| At the end of the protracted fight for NY-20, the otherwise-fearless Murphy legal team blinked.
With the number of ballots left to count now smaller than Murphy's lead, Tedisco's lawyers agreed to drop their suits, allowing hundreds of contested ballots to be counted for this election, on the condition that this didn't close the door on Republicans aiming to challenge voters on the same basis at a later date.
This took care of Murphy, but it didn't take care of the hundreds of local candidates in places like Columbia and Dutchess, where there are many second home owners -- a growing voting bloc which is overwhelmingly Democratic.
Many of us on the ground in towns like Taghkanic warned: They'll be back, and we'll have to fight this battle all over again, at huge expense to Town Committee coffers and volunteer energy.
Less than seven months later, that prediction is coming true. Thanks, Murph.
Yesterday at 401 State Street in Hudson, Democrats and Republicans had a daylong standoff over when and how to open absentee ballots. While a team of a half-dozen Republican paralegals and lawyers loafed around, racking up billable hours, Democratic BOE Commissioner Virginia Martin duked it out with her Republican counterpart, Don Kline.
Finally, at the end of the afternoon the GOP went to Republican county judge Jonathan Nichols, who swiftly issued an order to begin the count "immediately," and not stop until midnight; Dems countered by seeking a stay, but were denied. And so at about 8 pm, counting -- or I should say, not counting -- began for hotly contested races in the Town of Taghkanic, and continued until later than 1:30 am.
Today, the count resumes for other close races likely to be decided by absentees, in the towns of Ancram, Claverack, Stuyvesant and others. All of these disputes will wind up in court; and happens could affect voters all over the State.
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As before, the Republicans are raising blanket objections to voters who fit a very distinct profile: Democrats who receive their absentee ballots in places like New York City. (Cue the incredulous cowboys shouting "New York City!" from that old salsa commercial.)
Among those challenged are a retired couple who have voted in every election in Taghkanic since 1972; a man afflicted with Parkinson's disease; and the former head writer for The Cosby Show, who is one of the largest taxpayers in the town. (One wonders if Ciampoli, who is constantly grandstanding about the Founding Fathers, is familiar with that famous phrase about taxation and representation.) Others who don't fit the profile, except that they are suspected liberals:
* An 88-year-old woman, who "failed" to name her doctor on her absentee application.
* A student who "should" have voted at school (the reverse of Ciampoli's position several weeks ago for Bard students);
* The mother of a Democratic Town Board member and local schoolteacher.
The GOP wants the public to believe that hordes of dastardly Upper West Siders and other fellow-travelers are perpetrating a massive voter fraud by choosing to vote from their Hudson Valley homes, rather than from their city addresses -- which most of them maintain for work, while considering the Hudson Valley their true home.
Nevermind that this issue is one of long-settled case law. Courts have repeatedly held that so long as a voter only votes in one place, they are entitled to choose which of their homes is primary. (Imagine 17-home-owner John McCain's dilemma.) The most recent of these precedents was handed down barely a year ago, in "the Bovina case," a/k/a Willkie v. Board of Elections, in which the State Supreme court found:
the inquiry is not which of petitioners' dual residences is "the more appropriate one" for voting purposes, but whether the residence held by petitioners is a legitimate one (People v O'Hara, 96 NY2d at 385). The record herein is devoid of any suggestion that any petitioner herein has attempted to "create an address solely for the purpose of circumventing residency requirements"
Other precedents (cited by the extremely helpful Country Votes site, linked above) are Gallagher v. Dinkins, 343 N.Y.S.2d 960 (App. Div. 1973), Bressler v. Holt-Harris, 330 N.Y.S.2d 565 (App. Div. 1971), Gladwin v. Power, 249 N.Y.S.2d 980 (App. Div. 1964), Geller v. Lasher, 601 N.Y.S.2d 342, 343 (App. Div. 2d Dept. 1993), Iaboni v. Sunderland, 573 N.Y.S.2d 625, 625 (App. Div. 2d Dept. 1991), Umland v. Board of Elections of City of New York, 532 N.Y.S.2d 30, 31-32 (App. Div. 2d Dept. 1988), and Williams v. Salerno, 792 F.2d 323, 329 (2d Cir. 1986).
And of course, the Republicans don't actually object to all second-home voters, but only those who they believe voted against them. A handful of Taghkanic residents who fit the exact profile of the "problem" second-home absentee voter were not challenged by the GOP team, because they are known supporters of the incumbent Republican administration.
In short, the Paroli-Ciampoli team is shameless in its pretense of lodging principled objections to (imaginary) voter fraud, while only applying those principles to people believed to be on the other side.
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So who's bankrolling this effort?
Ostensibly, it's the Columbia County Republican party -- currently led, ironically enough, by local insurance broker Greg Fingar, who along with his brother Mark insure many second homes in the region. But where's the money coming from? That won't show up on financial disclosures for some time, if ever... But the Taghkanic leg, if not the whole bit, is assumed to be backed by an ostentatious banking heir and would-be racetrack developer Alan Wilzig, who has some local legal problems regarding his penchant for clearing farmland for motorcyle racing. Wilzig hopes to solve that problem in part by backing his unctuous personal chef and all-around Guy Friday, Erik Tyree, for local Town Board.
Around 1:30 am last night, the initial Taghkanic wrangle had gone as far as it could without reaching a judge. Only 37 of 123 absentee ballots had been counted, with almost all the rest slated to go to an as-yet unnamed judge. Even though most of the ballots allowed through were those the Republicans assumed would lean their way, the Democrats running together on Row A each picked up votes, by an average margin of 24-10. What happens to the remainder -- almost all of them challenged by the GOP -- will decide the race. It's expected that most of these contests will be decided by a lot less than 10 votes in the end, so every one counts (or, Roli-Poli hope, won't count).
Ain't small town politics grand?
The thing is, this isn't really a small-town issue: For if the GOP get their way here, then this precedent will be used to herd voters all over the state into Blue NYC, so as to recapture seats Upstate.
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The GOP has openly admitted, in the previous Tedisco-Murphy fight, that part of their intent is to intimidate residents out of choosing the Valley as their home for voting purposes. They hope the mere threat of someone snooping around their home or building, making less-than-veiled threats of reporting them to the rent board, or nixing their STAR exemption, will freeze those pesky Democrats from voting Upstate. Better, they think, to cage those voters in NYC, where they can't do more harm to Republicans.
Personally, I think the State and County Democrats should stiffen their backs and up the ante. This has every appearance of an organized conspiracy to deny an entire class of voters their most American right. |
