The Bernie Sanders campaign is building its own independent system to report the Iowa caucus results, aides said, because of concerns about Microsoft’s influence and questions about how the technology will work.
“Our bigger concern now is rolling out a new technology when we’re in the middle of an election,” Jeff Weaver, Sanders’ campaign manager told CNN on Thursday.
Microsoft has partnered with the Iowa Democratic and Republican Parties to provide technology for both to report their caucus results. Microsoft said Thursday that the results would be accurate and non-partisan.
The Clinton campaign is also building a backup reporting system, MSNBC reports.
“The Iowa Caucuses provided a unique, non-partisan opportunity to use technology to help evolve the reporting process. Microsoft is providing technology and services solely to administer and facilitate a neutral, accurate, efficient reporting system for the caucuses,” Microsoft spokeswoman Monica Hopkins said in a statement. “We are proud to partner with the Iowa Democratic and Republican parties to ensure accurate results on caucus night.”
Pete D’Alesandro, who is working for Sanders in Iowa, told MSNBC that they were suspicious of how a corporation might respond to an anti-corporate candidate like Sanders and wanted to be able to verify the results for themselves.
“It’s just a way that our folks can have an app that we trust to get the numbers to us in a timely fashion,” D’Alessandro said. “I’m always going to be more for sure on the stuff that my people had control over the entire time. … If there are any problems, we can spot them right away.”