Politics
Americans for Prosperity: 'Incompetent' Palm Beach Elections Supervisor Susan Bucher Must Resign
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Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher and Slade O'Brien
The Palm Beach Post reported Tuesday that some 500 faulty absentee ballots were mailed out by Democratic elections supervisor Susan Bucher’s office. The ballots contain duplicates of three Amendment questions, and omit another one entirely.
Recipients of the flawed ballots are being asked to vote twice on Florida Amendments 1 (Health Care), 2 (Veterans Property Tax), and 3 (State Revenue Limitation), while being denied any opportunity to vote on Amendment 5; if passed, Amendment 5 would hold the judiciary more accountable to the legislative branch by, among other things, requiring that all gubernatorial appointments to the Florida Supreme Court be confirmed by the state Senate.
Amendment 5 is being opposed by Bucher’s Democratic Party and several other leftist outfits, including the Florida Bar board of governors, the American Civil Liberties Union, the League of Women Voters, and the Service Employees International Union.
It’s not the first time this election cycle – let alone in others – that Bucher’s office has found itself making this kind of mistake. About a month ago, she sent out some 60,000 absentee ballots missing the proper headings for the merit-retention races of three controversial state Supreme Court justices – Barbara Pariente, R. Fred Lewis, and Peggy Quince – who are accused by critics of being left-wing judicial activists. Because the voting machines can't count the misprinted ballots, the supervisor of elections office has had to hire dozens of employees for hundreds of hours of work to properly hand-copy all votes onto the correct ballots.
Absentee voters are traditionally Republican-leaning, therefore these errors raise concerns that conservative and libertarian-minded voters might miss out on registering “NO” votes for the justices, and a “YES” vote on Amendment 5.
Sunshine State News contacted ballot printer Runbeck Elections Services and spoke to Kevin Bannon, the company’s president. Although his company accepted blame for the 60,000 faulty ballots sent out a month ago, he told the News this latest batch of 500 was not printed by Runbeck, but by Bucher’s office.
Five hundred replacement ballots are being mailed out to those voters, but it’s unclear when the voters can expect to receive them, or whether they will be able to mail them out in time to be received by the elections office on Nov. 6. Bucher’s office did not return multiple requests for comment.
Asked whether he thought it coincidental that both printing errors implicated the judiciary, O’Brien told the News, “It certainly should raise a few eyebrows.”
Restore Justice 2012, the nonprofit which is leading the campaign against retaining the justices, issued its own statement on the matter:
“Restore Justice is concerned by several recent media reports that call into question the basic integrity of the retention campaigns of Justices Pariente, Quince and Lewis,” the statement reads in part. “The justices’ campaigns and tenure have been a comedy of errors and disregard for Florida’s voters and Constitution.”
“You can’t make this stuff up,” said Jesse Phillips, president of Restore Justice. “I guess this is what happens when politicians [i.e., Justices Pariente, Lewis, and Quince] are desperate to get re-elected.”
Palm Beach County has been called by Time magazine the “Capital of Florida Corruption.” Besides the more than half-dozen election kerfuffles suffered under Bucher and her predecessors, several county commissioners have ended up in federal prison over the last seven or so years.
The beat goes on. As Sunshine State News first reported last week, Dave Aronberg, Democratic candidate for Palm Beach County state attorney, received some $14,000 in campaign contributions from a medical and lawyer referral service, while that service was being investigated for deceptive and unfair trade practices by Republican Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi. And now Aronberg, who was serving as one of Bondi’s assistant attorneys general at the time, is himself being investigated.
Reach Eric Giunta at egiunta@sunshinestatenews.com or at (954) 235-9116.
Comments (9)
Typically, decisions to 'remove' a justice are based on misconduct or incompetence, not disagreements over particular decisions. The Republican party’s decision to take sides surprised even some Republicans, who said it set a 'bad' precedent.
“I think it’s a mistake for a party, as a party, to state a position that a certain judge should be thrown out, because then you are introducing partisanship into a system that is supposed to be nonpartisan,” said Bob Martinez, a prominent 'Republican' lawyer who was once the United States attorney for the Southern District of Florida. “And when you have elected officials, on the right or left, criticizing judges publicly it can become' very dangerous' and it This is all about raw politics. It has nothing to do with jurisprudence.”
Americans for Prosperity, an organization founded by the Koch brothers, recently joined in the battle and began broadcasting television advertisements in several cities highlighting the health care amendment ruling. The group also plans to highlight other cases.
