PITTSBURGH and BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Democratic county officers admit they’re breaking the legislation to overturn Pennsylvania’s Senate election for dropping Sen. Bob Casey.
“I think we all know that precedent by a court doesn’t matter anymore in this country,” stated Bucks County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia, who voted Thursday to depend poor provisional ballots a Pennsylvania Supreme Courtroom order barred, wherein voters didn’t sign up considered one of two essential packing containers.
“People violate laws any time they want,” Ellis-Marseglia stated. “So for me, if I violate this law, it’s because I want a court to pay attention. There’s nothing more important than counting votes.”
As Democrat Casey refuses to concede and hopes a recount will overturn the race known as greater than every week in the past for Sen.-elect Dave McCormick, Republicans allege Dems are additionally violating the Pennsylvania Supreme Courtroom order to not depend undated ballots and people from voters unregistered on Election Day — although they continue to be assured the businessman and fight vet will hold his victory after the authorized shenanigans.
“When counting is done, Dave will be winning by tens of thousands of votes,” Mark Davin Harris, the McCormick marketing campaign’s lead strategist, stated concerning the ongoing depend, which has narrowed to a 22,000-vote GOP lead.
“There is no path for Bob Casey to be leading heading into the recount,” Harris added. He stated the burden of proof is on the Casey marketing campaign to “show the actual math” of the way it can shut the hole sufficient to justify Pennsylvania taxpayers coughing up at the least $1 million for a recount that’s required as McCormick’s lead is beneath 0.5 factors — as a result of the incumbent senator might name it off by admitting he misplaced.
McCormick and his GOP allies have charged Democrats with illegally making an attempt to depend “unregistered voters’ votes.”
“I am deeply disturbed by the efforts,” Harris stated, noting Casey’s legal professionals are interesting to county election boards to depend doubtlessly hundreds of votes forged as provisional ballots after their registration couldn’t be verified on Election Day.
“No one is trying to count votes from individuals who were not registered. This is categorically false,” Casey marketing campaign legal professional Adam Bonin advised The Submit.
“This is a blatant attempt by the GOP to lie and distract from their efforts to disenfranchise Pennsylvanians by throwing out votes from registered voters.”
The Submit obtained paperwork displaying an enchantment by the Casey crew to problem the rejection of 595, 310 and 591 unregistered voters’ ballots in Lancaster, Lackawanna and Montgomery counties, respectively.
The Casey marketing campaign “challenges the rejection of provisional ballots based solely on the Board’s staff’s failure to find voters’ names on registered-voter lists,” the Lackawanna enchantment reads, arguing the election board could have failed to acknowledge eligible voters within the state’s database, the voters could have moved or their registration is pending and doubtlessly canceled.
McCormick marketing campaign legal professional James Fitzpatrick clapped again: “There is zero legal or historical precedent to count the votes of unregistered voters in Pennsylvania,” promising to open litigation towards election boards that “legitimize this frivolous argument.”
“I don’t recall past challenges trying to get the Board of Elections to count provisional ballots for voters who are not registered,” Seth Bluestein, Philadelphia County’s Republican commissioner, advised The Submit, after 13 years of working with the board.
Democratic legal professionals withdrew challenges Friday in Philadelphia after they failed to supply a single voter who ought to have been registered.
McCormick’s crew can be making an attempt to overturn the Bucks County Board of Elections’ “baffling decision” to depend 405 undated or misdated ballots.
The joint go well with — which McCormick filed with the Pennsylvania GOP and Republican Nationwide Committee — alleges Tuesday’s board choice is “legally erroneous” and contradicts a Pennsylvania Supreme Courtroom ruling that stopped Philadelphia County from counting undated ballots simply two weeks in the past.
Fitzpatrick stated a number of counties Casey received — together with Bucks but additionally Centre and Philadelphia — both voted or publicly acknowledged their intent to depend undated ballots in defiance of the high-court ruling.
“We are simply asking for them to abide by the clear ruling of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court,” Fitzpatrick stated throughout Thursday’s name.
The RNC and Pennsylvania GOP are individually interesting to the Supreme Courtroom to dam the counting of undated ballots in all Pennsylvania’s 67 counties.
RNC chairman Michael Whatley slammed Casey for utilizing “scam lawyers” and “anti-democratic schemes” to “steal back a Senate seat which he lost decisively.”
