Alaska Senate Update: To the Supremes, Baby!

Joe Miller has appealed his spelling and fraud lawsuit to the Alaska Supreme Court on an expedited basis. It will hear argument in the case on Friday.

Miller and his attorneys argued that the law calls for write-in ballots to have the ballot oval filled and either the candidate's last name or the name as it appears on the declaration of candidacy written. Spelling, they contended, matters.

Judge William Carey disagreed, saying that if the Legislature intended for a candidate's name to be spelled perfectly to count, the law would have stated that. Miller's campaign said the ruling "essentially modifies state law."

Carey also dismissed as unfounded questions raised by Miller about voting irregularities.

Miller is also asking for a hand recount of the non-write in ballots, since, after all, the write-in ballots got counted by hand. The Division of Elections has countered that state law does not provide for hand recounts, but instead requires machine recounts.

posted by Gabriel Malor at 07:14 PM

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