“The Florida Supreme Court removed the amendment from the ballot, denying us a voice and a vote on a historically important issue,” the ad states. “Shouldn’t our courts be above politics and protect our rights to choose? You be the judge.”
'Slade O’Brien', the Florida director of Americans for Prosperity, said the television spots, which do not explicitly take sides in the retention battle, focus attention on cases in which the court has acted as “judicial activists.”
The campaign is really about giving Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican, the chance to appoint three new justices. The Florida Legislature also wants greater control of the judiciary — an effort that began last year with House Speaker Dean Cannon and is continuing with a proposed amendment on the ballot this year.
I think this is disgusting! O'Brien is a influential member of the Tea party and again this comes back to the Koch brothers as well,it's a tight predatory circle and we are their prey! It comes down to a simple fact- they want to take over Florida and exert their influences in our court system! In my opinion This is UN-American and treasonous behavior! In fact I believe Governor Scott should be 'impeached' for all he has done to suppress our fundamental right to vote and his overall conduct as a Governor!
They are not only a hate group but they are founded and funded by the Koch brothers. They should not be involved in any type of voting process, let alone political process. They are an erroneous group! In its 2007 annual tax return, the AFP Foundation reported revenue of $5.7 million with expenditures of nearly $6.8 million!
With that said, they founded AFP in 2004 when Citizens for a Sound Economy split into FreedomWorks (formerly Citizens for a Sound Economy,) and the Americans for Prosperity Foundation (formerly the Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation). Dick Armey, who had become chair of CSE in 2003 after retiring from Congress remained chairman of FreedomWorks, while David H. Koch remained chairman of the AFP Foundation. Like CSE, AFP was founded with the support of David H. Koch and Charles G. Koch, both of Koch Industries .In September 2012, the Washington Post called AFP "One of the major players on the right", reporting that AFP planned to spend $125 million on the 2012 United States presidential election! In August 2011, AFP "sent absentee voter applications instructing voters to return the paperwork two days late in at least two recall elections."In addition, the PO Box that was listed on the "Ballot Application" is the address of an anti-abortion group, Wisconsin Family Action, as opposed to an official state address! The state director of the conservative group Americans for Prosperity offered no apologies for papering homes in Detroit’s Delray district with fake eviction notices trying to use scare tactics on voters! The list of egregious acts by this group goes on and on! They have some Nerve to say anything about Susan Bucher! GOP has Operatives like Nathan Sproul was arrested for dumping over 500 Democrat voter registrations,that is the tip of the iceberg!. Just look at Governor Scott Suppressing votes!
Former RNC Chair 'Jim Greer' said the RNC are crazy people.That's why Gov.Crist went over to the Democrats! People should not take their Hog Wash seriously.The RNC discussed openly with Jim about Suppressing the Black voters;
"Ballot duplication is a 'tried-and-true' method that involves two-person teams and an emphasis on quality control, Bucher said. It is frequently used to process votes from military voters who send faxed ballots that also can't be scanned. The absentee duplication process can begin 15 days before the election and the company that printed the bad ballots, Runbeck Election Services of Arizona, will pay for the work.
Important to note-because Fred Lewis, Barbara Pariente and Peggy Quince represent the liberal wing of the court, they're facing a campaign, well-funded by state Republicans and Koch brothers entities, to remove them from the bench.
Bucher says the master file sent to Runbeck had a perfect absentee ballot on it, but it was somehow printed without the lines and titles that should have separated the judicial elections from adjacent county commission and port authority elections. Now that is a lot closer to the truth! People shoudl know these facts as well!
They have members who state openly they believe in slavery to boot! The Koch brothers are pure evil and so anyone who is affiliated with them and or this group. There is not one mention of their unscrupulous behavior! They should be banned,but this great country of ours has freedom of speech. However, that does not mean this groups should be considered a legitimate group when it comes to matters such as voting!
It allows the legislature to overturn a court ruling by a simple majority rather than the 2/3rds majority required now. That should frighten everyone. It gives the legislature a power that, unless a governor vetos everything they send up, no checks/balance over their power. And with a compliant governor, the legislature could II say would) run roughshod over our rights and we'd have basically no recourse.
Vote NO on 5.
I don't know why you insist on trolling our articles with this claim you've been repeatedly corrected about -- or who's paying you to do so: The Florida legislature has no authority to overturn court rulings, and Amendment 5 does not give it any such authority.
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