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By Jay Weiner | Published Thu, Feb 26 2009 3:20 pm
Answers are flying in and being reported reliably on the 300 allegedly “illegal” votes that Coleman lawyer Ben Ginsberg displayed to journalists Wednesday afternoon.
Colleague David Brauer Gleaned on it this morning, too.
At the Pioneer Press’ Political Animal blog, reporter Jason Hoppin expands on some reporting he provided in today’s newspaper and reports that St. Louis County elections director Paul Tynjala has an answer to why the ballots appeared a bit goofy, with many seemingly have the same printing styles on envelopes.
Noah Kunin, the recount expert at the TheUptake.org, reported on that site’s live blog that it appears that many of the voters that Coleman has questioned are so-called UOCAVA ballots. Hoppin wrote the same thing.
UOCAVA stands for “Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act,” which allows military personnel and Americans living overseas to vote via absentee ballots.
Kunin reported on his blog: “UOCAVA ballots don't come with the traditional absentee ballot envelopes. They contain a homemade secrecy envelope, voter certificate and a ballot. Those are mailed to the various election units.
“In St. Louis County, they thought it would be a good idea, since those materials come in all sorts of different forms from around the world, to use BLANK absentee ballot envelopes to contain all the materials.
“Then, one City Clerk labeled them all with Names and Basic Addresses so those envelopes would be transferred to the right precinct.”
The UOCAVA application/certificate inside the envelope had the necessary statutory information, Kunin reports.
“So,” Kunin wrote, “bottom line: all those ballots that Coleman said were illegally cast ballots? Were (in all likelihood currently) valid UOCAVA ballots."
Kunin received his information via email from Paul Tynjala, who wrote that the re-writing of the envelopes sounded “like a good idea unless you are in the position we are in now with everything scrutinized so closely.”
That’s for sure.
Later today, Coleman legal spokesman Ben Ginsberg said that not all of the ballots he put on display Wednesday were UOCAVA ballots.
(Kunin said it’s about 20 of that kind.)
And the Pioneer Press’ Political Animal blog agreed.
Ginsberg said the Coleman team received the ballots -- 309 on display to be exact -- via a Data Practices Act request.
“Certainly, the vast majority of ballots we showed were not UOCAVA ballots,” he said. “St. Louis County sent us what they sent us... If there are 20, we should take a look at the 20.”
But that would leave about 289 still in question. Ginsberg said he stands by them as being illegal ballots that were counted.
But it remains to be seen how or if the Coleman side will introduce them into evidence before they close their case. That will now happen first thing Monday morning.
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