The new improved primary ballot — as of Monday.
The Harp mayoral campaign failed to stop the city from mailing out absentee ballots Monday without changes; now it’s turning its attention to the primary election-day ballot.
Jason Bartlett, campaign manager for Toni Harp, one of four Democrats running in the Sept. 10 Democratic mayoral primary, first publicly raised the issue last week when he saw the design of the absentee ballots about to be mailed out to voters who allegedly can’t make it to the polls to vote in the primary in person. (Read about that here.)
He objected to the decision by Deputy City Clerk Sally Brown to leave Row A blank. The row is usually reserved by candidates endorsed by the Democratic Party. The Democratic Town Committee endorsed Harp at a convention, but then failed to file paperwork in time, so Harp ended up having to petition her way onto the ballot just like her opponents. In order to ensure her name would appear above theirs on the ballot (rather than alphabetically), her campaign created a petition “slate” with city/town clerk candidate Michael Smart. Slates appear first on the ballot.
Bartlett also objected to a decision to note in blank Row A that no party-endorsed candidates appear on the ballot. He objected as well to Brown’s decision to start the list of aldermanic candidates on Row C and leave the column for aldermanic candidates blank on the Harp-Smart Row B.
After consulting with the secretary of the state’s office, Brown agreed to have ballots reprinted to move the placement of the notice about a lack of endorsed candidates. But the office backed up her interpretation of state law that led to the decision to leave Row A blank and start listing aldermanic candidates on Row C.
Fast forward to Monday morning. Brown’s office received 4,000 newly reprinted absentee ballots from the printer. She separated 600 for voters who had already requested them. “I took them to the post office myself” to mail them, she said.
Bartlett said later that the Harp campaign will not further contest the absentee ballots. But it still is seeking to have the ballot changed for those coming to polls on Sept. 10 to vote in person. He said he wants aldermanic names to start on Row B. (That would still mean some of the aldermanic candidates aligned with the Harp campaign would appear next to her name; but in other wards candidates opposed to the Harp camp’s candidates would appear on that line, because they appear in alphabetical order.)
Sally Brown said Monday that she does not plan to change that ballot. “I’ve never seen that [done] before. Whatever goes out on the machine is the same as what people” get sent for absentee ballots, she said.
Meanwhile, secretary of the state spokesman Av Harris said Brown has correctly interpreted state statutes. He pointed specifically to subsections a, d and f of Section 9 – 437 of the Connecticut General Statutes, which he said his office interprets as clearly meaning that no other candidates (such as petitioning aldermanic candidates) can appear on the same line as a citywide slate (like Harp and Smart).
“The law is complicated, but what it says is that a slate means citywide candidates. A slate cannot include district or aldermanic candidates,” Harris said.
Ultimately, Harris said, his office can advise Brown, but Brown’s office makes the final decision about how to interpret state law for municipal election ballots.
Campaign manager Bartlett said he intends to raise the issue with Theodore Bromley, a lawyer in the secretary of the state’s office.
Brown consulted Bromley before preparing the ballot in the first place. Bartlett consulted with him too. Bromley wrote a memo, then went on vacation. He’s scheduled to return to work Tuesday. Bartlett said that Bromley offered a different legal interpretation, one allowing for aldermanic candidates to begin to be listed on the Harp-Smart slate’s Row B. Bartlett cited this sentence in the memo: “The above rules used for at-large office petitions apply separately to challenge candidacies for offices from political subdivisions. Begin on the second row (Row B) and continue on the succeeding horizontal rows, under the applicable political subdivision office title — the number of rows which will be used being dependent on the number of such challenge candidacies. Allocate rows to subdivision ‘full slates’ by time of filing — but remember that a petition naming only one candidate never qualifies as a ‘full slate’ (see above). Below the subdivision ‘full slates’ if any — or beginning on Row B if none — place all other subdivision petitioners in alphabetical order as indicated above.”
Click here to read Bromley’s full memo.
Bartlett said he intends to pursue the Row B aldermanic quest with Bromley when he returns to work Tuesday. Meanwhile, another Democratic mayoral candidate, Henry Fernandez, issued a release Monday requesting to be included in any discussions with officials about potential ballot changes.
After reading the memo, it appears as though Ms. Brown has indeed done her own editorializing and is endorsing a particular candidate. First, it is optional to delete any columns or rows not needed. Rather than deleting a row, she chose to first state that there is no endorsed candidate. When that failed, she left it blank but kept a row there. There is little doubt in my mind that this was politically motivated.
However, since she has chosen to keep row A empty, "challenge candidates names must appear on the second row (Row B)," which would be the same row as Senator Harp and Mr. Smart. This is an example of someone over stepping her boundary. The rules are quite plain. She didn't comport to them but rather is picking and choosing the rules and interpretation thereof that she desires in an unveiled attempt to impact the election.
Indeed, this is becoming increasingly silly. Thank you NHI for posting the memo. I'm saddened by Ms. Brown's behavior but as she once told me "this is just politics." Its astounding to think that she treats her job as just politics and not as an honorable profession.