Gov. Bush defends Florida elections, calls criticism `nonsense'

BY BOB MAHLBURG

The Orlando Sentinel  28 September 2004

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - (KRT) - Gov. Jeb Bush lashed out at Jimmy Carter on Tuesday, saying the former president was off base in criticizing Florida elections.

In a Washington Post column on Monday, Carter called Secretary of State Glenda Hood and other Florida election officials "highly partisan" and accused the governor of doing nothing to fix it.

"There's this constant haranguing of nonsense, including by President Carter, which is a huge surprise to me because I have admired his compassionate actions in his post-presidency," Bush said. "Without talking to a single person, without getting any information, he joins up with the MoveOn.org crowd, and I cannot tell you how disappointed I am."

Bush also blasted what he called "conspiracy theories" about Florida elections, such as recent reports questioning touch-screen voting.

Carter, whose Carter Center has monitored 50 elections around the world, wrote that America should set "a global example," but instead "some basic international requirements for a fair election are missing in Florida," including impartial officials and uniform procedures.

"The disturbing fact is that a repetition of the problems of 2000 now seems likely," Carter wrote.

Carter said Florida's top 2000 election official, Secretary of State Katherine Harris, was "highly partisan" and that Hood, who reports to Bush, has shown "the same strong bias." Carter said Bush has "taken no steps to correct these departures from principles of fair and equal treatment."

Bush, who chairs his brother's re-election campaign in Florida, said he won't remove himself from a state election canvassing board. Bush said changes in state law made the post "a purely ministerial role."

"If President Carter had actually asked our office or asked the secretary of state, he would have known that," Bush said, adding, "the election will be a fair one."

"If I see a conspiracy, it is an organized effort by varying different groups, including MoveOn.org," he said. MoveOn.org is a grass-roots political group.

Peter Schurman, Executive Director of MoveOn.org, responded: "As far as we know, President Carter is not one of our 2.8 million MoveOn.org members, and we haven't had the privilege of working with him. However, we do share his concerns about the integrity of the voting process in Florida."

A Carter spokeswoman said Carter expressed his views in the Washington Post and would not respond to Bush's remarks.

In the column, Carter also criticized the state's abandoned move to purge thousands of felons from voter rolls and a lack of printed voting records from touch-screen machines.

Touch-screen machines replaced punch cards in some Florida counties after the 2000 election when George W. Bush won the White House by 537 votes. A federal appeals court Monday ordered a judge to hear a suit urging paper printouts for the ATM-like machines.

Gov. Bush dismissed recent reports that electronic voting machines in Hillsborough County are vulnerable to hacking. "That's bogus," he said.

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