LAFAYETTE, IN — The recount for the GOP race for the state senate’s 23rd District began Tuesday morning in Tippecanoe County.
It was the first stop of a six-county election recount to determine whether incumbent Spencer Deery or challenger Paula Copenhaver carried the race. The winner will appear as the Republican candidate in the November election and will face Democratic candidate David Sanders and Independent candidate Joshua Brant.
Vote tallies from the May 5 primary led to Deery winning the district by three votes. Copenhaver filed for a recount, alleging that Democratic Party voters cast ballots in the Republican primary. Copenhaver argues in her petition for a recount that those votes should not be counted.
Whether those votes are disqualified will be an argument made before the recount commission at another date, Deery’s attorney, Samantha DeWester, said Tuesday as she watched the recount while being interviewed just outside the Tippecanoe Room in the County Building.
Copenhaver’s campaign was backed by President Donald Trump as a result of Deery’s December vote against redistricting Indiana’s congressional districts to favor Republicans. Trump favored the failed congressional redistricting.
Five other state senators who voted against redistricting lost their primary elections to Trump-backed challengers. One incumbent survived the Trump challenger, and Deery’s race is too close to call.
The Indiana State Board of Accounts traveled to all six counties last month for a precount inspection of the ballots. The counting started Tuesday in Lafayette.
The tables in the large meeting room at the County Building seemed oddly arranged, and a long strip of gray duct tape divided the room, with official recount activity on one side and the public or campaign supporters on the other. In the front of the room were attorneys for the recount commission and the Indiana State Board of Accounts, as well as various other officials.
At each table, two Indiana State Board of Accounts auditors sat on one side of the tables reviewing ballots, and observers for Deery and Copenhaver sat on the other side watching.
“Copenhaver’s folks are challenging the entire precinct that had multiple absentee ballots,” DeWester said.
Ted Nolting, an attorney representing Copenhaver, said they asked that all the votes in the 23rd District be recounted. But they’ve singled out five precincts for more scrutiny.
If one compares the recount to a civil court proceeding, then the Indiana State Board of Accounts employees are shifting through possible evidence, and when a challenge by either political camp is made, that ballot is documented and, in essence, preserved as evidence, DeWester said.
The recount commission’s job is to review the challenges and rule on them, as well as decide on procedural issues.
For example, Copenhaver asked the recount commission to issue subpoenas to Democratic voters who self-reported on social media or to a news outlet that they crossed over to vote for Deery in the Republican primary.
It is the responsibility of the recount commission to rule on whether to issue subpoenas, Nolting said.
It will be up to Nolting to argue for the subpoenas and DeWester to argue against them on behalf of their clients.
Indiana Recount Director Evan Norris told the Journal & Courier last month that the goal is to finish the recounting for the three challenged races — two GOP senate races and one GOP state representative race — before Independence Day.
At the conclusion of the vote counting, the recount commission will meet to hear arguments and rule on votes that have been challenged, DeWester said. The commission’s decisions might change the outcomes.
The Indiana State Board of Account auditors plan to finish Tuesday at Tippecanoe County. They will move to Vermillion County on Wednesday and to Parke County on Thursday, DeWester said.
Next week, the auditors will be in Montgomery County on Monday, Warren County on Tuesday, and Fountain County on Wednesday and Thursday, DeWester said.
Reach Ron Wilkins at rwilkins@jconline.com. Follow on Twitter: @RonWilkins2.
This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Recount for state senate’s 23rd District begins in Tippecanoe County
Reporting by Ron Wilkins, Lafayette Journal & Courier / Lafayette Journal & Courier
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By Ron Wilkins, Lafayette Journal & Courier | USA TODAY Network
