Good News For Mary Jo Kilroy

• Author: Kyle Kutuchief
• Filed under: National Landscape 2008, Ohio 2008
• Date: Nov 21,2008

A Federal Judge has ruled that 1,000 provisional ballots cast in heavily Democratic Franklin County must be counted in the hotly contested OH-15 recount. According to Buckeye State Blog, the ballots will remain sealed until November 29th to allow for an appeal, but this is a step in the right direction for Kilroy. The Columbus Dispatch offers a succinct summary of the ruling:

U.S. District Judge Algenon L. Marbley ruled yesterday that both state and federal law "impose a duty on poll workers to verify that a provisional voter" has completed the ballot properly. That includes signing and putting one's name on the ballot envelope, he said.

"Thus, because the disputed ballots in the FCBE's (Franklin County Board of Elections) custody are deficient due to poll worker error, they constitute valid votes that must be opened and counted," Marbley said

It is important to remember that not one of Franklin County's 27,000 provisional ballots have yet been counted because of the legal challenge to the 1,000 disputed votes. They will remain untouched until the appeal process ends, which is fair. Currently, Stivers leads district wide by 479 votes. I checked the county by county numbers expecting Kilroy to be way ahead, but she is actually down by 149 votes. The good news is Obama won 59%-40%. The hope for Democrats is those coat tails helped pull 478+ more of those provisional ballots for Kilroy.