also on the May 3 ballot are incumbent Sara Garcia and newcomer Gary Lusin. Voters can cast votes for two candidates, and two seats will be filled in the elementary district race.

Ironically, the southside precincts where McGuire got most of his signatures are Democratic Party strongholds. Precincts 33 and 36, with polling places at Longfellow School and the Emerson Cultural Center, voted 67 and 71 percent for Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, according to the county elections office.

Bennett wasn't the only petition-signer upset after reading about McGuire's candidacy.

"I almost threw up my breakfast," one woman wrote in an e-mail, after realizing that she had signed the petition. "Shame on me for not asking important questions!"

Rick Hannula, a Chief Joseph Middle School teacher, said he had asked questions before signing McGuire's petition. McGuire gave him the impression he was an engineering student at Montana State University, although MSU's registrar said on Friday that McGuire is not and has never been an MSU student.

"He said, 'I want to make some changes in the community,'" Hannula said. "I asked, 'Any other agendas?' He said, 'Well, I just want to make some changes.'

"He definitely was less than honest, by omitting what his agenda was," Hannula said. "I felt almost violated, used."

Next time they're handed a petition, Bennett and Hannula said, they plan to ask a lot more questions.

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