After having issues with the Republican Primary Election in May, Mingo County is yet again having issues with its voting process. This is the second time in this election cycle, and in this particular race for this state senate seat, that there have been large-scale issues with the voting process.
Jeff Dissibio is running for Senate in a district that encompasses parts of Wayne, Mingo, McDowell and all of Mercer County. However he was left off the ballot for nearly 700 early and absentee votes in Mingo County. A previous Democratic candidate for the same seat was left on the ballot instead.
Typical voter turnout for that district ranges from 20,000 to 40,000 votes per general election.
Dissibio said that these problems in Mingo undermine democracy.
“A fair and free election is what the cornerstone is, it’s what’s the cornerstone of our democracy, quite frankly,” Dissibio said. “Everyone who goes to the ballot box should feel that their vote is being cast. It’s being cast fairly. It’s being cast accurately.”
Dissibio’s opponent, Republican candidate Craig Hart, said in a press release that it was an “honest mistake” and that Dissibio should stop complaining about being left off the ballot.
“I ran and won a tough primary. I earned my spot on the ballot. My opponent inherited his spot on the ballot, hasn’t won anything, and now he’s complaining the election process is ‘a threat to democracy.’ That’s the pot calling the kettle black,” Hart said. “He’s never received a single vote and now he is falsely alleging a ‘threat to democracy’ and attacking the good people of Mingo County.”
Dissibio said he doesnt think this should be a partisan issue, and trusts that the secretary of state will do a thorough investigation into the issues in Mingo County.
Dissibio was nominated by the state’s Democratic Party for that seat after the original Democratic candidate failed to file campaign finance reports by the Aug. 14 deadline to do so.
Donald Kersey, from the Secretary of State’s office, said this mistake is unacceptable and the office is looking into the problems in Mingo.
“These were errors that occurred and that benefited one person over another. That is, that is the opposite of integrity,” Kersey said.
Kersey said the point of the laws set forth and enforced by the Secretary of State’s office is to put checks and balances into place to ensure fairness in elections to candidates and so that voters have the opportunity to vote a ballot they are entitled to.
He said moving forward the Secretary of State’s Office plans to increase training in Mingo County.
“This is a huge deal. I mean, these are our elections. So we’re going to be focusing very much on making sure that these kinds of errors don’t occur again, especially in this county,” Kersey said.
Kersey said that voters who voted using an absentee ballot will be able to reconsider their vote with a correct ballot, but voters who voted early and voted for the wrong Democratic candidate will not be able to reconsider their vote, and those votes will not be counted.
However Kersey said that if the election is lost within the margin of the number of votes illegally cast then Democrats will have a legal basis to challenge the election results in this county.
The state Democratic Party chairman, Mike Pushkin, said that he and other party officials will be keeping a close eye on this election.
“We’re leaving every legal option open,” Pushkin said.
Pushkin said all the issues in this particular issue have benefited one person: Hart.
“The part that’s really hard to explain, is that both of these errors benefited the campaign of the Republican candidate in the district,” Pushkin said.