Since posting the list of the voters who the Board of Elections has listed as “rejected” after they signed a petition to take the “in state tuition for illegal immigrants” bill to referendum we have learned that lots of citizens have had their signatures rejected. Some are rather high profile citizens who you would think the election board may have known and or been able to contact to correct what ever minor imperfection in their signature or petition had led to the decision to reject their signature and effectively disenfranchise them.
Among those being “rejected” are a former presidential candidate, the husband of a former gubernatorial candidate and ambassador, three State Delegates, one member of a County Election Board, numerous central committee members and the friends., families and neighbors of some of these folks. Over seven thousand voters have been “rejected”.
The reasons for these voters being “rejected” are varied but most fall into two categories, either there was a problem with the signature or there was a problem with the petition upon which a proper signature was placed. I have heard from dozens of folks from around the state who are irate over having been disenfranchised by having their signature rejected.
The first question I get is how do I fix this and who can I send my corrected petition and signature to? The answer they get from the Election Board makes them apoplectic. Voters are told, ” There is no way to correct having been rejected!”
The election board is interpreting the State law that makes it a misdemeanor to sign more than one petition to mean that if your signature appears on a petition and is rejected, if you were to send in a corrected version of the signature or petition it is rejected because it is a second signature of a petition and thus in violation of state law. Clearly, anyone knows the intent of the State law is to prevent fraud from people submitting multiple signatures in a petition drive effort.
Del. Mike Smigiel lives in Cecil County and represents the 36th District in the Maryland House of Delegates. District 36 includes part of Cecil, Kent, Queen Anne’s, and part of Caroline counties.
2 comments:
What I think is funny (not haha funny) is that the liberals complain about having to show ID and prove citizenship to vote yet reject these signatures as legit.
Another example of government being too big for their pants. Time to take em' down. Seems the people we elect do as they damn well please and couldn't care about what "WE THE PEOPLE WANT".
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