Report: Journalists at DNC Using Fake Names to Purchase Obama Merchandise

Sometimes, truth is stranger than fiction. Sometimes, it's just as strange. Who knew that just a few days after our colleagues at MRCTV attracted a mob at the DNC passing out t-shirts bearing the phrase "Journalists for Obama" that we'd see a report of journalists actually trying to do the very same thing?

But then again, this is the press that has so overwhelmingly favored Barack Obama since he began his candidacy for president in 2007 that it isn't exactly surprising.

Reporting from the floor at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, Hunter Walker of Politicker.com notes that journalists there have been allegedly giving fake names to official DNC merchandise staffers so that they can purchase Obama-Biden paraphernalia:

Members of the media have apparently been using “fake names’ to buy official Obama gear and contribute to the Obama campaign inside the Time Warner Cable Arena where the President is due to speak in a few minutes. During our travels around the arena, Politicker spotted a souvenir stand in one of the press stands selling T-shirts and buttons supporting President Barack Obama, “Democrats Are Hot” bumper stickers and other official Obama merchandise.

The souvenir stand was in a secure area only accessible to those with a media credential and buying campaign gear means contributing to the campaign, so we asked the woman working the cash register whether anyone at the press stand had been making purchases. Her answers were quite surprising. 

The woman working at the souvenir stand told us she hadn’t been “too busy” during the day, but had seen business pick up in the past half hour or so. She then asked us whether we wanted to buy anything. When we informed her that our status as a reporter means we don’t buy campaign gear, she suggested a strategy other members of the media have apparently used to pick up their Obama swag.

“Have you ever thought of making up a fake name? That’s what the other guys do,” she said.

Buying Obama merchandise at the DNC actually requires a donation to the Democratic National Committee. Giving out a fake name to buy Obama swag is also likely a crime, if indeed it is taking place.