Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Illegal votes cast in Macias v Miller race, Macias wants new election

Macias seeks new election in Republican race for House seat: "He says there were several hundred illegal votes cast." There were literally hundreds of double votes:


Macias' attorney said hundreds of illegal votes were counted in the contest, including 253 from voters who cast two ballots.

"I, personally, as former general counsel for the Republican Party of Texas, was shocked at irregularities," said Macias attorney Rene Diaz.

Diaz said the same unique voter ID numbers appeared more than once on the official voter lists from each party's primary. In some cases, people voted early in both primaries. Some voted early in one party primary but voted in another on election day. Other voters cast ballots early and again on election day.
Diaz also claims 44 mail-in votes and three provisional ballots are illegal because they were not signed by county election officials.

The challenge also questions the validity of a Gillespie County ballot box, which the suit claims was turned in to the counting location four hours after polls closed, included a defective sign-in sheet and was counted by an in-law of Miller's.

This is a shocking reminder that ballot security and voter integrity are still issues in elections. It happens. I don't know the details of electoral law, but the right thing to do at this point is to call for a new election.

2 comments:

Randy Samuelson said...

The Gillespie County results are shady. Carter Casteel, who Nathan Macias beat in a close election in 2006, was seen in Fredericksburg at the county election office when the polls closed. The 2006 race got very heated and dirty as Casteel was painted as a RINO and local government spendocrat.

I don't want to accuse Mrs. Casteel of foul play here as she is a former elected official, but because of the past relationship between her and Macias, this election looks shady. I endorsed and attended a candidate forum in support of Macias in the 2006 primary and saw first hand Carter Casteel's temper one night.

MJSamuelson said...

Macias should get his new election - this kind of accusation shouldn't be ignored.