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Old 11-10-2010, 04:32 PM   #1
lapyignipinge

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Oct 2005
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Default Joe Miller's Legal Argument: If You Misspelled Murkowski, It Was A Protest Vote
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Republican Joe Miller filed a federal lawsuit yesterday over the planned count of write-in ballots in the Alaska Senate race, arguing that counting ballots with misspelled names is unconstitutional.

The lawsuit argues that many people who cast misspelled write-in ballots might have done so deliberately, as a protest against Sen. Lisa Murkowski's campaign. If elections officials deem these misspelled ballots as votes for Murkowski, it "overrides voter intent" and "nullifies the protest and falsely inflates the vote for the write-in candidate," the suit argues.

Miller's lawsuit asks for an injunction and for a hearing to be held today, in an attempt to stop the state from "counting or otherwise accepting as valid any write-in ballots in which the name of the candidate is spelt [sic] incorrectly, or on which the name of the candidate is not written as it appears on a write-in declaration of candidacy."

The Alaska Division of Elections (DOE) is scheduled to begin counting the write-in ballots today at 1 p.m. ET despite the lawsuit.

The state has said that it will attempt to determine "voter intent" when examining the ballots, which might include counting votes that contain "minor misspellings."

Lt. Gov. Craig Campbell has argued that "the courts have been very clear for the last 25 years that voter intent is important. You do not want to disenfranchise voters over a technicality." Miller has previously accused Campbell of bias when it comes to overseeing this election.
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