One Ohio Legislative Race Still Unsettled After Recount

Posted on by
1

The election returns are still disputed in one Ohio legislative race. The original count, for State House, 98th district, showed Al Landis, the Republican nominee, defeating Joshua O’Farrell, the Democratic nominee, by 14 votes. After a recount the margin was 8 votes. O’Farrell has asked the State Supreme Court to rule that the results are invalid. His brief identifies many areas of dispute. One example is that one of the two counties in the district accepted absentee ballots in which the voter left the “birthdate” question blank, but rejected absentee ballots when the voter absent-mindedly put “2012” as his or her year of birth, instead of the actual year of birth. See the brief here. Thanks to Moritz Election Law for the link. The case in the Ohio Supreme Court is O’Farrell v Landis, 12-2151, filed December 24, 2012.

South Dakota Law Construed to Permit a Candidate to Notarize Own Ballot Access Petition

Posted on by
Reply

On December 28, a state court in South Dakota ruled that nothing in state law makes it illegal for a candidate to notarize that candidate’s own ballot access petition. As a result, incumbent Representative Brian Gosch’s spot on both the Republican primary ballot, and the general election, was valid, and he is now considered elected. See this story.

In South Dakota, all candidates seeking a spot on a party primary ballot in a state legislative race must submit a petition signed by party members.

National Archives Web Page Has Copies of Certificates of Ascertainment and also Certificates of Electoral College Vote

Posted on by
6

The National Archives & Records Administration web page is posting copies of the 2012 Certificates of Ascertainment received from each state. This is a document that tells the total number of valid votes received by each candidate for presidential elector. The web page is also posting copies of each state’s electoral college vote, as the states submit them. See here.

The District of Columbia’s Certificate of Ascertainment appears faulty. It asserts that the only qualified presidential elector candidates were those pledged to President Obama, Mitt Romney, Gary Johnson, and Jill Stein. Actually, there were also three legally-qualified presidential elector candidates in D.C. pledged to Rocky Anderson, but the Certificate does not list them. Anderson was a declared write-in candidate in D.C.

The State, Daily Newspaper for Columbia, South Carolina, Exposes Inability of South Carolina to Enforce its Own Election Laws

Posted on by
3

The State, daily newspaper for Columbia, South Carolina, explains here that South Carolina has many election laws which are not enforced. For example, state law says precincts cannot have more than 1,500 registered voters, but two-thirds of the precincts in Richland County did have more than 1,500 registered voters. One precinct had 4,029 registered voters.

New York Assembly Speaker Introduces Bill for Early Voting

Posted on by
1

New York state law does not permit voters to vote before election day, unless they will be absent. However, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has just introduced a bill for early voting. The bill would provide such early voting during the two weeks before an election, or one week before a primary or special election. The New York State legislative web page does not yet list any 2013 bills, so the bill number is unknown. See this story. 33 states already have either “no excuse-absentee voting” or “early voting.”

U.S. District Court Hears Oral Argument in Libertarian/Anti-Prohibition Fusion Lawsuit

Posted on by
4

On December 20, a U.S. District Court Magistrate in Brooklyn, New York, heard oral arguments in Credico v New York State Board of Elections, 1:10cv-4555. The issue is a discriminatory law that lets two qualified parties jointly nominate the same candidate and puts such a candidate on the ballot twice; yet when two unqualified parties jointly nominate the same candidate, the candidate can only appear on the ballot once, with both party labels squeezed into the tiny space next to his or her name.

This case arose in 2010, when both the Libertarian Party, and the Anti-Prohibition Party, nominated Randy Credico for U.S. Senate. The state refused to list him twice. The oral argument lasted almost an hour. The state focuses mostly on procedural issues, rather than defending the substance of the law.