Senate panel finds improper Ford votes

Nashville City Paper
By John Rodgers
January 25, 2006

A senate panel investigating Sen. Ophelia Ford’s election Tuesday found that nine ballots were either fraudulent or cast illegally in a special election that Ford won by just 13 votes.

But the committee, which is charged with making a full recommendation to the Senate about the legitimacy of the election, delayed any further action on pushing to either uphold or void Ford’s election until after a federal court hearing is held.

That hearing is scheduled for today in Memphis.

“We don’t want to get in a position where we’re crossways with the federal court,” said Sen. Mike Williams (R-Maynardville), who chairs the committee. “We’re wanting to work in conjunction with, and making sure we’re touching all the bases.”

The Senate had previously voted as a committee to void Ford’s election because of some questionable ballots cast.

In response, Ford (D-Memphis) filed a lawsuit against the state Senate last week. In that lawsuit, Ford, who is black, alleged in part that the state Senate discriminated against her because of her race and disenfranchised voters in her district by voting to void the election.

A federal judge ordered that a hearing occur about Ford’s suit and prohibited the Senate, and the investigating panel, from taking any action on Ford until after the hearing could take place.

But Tuesday, the panel met and unanimously approved nine ballots as being either fraudulent or illegal. Those improper ballots include two cast with the names of dead people, four votes by convicted felons, one vote by a voter living outside the district, and two ballots from voters registered with business addresses.

The decision on those improper votes, however, was not a large point of contention within the panel.

The main argument Tuesday among attorneys for both Ford and the Republican she defeated, Terry Roland, as well as senators from both parties, concerned whether some ballots that were possibly not administered properly by precinct officials should be counted or thrown out.

Both sides cited conflicting case law that supported their arguments.

“They never hold it against a voter because of a relatively minor election error,” said David Cocke, Ford’s attorney. “That is the policy. You’d be changing that policy if you just enforced it in District 29.”

Maclin Davis, Roland’s attorney, said it only takes 13 or more illegal votes to declare the election void and he feels he’s found as many as 179, which counts dozens of possibly improperly administered ballots.

“There’s so many illegal votes in this election that clearly the election is void,” Davis said.

As a result of the federal court hearing today, the Senate will not meet as scheduled because it won’t have a quorum.

Three senators have been subpoenaed to appear in court and several more may attend the Memphis hearing.

“I’m just so sorry about the inconvenience,” Ford said about the senators missing session to attend her hearing.

Cocke has subpoenaed Republican senators Mark Norris of Collierville and Curtis Person of Memphis, and Democrat Don McLeary of Humboldt to testify in the hearing.

After the Senate initially voted to void her election, Ford said the Republican-backed move was “about racism.”

But she partially backed off those statements Tuesday.

“Maybe I was a little bit harsh in saying it just that way,” Ford said.

The court hearing convenes at 8:45 a.m. today in Memphis.