Hawaii Supreme Court orders new election in tied House race

Filed 1h ago · Via Courthouse News · The Buffoon Desk

THIS STORY IS SCORED

Quirky Dog

Kevin MacLeod · incompetech.com · CC BY 4.0

Photo: Roc0ast3r · CC0 · via Wikimedia Commons

The Hawaii Supreme Court threw out the results of an 842-842 tied Republican primary for a Leeward Oahu House seat, ordering a do-over election in November rather than letting a coin-flip-style drawing stand.

Justice Lisa Ginoza's opinion found two separate problems, either one fatal: two ballots from the wrong district got folded into the count with no way to trace how they voted, and the office's lauhala-basket tie-breaking method was itself an unlawfully adopted rule, built without the public notice the law requires.

Because both candidates are Republicans and no Democrat filed, whoever wins in November takes the seat outright. The Office of Elections now has to add the race to a ballot that was already supposed to be printed.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.

✒ FROM THE EDITORIAL DESK

Two ballots from the wrong neighborhood is a small mistake, and small mistakes are exactly how you end up printing a ballot twice. The basket wasn't the real trouble anyway. Nobody ever wrote down the rules for it, which is a fine way to run a raffle at a school carnival and a poor way to hand somebody a seat in the legislature.

Source: Read the original at Courthouse News → Scored: Quirky Dog · Kevin MacLeod · CC BY 4.0

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