Andrew Do was supposed to be sworn in today but former Senator Lou Correa has requested a recount in the recently completed special election for the First District for the Board of Supervisors seat according to a tweet from the Registrar’s office.
The Orange County Register has also chimed in with Correa’s explanation.
“If ballots were cast illegally in the election and were erroneously counted in the original canvass of the votes, a recount cannot ‘undo’ those votes and remove them from the vote count,” Correa wrote in his statement.
“Conversely, a recount generally cannot result in adding any votes to the tally that were erroneously rejected in the original vote count.”
Instead, Correa said he wants to follow-up on a series of alleged irregularities to assure his supporters and the public that the election was free and fair.
“My campaign has received a number of reports over the past week or so contending that people who did not really live in the First Supervisorial District registered to vote and cast ballots in this election. We have also received reports regarding irregularities in the handling and processing of vote-by-mail ballots, with campaigns collecting (and even paying for) voted ballots and returning them to the Registrar’s office or at the polls,” Correa wrote.
Correa says his lawyers found several examples of unsigned provisional ballots being counted, examples of ballots from voters who tried voting more than once, and ballots from voters who just moved into the First Supervisorial District but hadn’t re-registered from their new address.
Correa told the Register, “A recount will allow us to investigate and determine the scope of these and any other irregularities, to analyze whether they might have affected the outcome of the election, and to decide whether further action is warranted, either in the form of a judicial action or the District Attorney’s investigation.”
Lou Correa was one of the state legislators that made the voting rules and procedures.
“If ballots were cast illegally in the election and were erroneously counted in the original canvass of the votes, a recount cannot ‘undo’ those votes and remove them from the vote count,” Correa wrote in his statement.
Therefore: A recount serves no purpose. An investigation of “irregularities” serves no purpose. In reality, one does not have to sign the mail-in ballot, or live in the District, or re-register with one’s new address, or even need to be a citizen to vote in California.
State legislators Voting Rules
You are correct RL – anyone can vote illegally in California. The question is – what are the consequences of such illegal voting?
It seems that what Lou Correa is saying that:
1) VOTES were IMPROPERLY INCLUDED:
that if a person voted twice, then a recount would only result in counting the “improper vote”…
2) VOTES were IMPROPERLY EXCLUDED:
that if a person voted but their vote was invalidated and not included in the count, then a recount would not include the IMPROPERLY EXCLUDED votes.
and therefore you have to go beyond just a simple recount, and look for the IMPROPERLY INCLUDED VOTES ( to SUBTRACT them from the count); and look for IMPROPERLY EXCLUDED Votes (to ADD them to the count).
Additionally, I suspect that if this is not addressed, then it may cast an unjust “shadow” over the Vietnamese-American community, because others will always claim that they achieved the win by deception . . . so because these are serious allegations of irregularities, it seems they should be investigated, and if none existed, then the Vietnamese-American community would come out “smelling like roses!!!”
Paco Barragán
Sunshine is best Paco.