What’s next in Ek case? No one’s sure

12/16/2005

By Lawrence Schumacher
St. Cloud Times

State officials don’t know what will happen to a Dec. 27 special election ballot if the Minnesota Supreme Court removes legislative candidate Sue Ek from the race.

The Secretary of State’s office will use a court ruling for guidance on several key questions: whether the Republican Party of Minnesota could substitute another candidate to replace her, whether Gov. Tim Pawlenty could reschedule the special election for a later date and how such a change would affect ballots that already have been cast.

“The court will decide whether the candidate can be removed from the ballot, and we would expect it to address those other issues as well,” said Kent Kaiser, spokesman for Secretary of State Mary Kiffmeyer. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

The Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday morning on whether Ek, the Republican candidate for a vacant House 15B seat, should be removed from the ballot based on claims she had not established residency inSt. Cloud at least six months prior to the special election date.

A lawsuit filed bySt. Paul attorney Alan Weinblatt on behalf of St. Cloud resident and DFL volunteer Ric Studer claims Ek, who listed a home address in St. Cloud on her affidavit of candidacy, actually resided in St. Paul as of the June 27 deadline. Ek has maintained she is a long-timeSt. Cloud resident.

Representatives of the governor and Attorney General Mike Hatch declined to comment for this story, referring the matter to Kiffmeyer’s office.

Little time

Stearns County needs to know by Monday if there is to be a new candidate, requiring it to prepare new ballots, said Randy Schreifels, county auditor-treasurer.

Ballots have already been distributed and absentee ballots have been coming in for some time, he said.

Nowhere in Minnesota statute does it say that a political party could put a new candidate on the ballot if another is ruled ineligible, raising the possibility that Ek’s DFL opponent, Larry Haws, would be unopposed, Schreifels said.

“But we’ll abide by whatever the court decides they want us to do,” he said.

If a decision comes too late to have new ballots printed, the only other option would be to use unofficial, photocopied ballots, if the state approves it, he said.

One possibility

Following the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone shortly before the 2002 election, the state faced a similar situation.

A new DFL Senate candidate — Walter Mondale — was substituted on the ballot at the last minute.

Election judges were instructed to strike Wellstone’s name from each ballot and attach a supplemental photocopied ballot with Mondale’s name on it, Kaiser said.

Absentee ballots marked for Wellstone vote were not discarded, but the Wellstone vote was not counted. Absentee ballots with a vote for Republican candidate Norm Coleman were counted.

Republicans wait

If the court decides to remove Ek from the ballot, local Republicans expect they would get a chance to nominate someone new, said Roger Knauss, Senate District 15 Republican Party chairman.

Knauss declined to say if the party had a potential replacement lined up.

“Obviously, at this time, I’m still hoping that won’t be necessary,” he said. “But I’ve begun to consider any ramifications of the court’s decision.”