Posted on 04/29/2005 7:20:52 PM PDT by Mount Athos
Working from lists provided to them in the aftermath of the troubled 2004 election, King County prosecutors have identified 648 felons illegally registered to vote, officials said yesterday.
Illegal votes from felons play a central role in the Republican Party's legal attack on the election of Democrat Christine Gregoire as governor in November. Gregoire edged Republican Dino Rossi by 129 votes after a hand recount of more than 2.8 million ballots, and the GOP is suing to set aside that result in a trial starting May 23 in Wenatchee.
"The government is making our case for us," state Republican chairman Chris Vance said.
The state constitution bars felons from voting unless they have completed their sentences and paid their fines and thus restored their political rights.
The GOP submitted 891 names of King County residents they said were felons who voted illegally in November, and prosecutors ultimately moved to revoke the registrations of 549 of them. Ninety-nine other revocations were triggered by a 105- name list provided by The Seattle Times. The Republicans sent the county 55 more names Wednesday, prosecutors said, and those voters, too, will be investigated.
In the court case, the GOP has listed the names of 726 King County voters the party claims are felons who illegally cast ballots in November. That number includes the voters challenged by prosecutors so far, as well as the additional 55, Vance said.
The Republicans also have claimed 220 illegal felon voters elsewhere, and 389 other types of improper votes -- mainly provisional ballots counted without the required verification of voter eligibility.
In pretrial rulings in the case, Chelan County Superior Court Judge John Bridges has said it won't be enough for the GOP to show the number of illegal votes exceeded Gregoire's margin of victory. Instead, the Republicans must establish that she owes her win to illegal votes, Bridges said.
The Republicans hope to meet that requirement by applying a statistical formula to the illegal votes, subtracting them from the candidates' totals in proportion to the percentage of the overall vote each candidate received in the affected precincts. Gregoire beat Rossi by 58 percent to 40 percent in King County, so she is especially vulnerable to that approach there.
Click Here But the Democrats say the methodology is not allowed under state law. They'll argue the point Monday in a hearing before Bridges.
The parties also are wrangling in Bridges' court over what the GOP has to show in challenging votes by felons.
The Republicans say it should be adequate to document that a voter is a felon and that there's no record in his file of a certificate restoring his rights. Democrats counter that mere absence of a certificate is insufficient to prove that the felon has not earned restoration of his voting rights. That, too, will be argued Monday.
In reviewing the lists submitted to them, King County prosecutors applied the method advocated by the GOP in the court case. In at least a couple of cases, prosecutors said, voters produced certificates after the challenge to their registrations were initiated.
Prosecutors did not press challenges against 46 voters on the original lists whose rights, it turned out, had been restored. For 283 of the listed voters, no record of an adult felony conviction could be found. And in 19 cases, the registrations had already been canceled.
Registration forms require voters to attest that their rights are not in abeyance, but registrations generally can be challenged only after they are entered.
The information systems designed to guard against felon registrations are incomplete and ineffective, a problem state officials say should largely be fixed by a new voter database scheduled to go online by Jan. 1.
Knowingly casting an illegal vote is a crime. But several felon voters have said they were unaware they could not vote.
dim vote fraud bump
Where am I wrong?
NOPE....not unless we can find out she's broken the law in her business as Governor....
The most likely scenario is that the Dems lose the court battle over this election....and then the Lt. Governor takes over until November, when a new election is held....but a lot of pieces have to fall into place BEFORE THAT HAPPENS!
So .. even if you could tie her campaign to some of the fraud of the election - it wouldn't be a recall issue ..?? She would have to commit some illegal act now that she's technically elected ..??
Where am I wrong?
Just on a technical aspect. Currently it's illegal for felons to vote. When needed the law will be declared unconstitutional by the Democratically controlled state supreme court.
I live in TAxachusetts. We have the good fortune to have Governor Mitt Romney.
Pity those in WAshington. I remember I was so ecstatic when I heard another Republican won the governorship. :(
If Washingtonians really wanted a dem, the Gargoyle "victory" would not have had to have been manufactured. Besides, look at her actions since the "election." The only reason she "won" was because of the huge "turn-out-the-vote" effort by the George Soros-funded dem party. Unless Soros deems the Washington gubernatorial re-election worth his millions, Gargoyle's a goner.
As I discussed before, who would impeach her? The Democrat-controlled state house? Who would find her guilty? The Democrat-controlled state senate? And who would hear her appeals? The Democrat-appointed state supreme court?
To say its an uphill battle is a vast understatement. Republicans should be focused on the 2008 election because they are not going to unseat her.
Now that is truly funny,burzum!
Dead felons get to vote twice.
"who would impeach her?"
Well .. "recall" in not impeachment - which is what I ask.
In CA we have all the same democrats to deal with that you do .. however, we recalled Davis - and we didn't have to "impeach" him to do it.
The tide is turning. Many Democrats realize the election was flawed. I believe history will be made in the next few months by a precedent-setting decision by the good judge in Chelan County.
YEP!
ARTICLE 1 SECTION 33 RECALL OF ELECTIVE OFFICERS.If I've interpretted this correctly (I've only become a Washington resident recently due to moving into the state due to a military obligation--I may be completely wrong) 25% of the number of those who voted in the last election (of those who were registered to vote) must sign a petition stating that the governor has done an illegal act or violated her oath of office.Every elective public officer of the state of Washington expect [except] judges of courts of record is subject to recall and discharge by the legal voters of the state, or of the political subdivision of the state, from which he was elected whenever a petition demanding his recall, reciting that such officer has committed some act or acts of malfeasance or misfeasance while in office, or who has violated his oath of office, stating the matters complained of, signed by the percentages of the qualified electors thereof....
SECTION 34 SAME.
The legislature shall pass the necessary laws to carry out the provisions of Section thirty-three (33) of this article...the percentages required shall be, state officers, other than judges, senators and representatives, city officers of cities of the first class, school district boards in cities of the first class; county officers of counties of the first, second and third classes, twenty-five per cent.
Where do YOU live? If we do not UNSEAT her, the problems which got her elected will be alive and well EVERYWHERE....EVERY city/county/state in this nation SHOULD be watching this.....and, by the way, I DO BELIEVE WE WILL UNSEAT HER....I've said it since November. I live in Washington, the State......and you really have to BE here to KNOW what's going on!
I know one thing, everyone should pay attention to our situation because if they get away with it here the 'rats will try to use our "election process" in every state.
I see you've just moved here.....I'm one of those "originals"......who's been following this carefully...we WILL WIN....Or this nation is sunk.
Forget him, what does the Washington supreme court look like? That's what's going to matter.
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