The Week on Politwoops: Macklemore, the Worst Autocorrect Ever and Self-Funding

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An image from a deleted tweet archived by the Sunlight Foundation's Politwoops project. The associated message read: Great meeting @macklemore and @RyanLewis today. Discussed issues related to public service, #equality, and education. http://t.co/UZFNA1anJN
Deleted photo via Politwoops.Sunlightfoundation.com.

Time again to look at the past week through the lens of deleted tweets from U.S. politicians caught by Politwoops.

Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., deleted a tweet after 37 minutes that read “Great meeting @macklemore and @RyanLewis today. Discussed issues related to public service, #equality, and education.” There’s no other mention of this meeting on his Twitter feed and the image seen to the right never reappeared.

Rep. Juan Vargas, D-Calif., made a very unfortunate word choice in a tweet that read “Providing the open remarks at my briefing that brought awareness of the sexual exploration of our children.” He caught this likely autocorrect error and deleted this tweet a lengthy 8 weeks after it sat publicly on his Twitter feed.

Mike Collins, a Republican in Georgia’s tenth congressional district, deleted a retweet of Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee. He faces Jody Hice, a tough opponent with Tea Party support and nary a deletion in Politwoops. Mr. Collins is campaigning on the message to “Overhaul DC” (a plan not detailed on his campaign website), so it’s interesting to see him removing messages associated with the Republican establishment.

Karen Handel, a Republican running to represent Georgia in the Senate, shared that she “Just made a donation to Karen Handel for U. S. Senate” and deleted it after 4 minutes. Perhaps staff was testing the share button on her campaign site or maybe she was more open than she intended about contributing to her own campaign. For self-funding disclosures she can’t delete, follow the latest filings for Karen Handel with the Sunlight Foundation’s Influence Explorer tool. Speaking of funding your own campaign, Vance McAllister, the political newcomer who just prevailed in the special election in Louisiana’s fifth district was sworn in this week and is now listed in Politwoops as a Representative. We’ll add his official House Twitter account when he creates one.

A sampling of the additions to Politwoops this week are the campaign account of Senator Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and George Demos, a Republican candidate for New York’s first congressional district.