Election rules face Supreme Court test Monday

OLYMPIAN STAFF, NEWS SERVICES    12 December 2004

Election workers will return to their tables Monday to continue the hand recount of votes cast for governor of Washington, but the count that might decide the election could come from the state Supreme Court chambers in Olympia.
The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Monday afternoon on the Democratic Party's lawsuit seeking to clarify ballot-counting rules. The suit asks that elections officials in at least four counties be forced to reconsider about 15,000 ballots that were rejected the first time around by canvassing boards.

The Democrats contend some of the ballots might have been rejected improperly.

Both sides realize that in the razor-thin race, the Supreme Court's decision might decide who becomes the next governor of Washington.

"It's a major development," said Mary Lane, campaign spokeswoman for Republican candidate Dino Rossi.

Both parties frame the issue in front of the Supreme Court differently.

Republicans say it's an effort to change the rules after the game has already been lost.

"The issue at hand is do we abide by the rules or do we change the rules midway through the election," Lane said Saturday.

The Democrats say they're trying to ensure that every vote gets counted.

Democratic candidate Christine Gregoire, in a letter on her Web site, said "the Democratic Party has gone to the Supreme Court to fix mistakes that kept legitimate votes from being counted before."

Gregoire said she is not a part of the party's case, but supports the effort.

Her Web site also contains 17 sworn statements filed with the lawsuit from Washington residents who claim their votes weren't counted.

For instance, an affidavit from voter Ronald Taro Suyematsu says he voted provisionally on Nov. 2, then learned that his ballot was rejected on the false premise that he was not registered. The affidavit states that King County elections officials later admitted his vote was wrongly rejected because an employee coded his ballot incorrectly.

According to the Supreme Court's Web site, the justices will review the case in an "expedited manner," but it's not clear when the court will hand down its decision.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Gerry Alexander said last week that he thinks the nine-member court will "go into it with a totally open mind."

"There's some statutes they are citing. We'll have to interpret them," Alexander said. "This is uncharted water for us."

If the court rules in favor of the Democrats, Rossi's campaign will have options, Lane said, though she declined to be specific.

"Oh gosh, we would definitely have recourse," Lane said.

So far, Rossi has posted a net gain of 28 votes in the hand recount, with 17 of Washington's 39 counties reporting results. Teams expect to count nearly 2.9 million votes by Dec. 23.

Rossi beat Gregoire in the first count by 261 votes, then in a mandatory machine recount by 42.

The Democrats paid $730,000 to fund the hand recount.

Gregoire said Friday that "42 votes out of 2.9 million is literally a tie. I want every legitimate vote counted and when that gets done hopefully by Dec. 23 the race will be done, and I will live by the results."