Two voters are attempting to use the judges as a tool to compel Butler County to accept the new” cured” vote after the Pennsylvania State Department allegedly gave the alleged voter instructions to do so via temporary poll.
The RNC is requesting an intervening as a participant in the case along with the Pennsylvania GOP. According to the processing, the two citizens want Butler County to permit them and others to” curate their mail-in vote, which they allege were deficient in Pennsylvania law.”
The petitioners filed a lawsuit against Butler County after the state rejected their mail-in ballots because they lacked the required privacy envelope and refused to accept their temporary ballots. A vote must be counted using the confidentiality letters provided by state laws.
The RNC claims that the Department of State has taken it upon itself to formally urge electors to correct ballots that were rejected because they perceived there to be no secret box and to appear in person and cast a provisional ballot.
Butler County rejected the “illegitimate” temporary vote, according to the filing.
In Pennsylvania Democratic Party v. Boockvar, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania declared in 2020 that mail-in ballots without the privacy box irrelevant. This choice allowed counties to treat “certain deficiencies in their mail- in ballots if they are so inclined” but, as the filing summarized,” no court … you need them to perform so”. Just the state government can make such a condition via policy, the RNC argues.
The Board has already taken into account the matter, developed a plan governing the problems it will eliminate, and has determined that the lack of a privacy packet is not something that can be fixed, according to the filing. This is exactly what Petitioners want from the court.
The county elections bureau” shall not send the Ballot back to the Voter or issue the Voter a new Ballot due, to]a ] Deficiency” in the mailed ballot (emphasis added ) is stipulated in a copy of Butler County’s ballot curing policy attached to the filing.
According to the plaintiffs, the Butler County Board should be required to” cure legally deficient vote by counting illicit provisional vote.”
RNC Chairman Michael Whatley stated in a statement that” Butler County does not permit ballot curing for ballots that do n’t adhere to the required secrecy envelope.”
” If a voting is not officially cast, it should not be counted”, he added.
The Pennsylvania State Department has a history of defying poll regulations.
Acting Acting Secretary of the Commonwealth Leigh M. Chapman claimed that the Supreme Court’s ruling did no “in any approach” have an impact on the lower court’s decision in 2022 after the Supreme Court invalidated a lower court’s ruling that improperly allowed unpublished mail-in vote to be counted.
We anticipate that counties will continue to follow their legal vote requirement, she said in a speech.” It provides no explanation for counties to eliminate vote based on a slight mistake.
The Pennsylvania vote prosecutor Linda A. Kerns claimed at the time that Chapman’s training “defies the Election Code written by the government and signed by the chancellor.”
By enforcing instructions that citizens who needed to give proof of identification could do so up to nine weeks after Election Day, former Secretary of the Commonwealth Kathy Boockvar bucked state law during the 2020 election. Six weeks after the election, state legislation mandated a limit.
Judge Mary Hannah Leavitt later criticized Boockvar for abusing the guidelines that she gave him in order to” change the deadline” for some electors to verify proof of identification.
The Federalist’s election journalist, Brianna Lyman.
