NC Supreme Court To Hear Out-Of-Precinct Ballot Issue

[Jane Eyre]

This was just announced today - a Republican challenge over whether or not to count provisional ballots cast out-of-precinct will be heard by the NC Supreme Court on January 18. The vote has been certified by the state Board of Elections already, and Democrat June Atkinson was declared the winner of the state Superintendent of Instruction with a 8595-vote margin of victory.

For those who have not been following the royal mess in NC, there is a major issue with 4000+ votes which vanished into thin air because of faulty programming on a machine in Carteret County. Another statewide election for agriculture commissioner hangs in the balance because the Republican candidate appears to be about 2300 votes ahead, which is less than the number of disappeared vote.

Another reason to worry about this decision by the NC Supreme Court to hear the case: The court has 6 Republicans and 1 Democrat, all elected in statewide elections.

This means that the clear winner of the election, Democrat June Atkinson, will not be able to take office at the inauguration of all the other state officers on January 15. If the Republican court sides with the Republicans on this issue, we are going to have one more crazy issue to deal with on top of everything else and it could cost us a wonderful Democratic office holder. This is outrageous.

http://www.wral.com/news/4018888/detail.html

N.C. Supreme Court Temporarily Blocks School Chief Results

POSTED: 6:04 pm EST December 22, 2004
UPDATED: 7:04 pm EST December 22, 2004

RALEIGH, N.C. -- The North Carolina Supreme Court blocked the winner of the state school superintendent race Wednesday from taking office while it examines whether some provisional ballots should have been counted.

Democrat June Atkinson leads Republican Bill Fletcher by 8,595 votes and would have taken office in early January if the justices had not issued the temporary stay.

The court plans hear arguments on the matter Jan. 18.

Fletcher argues that provisional ballots cast in the wrong precincts on Election Day should not have been counted. His attorney estimated that could be as many as 10,000 votes.

The State Board of Elections rejected Fletcher's arguments last month and certified Atkinson as the winner.

Fletcher sued over the provisional ballot issue and filed appeals seeking a hearing before the results were certified.

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[BeFree]

1. Hmmm

Another "Don't dare count all the votes" republican, eh?

NC is a royal mess. I predict a statewide revote for the ag comm. If nothing else, this will end, once in for all, the use of DREs in NC. The cost of another election will run into the millions, negating any cost benefits heretofore claimed concerning DREs.

And then we have this puke claiming the votes cast by thousands of people not be counted at all. I'd say that is a constitutional violation, and if technically it ain't, well then, it oughtta be. Every elected official should pledge that he or she would never argue for the discounting of votes.

Discounting the votes. Isn't that what they are doing in Ohio, too?

How about we call this year, this election, this fiasco," The year of the Discounted Vote".

[berniew1]

2. Any provisional ballot cast out of precinct means poll work malfeasance!

They should be warned about such the first time and fired the second. Its their job to know the election rules regarding where a person should vote and insure that the voters know the proper precinct to vote in. there was widespread deliberate malfeasance in this election by poll workers who gave out misinformation or did not give correct information on such and resulting in huge numbers of legal voters votes not counting in Ohio and Florida. This is not in conformity with democratic principles and the intent of election rules. There is no valid purpose served by denying a person the right to vote because they weren't sure which precinct to vote in.
There are thousands of uncounted votes in Ohio this years because of this, and this should be reversed.