GOP Candidate Who Lost House Race Seeks To Impound Absentee Ballots

[turbinetree]

Source: Talking Points Memo

By RUSSELL CONTRERAS
November 14, 2018 8:00 am
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A New Mexico Republican who lost her bid for a U.S. House seat is seeking to impound absentee ballots in a key county that decided the race for the Democrat, according to court documents filed late Tuesday.


In court documents filed in the 3rd Judicial District Court in southern New Mexico, Yvette Herrell asked a Dona Ana County judge to impound the absentee ballots so her campaign could inspect them.

Herrell’s lawyers cited “chain-of-custody issues and other improprieties” but didn’t give details of allegations of irregularities. In addition, the court documents claim Herrell was declared the winner of New Mexico open 2nd congressional district by some New Mexico media outlets on election night.

Some media outlets reported that Herrell was projected to win the race but rescinded that projection after Democrat Xochitl Torres Small began to close the gap and took the lead thanks to outstanding absentee ballots in Dona Ana County — a traditional Democratic stronghold.

Read more: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/gop-candidate-who-lost-house-race-seeks-to-impound-absentee-ballots

[GemDigger]

1. Chain of custody issues? And impounding them would do what? What does she know about the machines?

It would definitely be a "chain of custody" issue and it definitely would help her cheat like a republican.

NO ONE in a race should be anywhere near those ballots or machines!! They have a place for observers and that would be the only place they should be.

[Desert grandma]

2. Sore losers..

These people are disgusting. These 8000 absentee ballots were there because there was an extraordinary amount of absentee ballots from Las Cruses NM, which is a highly Democratic area in a district that usually leans red. Only one half were counted by election night, and those had not yet been added to the vote totals because the normal protocol is to add all of the absentee votes to the total at one time. Because there were still 4000 ballots to be counted, persons from both campaigns were deputized as poll workers to count those remaining 4000 ballots. Then all 8000 were added to the vote totals. Since the majority of these ballots were from Las Cruces, the home of Xochitl Torres-Small, the overwhelming number of votes went to her, making her the victor in this race. Television stations and pundits called the race for Yvette Harrell on election night, because they did not know there were 8000 votes yet to be added to the totals. Yvette Harrell gave her victory speech and now has egg on her face. Awkward situation but there was no election fraud or improprieties. Republicans are grasping for straws. All votes should be counted in a democracy. These sore losers need to let it go and move on.

[Power 2 the People]

9. +1

[janx]

3. From the Albuquerque Journal:

She did not cite any specific evidence of wrongdoing in the lawsuit but said impounding the ballots would ensure voter confidence in the election and that a “valid democratic outcome” is obtained.

Earlier Tuesday, the Doña Ana County Commission convened as the canvassing board and certified election results that show Democrat Xochitl Torres Small as the winner in the 2nd Congressional District race. Election results are not official until they are approved by the state canvassing board later this month.

Herrell delivered a victory speech on election night after several news organizations, including the Journal, projected her as the winner of a tight race that featured big spending and hard-hitting attacks by out-of-state groups.

However, the Secretary of State’s office announced after midnight on election night that roughly 4,000 absentee ballots in Dona Ana County still needed to be counted and an additional 4,000 absentee ballots had not yet been added to the vote tally.

Once those votes were counted, Torres Small overtook Herrell. She then expanded her lead Monday when roughly 1,100 provisional and hand-tallied ballots were added to the vote count in Doña Ana County.

The current unofficial election results show Torres Small with 100,570 votes and Herrell with 97,031 votes.

https://www.abqjournal.com/1246305/herrell-seeks-to-have-absentee-ballots-impounded.html

[Judi Lynn]

4. Trump befriends only the best candidates.

[Hugin]

5. NM's own little bit of Florida.

Calling it early by various right leaning media outlets before the most populous county in the district is counted and then contesting the results seems like a risky strategy to me.

Seriously, wouldn't it be easier to y'know run a non-crazy candidate and maybe do some campaigning and debating? Seriously?

Ah, each to their own I guess.

[SunSeeker]

6. Ha! If they re-examine the ballots, they'll only find more votes for the Democrat!

Herrell is an idiot.

[lark]

7. Unless she thinks she can tamper with them first.

No judge is going to be that stupid, surely.

[SunSeeker]

8. Her review would not be unsupervised.

Not only would there be a state election official there, but there would have to be a representative of the opposing candidate there. At least that's what the law has always required.

[duhneece]

10. She was a 'State Legislative Star' of ALEC

She now sits on ALEC’s national board. She ran against the Republican Governor favorite in the primary and won. Governor Susanna didn’t help this vocal Trump supporter. But with ALEC behind her, she has access to $ for attorneys. She inherited real estate money from her dad.

[Desert grandma]

11. She will end up

throwing a bunch of that money down the drain while she pursues this futile effort to save face. She is a trumpian and that is why many Republicans in this district voted for the Democrat this time. TV ads showed lots of registered Republicans saying they were voting "person over party" this election. Even some stalwart Republicans can't stomach Trump. Xochitl ran as someone who will work with "anyone" to get things done for NM and her district. So..go away Yvette. Time to move on.