County Republicans file for vote recount in three races

The Monroe County Republican Party is filing for a recount contest in three county races from the Nov. 7 midterm election, saying they found problems with voter registration and absentee ballots.\nAn $11,000 bond paid for the recount was filed before noon Monday, just minutes before the recount deadline, said Monroe County Republican Party Chairman Franklin Andrew.\nCalling for a recount for county recorder, county council District 2 and Van Buren township assessor, the party chose those three races as a "random sampling" of all different levels of government, Andrew said. The three races weren't chosen because they were the closest in the number of votes but because voter fraud could be found in any of the races, Andrew said.\n"It we change the outcome of an election, that's a bonus because what we're really trying to do is determine that if everyone that cast a ballot in this last election is actually eligible to vote in Monroe County," Andrew said.\nThe evidence, he said, lies in absentee-ballot requests and voter registration forms.\nVoters who registered prior to a new verification process did not have to verify their location, he said.\nMonroe County Democratic Party Chairwoman Lee Jones called the recount "absurd" and said she doesn't think a recount of those races would make any difference in the election outcome. Andrew said one of his party's main concerns is people were registered to vote in locations in which they didn't live.\nThe issue lies in overseas voters who are allowed to vote using U.S. addresses, Lee said. But because some of them lived in trailers and the homes had since been removed, the address given was an empty lot, so it looks like they didn't have validity to vote. \nBut Andrew said at the time those individuals registered to vote, their homes were already destroyed.\n"If (the Democratic Party) feels it's proper for people to vote from addresses they don't reside (at), that in and of itself speaks volumes," Andrew said. \nThe recount process and investigation are simultaneous but are two different processes, Andrew said. The recount, he said, is a technical term of the process.\n"What I want to do is determine if individuals were eligible to vote, and if we determine (that, we will) provide those results to the special prosecutor who will determine if it warrants a criminal prosecution," Andrew said. "The question for the special prosecutor to decide is who cast those ballots and who cast those ballots in a legal fashion," Andrew said.\nAndrew said a further concern of the Republican Party is an ongoing investigation about a member of the Democratic Party who made a duplicate key, giving her access to the computerized database of all Monroe County voters. The party member, a temporary county employee, even had ballots in her possession.\n"We know what she had access, to and we know it was unauthorized access, and we know it was unsupervised access," Andrew said. \nJones said the FBI has already investigated and found no criminal intent.\n"Basically, the FBI has investigated, state police has investigated it, the election board has investigated it, and absolutely none of them have found any problem with it at all," Jones said. "They don't see any criminal intent there whatsoever. I don't really see that as being an issue."\nThe issue, Andrew said, is that the investigation is not complete. He said the FBI did not investigate it, and state police are pursuing an investigation. Their goal is to make sure no one working in absentee voting broke the law.\n"I've got more questions than I have answers," Andrew said. "And you should never end an election with more questions than you have answers"