Supreme Court rejects GOP bid to challenge voter registrations David Edwards and Muriel Kane

Published: Friday October 17, 2008





Print This Email This In a closely-watched case involving disputed voter registrations, the US Supreme Court has overturned a ruling by a federal judge in Ohio that could have forced as many as 200,000 newly-registered voters whose information does not perfectly match that in social security or motor vehicle databases to cast provisional ballots.



Those discrepancies typically involve minor differences or even typographical errors. For example, "Joe the Plumber" -- whose full name is Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher -- is listed on Ohio voter roles as "Worzelbacher."



The Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Friday that only the federal government -- and not a private party like the Republican Party -- has the right to sue the state of Ohio over the implementation of the Help America Vote Act. As a result, Ohio's Democratic Secretary of State, Jennifer Brunner, will not have to hand over the list of names, which could have been used by Republicans to challenge those voters on Election Day.



Fox News's Megyn Kelly saw the decision as a partisan victory for the Democrats. "I'm surprised that the full court sided with the Democrats on this," she stated, "because I'm surprised they wanted to wade into election law again."



Kelly acknowledged that "on the merits, I understand the decision." However, she insisted that Secretary of State Brunner "is in blatant violation of her obligations under the Help America Vote Act."



"You cannot overstate the importance of this," Kelly continued. "President Bush won Ohio by less than 200,000 votes in both 2000 and 2004. ... The Secretary of State of Ohio has said, of the 660,000 new voters ... at least 200,000 have been identified as potentially problematic. The GOP said, 'Fork over the list.' She said no. ... And now she won't have to do it.



"They're going to get to cast a real ballot," Kelly concluded unhappily.



This video is from Fox's Happening Now, broadcast October 17, 2008.









Download video via RawReplay.com







