Kerry backer questions Cuyahoga recount
Thursday, December 23, 2004
Diane Suchetka Cleveland Plain Dealer Reporter

John Kerry's presidential campaign criticized the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections Wednesday night for its handling of the presidential recount and said some parts of that recount should be conducted again.

That won't happen. 
 
The board certified the recount results Wednesday, which means they're official and will be forwarded to the secretary of state to be included in statewide totals.

The new numbers show Kerry beat George W. Bush 448,503 to 221,600 in Cuyahoga County. In the recount, Bush lost six votes and Kerry gained 17.

Board and staff members responded immediately to some concerns raised Wednesday night by George Taylor, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh who lives in Cleveland Heights and who spoke, he said, on behalf of the Kerry campaign.

Taylor, for example, complained that some provisional ballots were thrown out because the signatures that voters used on Election Day were in cursive while the signatures they had on file with the board were printed. Those ballots, Taylor said, should count.

Board member Edward Coaxum said the board has always required both signatures be printed or in cursive.

Taylor also complained that some provisional ballots - ballots cast by those whose names do not appear on voter rolls - had been rejected because election workers determined voters cast them in the wrong precinct.

But Taylor said the board's own records show they were cast in the right precinct.

Cuyahoga County elections director Michael Vu had not had a chance to review those records. He will address that issue and others Taylor raised after the first of the year.

And he reminded Taylor that election regulations say only valid ballots - not those rejected - should be included in a recount.

Taylor disagreed.

"There should be a process for re-examination of every vote that was cast," he said.