New Mexico's Missing Ballot Boxes

Posted by Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet at 5:22 AM on February 7, 2008.

Heath Haussamen, a New Mexico political columnist and blogger, has reported a developing story that suggests overzealous Democratic Party officials -- who may be Clinton supporters -- took home four ballot boxes after Super Tuesday's caucuses that were not counted in the Election Night results.

This is significant because with 98 percent of precincts reporting, there is only a 200-vote spread between Clinton, who leads, and Obama. There also are some 17,000 provisional ballots that have to be verified and counted before the results are official.

Haussamen writes, "The New Mexico Democratic Party caucus may be tainted by three ballot boxes that spent the night in the home of the Rio Arriba County party chair or the homes of other local election officials instead of being reported to the state party.

"Those ballots still haven’t been counted, but they have been retrieved by the state party.

"Several sources told me the ballot boxes spent the night at the home of Rio Arriba County Democratic Party Chair Theresa Martinez, whose state-lawmaker husband, Sen. Richard Martinez, endorsed Hillary Clinton. But Richard Martinez told Santa Fe New Mexican reporter Kate Nash that the boxes actually spent the night in the homes of three polling-place managers. He gave Nash no explanation for why the results from those ballots weren’t reported to the state party last night and why they were instead kept overnight in officials’ homes.

“The site managers locked them and they kept them and they took them to my wife this morning,” Nash quoted Richard Martinez as saying.

"State party officials and Theresa Martinez have not returned my calls seeking comment."

Haussamen, reached by phone, said he expects the Democratic Party to issue a statement on Wednesday night. Earlier in the day, he said party officials told him there was "nothing unusual" about taking ballot boxes home. The open question, he said, was whether this was an example of very sloppy election administration or an attempt to affect the presidential vote totals.

Haussemen said New Mexico's Attorney General declined to get involved in the matter, saying the party's caucuses were a private affair, not regulated by state law. Apparently, the Obama campaign has sent a lawyer to the state to investigate. Stay tuned.

Tagged as: voter fraud, ballot box, new mexico, caucus, clinton, obama