Kerry files motions in Ohio recount

On Monday, the Kerry/Edwards campaign filed two motions in support of the Cobb/Badnarik-led recount in Ohio. The motions request that ballots and machines be preserved for evidence of possible election fraud and that a technician for voting machine company Triad Systems be required to give sworn testimony. As I noted in a previous entry, there have been accusations that a Triad Systems employee may have tampered with voting tabulators in Hocking County, Ohio, prior to the recount.

The motions are perhaps most significant not for their substance but for bringing the Kerry/Edwards campaign into the legal fight in Ohio. To go forward, the Cobb/Badnarik (Green and Libertarian candidates for president) legal challenges must show irreparable harm and that there is a significant chance that the case will succeed on its merits. But no recount would deliver an Ohio victory to Cobb or Badnarik. A recount, however, could very well turn Ohio to Kerry’s column, so Kerry’s entry into the legal fray satisfies the success on the merits requirement.

Attorney John Bonifaz, who serves as general counsel for the National Voting Rights Institute and co-counsel for Cobb and Badnarik in the recount, had this response to the Kerry/Edwards motions: "We are pleased that the Kerry Edwards campaign has joined our motion to preserve all of the ballots and election machinery in the presidential election in Ohio and to investigate the potential tampering of voting machines by Triad Governmental Systems, Inc, prior to the start of the recount. We welcome the Bush Cheney campaign joining our motion as well. The integrity of this recount is at stake. All candidates ought to join together in ensuring the proper counting of every citizen's vote."

The Reverend Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, United for Peace and Justice, and other groups are gearing up for a rally in Columbus, Ohio, on January 3 to demand that all the Ohio votes be counted, all voting irregularities be investigated, and Ohio electors not be seated until there is an accurate final count.