Election officials receive citations
OCEAN SHORES, Wash. – All of the state’s elections officials have received citations to testify in the court challenge of the election of Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire.
A Grays Harbor County sheriff’s deputy handed out the citations Wednesday to all of the county auditors at the hotel where they were holding their yearly conference here.
Secretary of State Sam Reed received his citation Tuesday, according to his office.
Though the citation tells county auditors and the secretary of state to show up at the start of the election challenge trial on May 23, most will not have to attend.
The citation is a formality required by the state’s election contest law, which dates back to the 1880s, said Assistant Attorney General Jeff Even, who is representing the secretary of state in the election challenge.
“Very few if any will actually be required to be there,” Even said Wednesday. The citation, he said “is an oddity because of the age of the statute.”
The clerk of the Chelan County Superior Court said 41 citations were sent – to all the county auditors, Reed, King County Elections Director Dean Logan and King County Elections Superintendent Bill Huennekens.
The people who will have to appear in person at the trial will get a subpoena later on, Even said.
The trial before Chelan County Superior Court Judge John Bridges in Wenatchee is expected to last two weeks.
Republicans say they’ve identified more than 1,000 illegal votes – mostly felons, but also unverified provisional ballots and a few from dead voters.
Democrats have their own list of illegal votes. Republican opponent Dino Rossi is challenging Gregoire’s 129-vote victory in the November election.
Rossi, a former state senator and real estate investor, won the first count and a machine recount. But Gregoire, formerly the state’s attorney general, won a final, hand recount of 2.9 million ballots.
The state Republican Party intervened on Rossi’s side and the state Democratic Party intervened on the state’s side, defending the election.
Republicans are focusing on King County, the state’s most populous, where election officials have acknowledged that they let some people vote illegally while not counting other, legal votes.