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December 16th, 2004 6:34 pm
Ohio Justice Throws Out
Election Challenge
By Andrew Welsh-Huggins / Associated
Press
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) - The Ohio Supreme Court's chief justice
on Thursday threw out a challenge to the state's presidential
election results.
The 40 voters who brought the case will likely be able to
refile the challenge.
Chief Justice Thomas Moyer ruled that the request improperly
challenged two separate election results. Ohio law only allows
one race to be challenged in a single complaint, he said.
The challenge was backed by the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Cliff
Arnebeck, a Columbus attorney for the Massachusetts-based
Alliance for Democracy, who accused Bush's campaign of "high-tech
vote stealing."
Claiming fraud, the voters cited reports of voting-machine
errors, double-counting of ballots and a shortage of voting
machines in predominantly minority precincts as reasons to throw
out the results.
Ohio and its 20 electoral votes determined the outcome of the
election, tipping the race to President Bush. The state declared
Bush the winner by 119,000 votes, but counties are in the middle
of a recount - requested by two minor party candidates and
supported by John Kerry's campaign.
The complaint questioned how the actual results could show
Bush winning when exit-poll interview findings on election night
indicated that Kerry would win 52 percent of Ohio's presidential
vote.
Without listing specific evidence, the complaint alleges that
130,656 votes for Kerry and John Edwards in 36 counties were
somehow switched to count for the Bush-Cheney ticket.
The allegations are based on an analysis comparing the
presidential race to Moyer's Supreme Court race against a
Cleveland municipal judge.
But nothing in state law or any previous court decision allows
challenges to be combined, Moyer said.
"Were this court to sanction consolidation here it would
establish a precedent whereby twenty-five voters could challenge,
in a single case, the election results of every statewide race
and issue on the ballot in any given election," Moyer wrote.
Messages seeking comment on the court decision were left for
Jackson and Arnebeck.
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