King County Executive Ron Sims calls on Prosecutor's Office to initiate formal investigation of erroneous voter registration challenges

Nov. 29, 2005

King County Executive Ron Sims calls on Prosecutor's Office to initiate formal investigation of erroneous voter registration challenges

King County Executive Ron Sims today called upon King County Prosecutor Norm Maleng to initiate a formal perjury investigation of Lori Sotelo, the King County Republican Party vice-chair who erroneously challenged the voter registrations of hundreds of King County residents on the eve of the election.

Sims' call comes in the wake of yesterday's decisions by the King County Canvassing Board, which ruled on 199 voter registration challenges, the vast majority of which were issued under Sotelo's name. The board rejected 141 of those challenges, arguing that the challengers did not meet the high burden of proof required in such cases because they did not provide proof of the actual residence addresses of the challenged voters – proof that is explicitly required in state law.

"The Canvassing Board made the right decision," Sims said. "The right to vote is the cornerstone of our democracy, and what Ms. Sotelo did was an abuse of the challenge process. By signing an oath ‘under penalty of perjury' in which she swore she had ‘personal knowledge' that hundreds of King County voters were incorrectly registered – at least 178 of which were subsequently withdrawn after evidence came to light that the voters in question were correctly registered – she willfully and needlessly abused the voter challenge process. This was a deliberate attempt to intimidate voters and dissuade them from voting, and ought to be investigated and then prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

"The sad fact is that the vast majority of the voters – more than 1,000 – challenged by Ms. Sotelo ended up not voting in this election. In that sense, Ms. Sotelo and other party officials involved in her effort can say, ‘Mission Accomplished.' Unfortunately, our nation has a long and well documented history of systematic efforts by some groups and parties to disenfranchise large numbers of people, or alternately to intimidate them into not exercising their right to vote, and this effort appears to fall squarely in that tradition.

"Before allowing outside parties to initiate wholesale purges of the voting rolls, we must have absolute assurance that the charges leveled against affected voters are complete and accurate. That is what elections law requires. Anything less would be a slap in the face of the voting public of King County, and that is essentially what Ms. Sotelo did in swearing out hundreds of false challenges. At a minimum, that deserves a serious investigation by the prosecuting attorney. As the head of the state Republican Party has publicly admitted, none of the challenged voters appear to have engaged in fraud or displayed any intentions of engaging in such.

"At worst, some of these voters appear to have made an innocent mistake on their registrations born of a confusion about, or misunderstanding of, the technical requirements of election law, but to steal away their right to vote on such spurious technical grounds is an abomination," Sims said.

He added that Republicans proceeded with the challenges despite the fact that King County Elections officials had repeatedly indicated their willingness to work with the party to assess any evidence it developed regarding potential issues related to the voting rolls. State elections law makes a clear provision for this, allowing interested parties to present ‘anecdotal evidence' to elections officials regarding questionable registrations. This route was offered to the Republicans before the election, before the challenges, and at the hearings yesterday.

"Instead, they chose to engage in a partisan stunt which made a farce of established elections procedures, and the consequences of which were severe," Sims said. "The Republican effort to issue mass challenges just weeks before voters went to the polls unnecessarily upset and angered many voters, hundreds of whom were challenged despite the fact that it soon became apparent that their registrations were without blemish.

"Furthermore, the Republican approach placed an undue burden on elections officials, who were already working overtime to ensure that the 2005 election proceeded smoothly, and cost the taxpayers of King County countless thousands of dollars. Worst of all, it has succeeded in injecting a needlessly divisive note of partisanship into an elections process that is too important to fall prey to the deepening political divide in this country. That impression was only heightened by the fact that Republicans seem willing to turn a blind eye to identical policies and procedures in place in other counties where they enjoy the support of the majority of the citizenry."

Sims said that his call for an investigation of Sotelo would not affect ongoing efforts to improve the integrity of the voting rolls.

"However, I also want to stress that I do take proper registration equally seriously. Yesterday I directed County Elections officials to ensure that even though the majority of the challenges were rejected, the matter will not end there. It is clear from the evidence presented that many of the challenged voters need to update their registrations with more detailed residence information. Elections officials will in the immediate future be personally contacting each of those voters to assist them in that task. Should Elections staff uncover information as a result of that process that warrants further investigation, that information will be expeditiously passed on to the King County Prosecutor's Office for consideration. The citizens of this county can rest assured that as Executive, I will do everything in my power to protect both their right to vote and the integrity of the voting rolls.

"With that in mind, I will today be sending a letter to Prosecutor Maleng asking him to formally investigate whether the actions of Ms. Sotelo are in violation of state law.

"Finally, I believe there is a role for the legislature in appropriately resolving this issue. Several legislators have indicated their intention to introduce a bill in the upcoming Olympia session that will bar mass challenges of voters in the days immediately before an election. Given the uproar and near chaos that resulted here in King County as a result of Ms. Sotelo's conduct, I believe such legislation is prudent and necessary, and I will urge the legislature to adopt the proposed legislation."