Judge blasts Blackwell
Secretary of state faulted in provisional-ballot case, accused of failing Ohio
Thursday, October 21, 2004
Mark Niquette
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
A federal judge ripped Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell yesterday for failing to comply with a court order regarding provisional ballots and for "failure to do his duty."
U.S. District Judge James G. Carr in Toledo also suggested that Blackwell risked denying large numbers of Ohioans the right to vote on Nov. 2 and "apparently seeks to accomplish the same result in Ohio in 2004 that occurred in Florida in 2000."
While an appeals court decides the legal dispute over provisional ballots in Ohio, Carr wants Blackwell to give county election officials alternative instructions for the possible outcomes in the case so no time is lost once there's a ruling.
The judge even offered his own language for those guidelines, saying Blackwell can't be trusted to do so.
"I cannot be confident . . . that Blackwell will, indeed, fulfill his obligation to this court, Ohio's election officials, and Ohio's voters," the judge wrote.
http://www.dispatch.com/election/election-local.php?story=dispatch/2004/10/21/20041021-A1-00.html