A breaking story from Nassau County: County Clerk Maureen O'Connell, currently running for the state Senate, is suppressing an audit performed by the Nassau Comptroller, Howard Weitzman. The audit is being suppressed through some deft bureaucratic maneuvering; under regular procedure, O'Connell's office is given the right to respond to the document, however, the staffer who would craft such a response is conveniently on leave until after next week's election. Until then, she's going to hold it back, as she has been for the last several months.

In short, it's a cover-up right before the election, and O'Connell is crying partisanship by way of defense.

With a week left before the special election in the 7th State Senate District, candidate Maureen O'Connell is feuding with Nassau Comptroller Howard Weitzman over the possible release of an audit that is said to shine a negative light on O'Connell's leadership in the county clerk's office. [...]

The audit's contents are unclear but sources in both political parties who are familiar with the audit say it criticizes some of O'Connell's management abilities.

The sources also say O'Connell has delayed the report for months by claiming that staffers were not available to answer questions related to the audit. In addition, O'Connell said Weitzman's requests to question members of her team would have caused the office to shut down periodically.

Since she took office in January 2006, O'Connell has touted her accomplishments. "I've turned an office around in 12 months that had accumulated a 15-year backlog," she said. "We've brought the office into the 21st century and my staff has done a superb job."

O'Connell's main defense? Weitzman is a Democrat, and she's not; ergo, he must be partisan – as opposed to a duly elected official performing the job to which he was elected – and she's just not going to release his office's evaluation of her performance. The very performance she's running on, mind you.

It's not clear what exactly the nature of Weitzman's alleged partisanship is, or what recourse the voters would have if O'Connell's allegations turned out to be, shockingly, untrue.

In short, there's a long-planned (audits take time) independent report on O'Connell's main campaign selling point, and she's not releasing it. Instead, she's running commercials asking the voters to take her word for it when it comes to her performance. The voters are also required to take her word that the existing independent report is partisan, because there is no way to verify that assertion, either.

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a scandal.