COLUMBUS, Ohio - Secretary of State Ken Blackwell said he will do what he can to keep ballots from the contentious 2004 presidential election beyond their scheduled destruction date in response to a federal lawsuit filed Thursday.
In an Aug. 23 letter to Blackwell, voting-rights attorney Cliff Arnebeck asked Blackwell to preserve the ballots in connection with the legal action. He said the individuals and public interest groups he represents have found irregularities and anomalies among the ballots they have reviewed so far, and they want to keep digging.
Federal law says the secretary of state's office is required to keep ballots for 22 months following a federal election.
Arnebeck's sweeping lawsuit accuses Blackwell of violating state and federal laws and the U.S. Constitution by "inequitably distributing voting resources, suppressing votes, and spoiling ballots" in 2004, the letter said.
Last year, Arnebeck dropped a similar challenge to Ohio's 2004 election results after Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Moyer called the evidence "woefully inadequate."
Blackwell, a Republican now running for governor, has drawn criticism for his oversight of the 2004 election ? in which
President Bush prevailed over Democrat
John Kerry by 118,000 votes ? and his simultaneous honorary role on Bush's re-election committee.
He has already supported a thorough examination of the ballots by election officials, outside groups and members of the press, and will not interfere with the group's review, said spokesman James Lee.
Lee emphasized, however, that county elections boards have the final say regarding what happens to the records.
"The ballots were counted, and they were re-counted, the Los Angeles Times even came into Cuyahoga County and made photocopies of all the ballots," he said. "If this group wants to look at the ballots yet again then they can do that, but most everyone in the state ? Democrats and Republicans ? have moved on and know that the results of the 2004 presidential election are legitimate."
Lee said that the lawsuit is based on a faulty understanding of Blackwell's statutory duties as the state elections chief.
"Anyone who is objectively looking at the election system in Ohio knows that we have a bipartisan voting system that is run primarily at the county level, that bipartisan boards determined whether to place individual voting machines," he said. "It's amazing that there are still those conspiracy theorists out there who refuse to accept the facts."
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