Thursday, November 04, 2010

Chelgren Update: Victory in Court limits post election voting.

Earlier today I argued a case in the District Court in and for Wapello County, the Honorable Richard Meadows presiding, on behalf of the Mark Chelgren campaign. 

The Democrat Auditor took the position that she could open the outer envelope of an absentee ballot to determine the date on the affidavit and, if that date was on or before November 1, proceed to count the ballot.

A Chet Culver era Secretary of State manual seemed to indicate that the election officials could ignore the statutory requirements that any ballot received after election day could only be opened if it bore some indicia of a postmark.  The statute is, of course, plain and controlling.  The significance is equally obvious.  The difference between a 25/25 Senate-where our new LG breaks ties-provides us with a chance to redefine the state of Iowa. 

Adam Gregg and Brian Rickert kicked off the show with a damn fine brief on behalf of the Chelgren campaign that was filed earlier today.  I appeared at 1:00 p.m.  Two and a half hours later-the GOP won a major battle.

Our argument was on point and I never felt the result was in doubt.  The local Democrat County Attorney also demonstrated substantial integrity by acknowledging the plain language of IC 53.17 and its obvious application to the facts at hand.

Whether the local Dems (almost all of whom I know personally) would have actually cheated or not is, of course, not the point.  The law was applied and the public can have a greater level of confidence in the integrity of the outcome.

As it stands now, that outcome is a tied Senate and an even greater opportunity to reverse the tide of Eurosocialism than heretofore thought possible exists.

At least until the recount.

2 comments:

RF said...

Maybe you could elaborate one of these days what the "tide of Eurosocialism" you are referring to specifically entails? It certainly can't be the new health law that's based on 90's Republican proposals by Dole & co. I would also be curious to learn what your definition of socialism is.

marked5x said...

1 problem with your commentary. Since the law change regarding the Lieutenant Governor, the LG DOES NOT break ties in the Senate. Remember 2005-2007, 25-25 tie means totally shared control.

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