SCOTX Candidate Smith Sues Over Election Problems: The Battle For Texas’ High Courts Continues Among Republicans
As mentioned briefly in the From The Blogs post, former Texas Supreme Court justice Steve Smith has sued SCOTX Justice Don Willet to contest the results of the election for Place 2 on the state’s highest civil court.
According to Texas Lawyer, which has a much better take on the situation than the Dallas Morning News, the lawsuit is basically alleging three things:
1.) The final canvass of the primary election results by the Republican Party of Texas does not include legal votes cast for Smith in at least seven Texas counties: Armstrong, Cass, Childress, Dimmit, Kent, Limestone and Lyon.
2.) The final canvass includes illegal votes for Willett in Galveston.
3.) Final canvass does not include legal votes cast in Tarrant and Gregg counties.
A Wikipedia entry on Smith also makes further allegations related to problematic vote counts:
Other irregularities were also alleged in Winkler County in West Texas as well. Official returns gave Willett a 273-0 advantage in Winkler County. In 2004, however, Smith had beaten opponent Paul Green, 468-249, and in 2002, he had defeated Xavier Rodriguez in the county, 260-92. Therefore, the 273-0 tally raises suspicion.
The magazine also has these comments from legendary Texas election lawyer Buck Wood:
Randall “Buck” Wood, an Austin election law attorney who has represented clients in election contests since the 1970s, says it will be hard for Smith to prevail.
“I think it’s a real shot in the dark for Steve [Smith],” Wood says. “I’m not saying it’s impossible. He may stumble on to something.”
Smith filed the lawsuit on March 31, the deadline for him to take action to contest the election under Texas law.
I’m not familar with the uproar about Galveston or Gregg Counties, but you will recall that in Tarrant County, a “programming glitch” reportedly caused some ballots to be counted as many as six times, a problem for which the company’s voting machine vendor, Hart-Intercivic has taken the blame.After the correction of the results, Willet’s lead shrunk significantly. Smith maintains he took more than 38 percent of the vote in Tarrant County.
Via DMN:
“In a race this close, we think it’s more important than ever that every single vote be counted correctly,” said David Rogers, Mr. Smith’s campaign manager.
Mr. Rogers said the lawsuit has a “1 in 5 chance” of succeeding. He said more results would have to change in Tarrant County for Mr. Smith to win.
Jeff Fisher, executive director of the Texas Republican Party, said he did not believe there were any more problems in Tarrant County. He said Mr. Smith’s lawsuit would not change the election’s results.
The lawsuit also says that the Republican Party’s statewide canvass – the final tally of votes – did not include seven counties. Mr. Fisher said there are very few votes in those counties. Gov. Rick Perry appointed Justice Willett to the court in August.
This entire episode is yet another in the continuing saga of Rick Perry trying to influence the makeup of Texas’ highest courts during elections. Further, it’s yet another instance of Republicans trying to fight among themselves to see who is the “most conservative.”
You’ll no doubt recall that, in 2004, Governor Perry endorsed Smith’s opponent now Justice Paul Green, a move that got Perry on the wrong side of the Young Conservatives of Texas. Smith was first elected in 2002, after defeating Perry appointee Xavier Rodriguez, which sparked a bitter Perry/Smith feud Smith has claimed Perry has refused to attempt to repair.
The 2004 election was somewhat ironic for the GOP, as Smith, best known for his role as an attorney in the Hopwood case, was endorsed by conservative groups and typical GOP stalwart ogranizations like the Texas Eagle Forum.
Written by Vince Leibowitz
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