Yesterday, Ohio Republican Party Deputy Chairman Kevin DeWine was crowing after ORP's favorite Judge Reagan appointee George Smith ruled for them in their latest lawsuit that is a continuing effort (in a losing cause, I might add) to disrupt Ohio's election process,
"For some reason, Jennifer Brunner does not want these new registrations checked." "Her refusal to comply with federal law raises serious concerns about her ability to objectively oversee this election."
Wrong again there Kevin!
Appeals court sides with Ohio secretary of state
A federal appeals court sided with Ohio's top elections official Friday in her running battle with Republicans over how to verify the eligibility of newly registered voters.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals set aside a federal judge's order a day earlier that Democratic Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner institute the means to verify voter registration information and make it available to Ohio's 88 county election boards.
Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner responds to the court's ruling:
"The US Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has halted another partisan lawsuit in Ohio. Under the Help America Vote Act, this verification process is not and has not been permitted to be used to determine a voter's eligibility.
"However, we have multi-layered, bipartisan systems in place to process and verify every new voter registration. Ohioans and the nation can be confident in our elections system.
"I have personally witnessed the tremendous efforts of Ohio's 88 county boards of elections to prepare for a successful election with a record voter turnout. Ohioans are voting in record numbers and we are already seeing the successful results of our preparation for November 4, 2008."
HIGHLIGHTS OF THE OPINION:
Specifically, we find it striking that the matching mechanisms at issue have been in place at least as early as 2007, yet ORP has waited until now to bring this action, now claiming that the time pressures involved require the federal courts to act quickly in its favor. ORP itself created the sudden rush for determination, and we are not prepared to reward it for forcing all parties into this unenviable position.
...We hold that the district court abused its discretion in issuing the TRO and we grant the motion to stay the TRO.
The National Voter Registration Act ("NVRA"), however, does not permit registered voters to be removed based on computer matching... Indeed, the NVRA requires that "any program the purpose of which is to systematically remove the names of ineligible voters from the official lists of eligible voters" must be completed at least 90 days prior to a federal election. Therefore, it is likely that the district court's TRO would cause the Secretary to violate both HAVA and the NVRA.
Given the fact that hurriedly reprogramming the database could lead to the purging of validly registered voters, we believe that it is in the best interest of the citizens of Ohio that we issue a stay of the district court's intrusive TRO.
Rather than undertake such fact-finding [regarding potential voter fraud], the district court, citing two newspaper articles, merely assumed that there will be wide-spread voter fraud absent the issuing of a TRO. Given the shaky ground on which this voter-fraud determination rests, we believe that this unsubstantiated fear does not warrant the district court's intrusion into the established state practice.
The ORP is desperate to create confusion over the election process in our state. Part of this is as an excuse for their party faithful with their pending huge loss in the upcoming election. The other part is an ongoing smear campaign that Secretary of State Brunner is a "partisan". Right! Compared to Ken Blackwell who was the co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign in Ohio in 2004, Secretary of State, Profile in Courage Award winner Brunner is a partisan.
What's behind this is that Republicans must win the SoS office in 2010 or they will lose control of the State Reapportionment Board that will control the currently Ohio Republican gerry mandered redistricting.
If they don't beat Brunner they will lose the state for the next 10 years at minimum.
Mr. Dewine is predicted to be their candidate against Jennifer Brunner in that consequential 2010 race.