The Indiana Recount Commission rejected a request to question voters under oath about how they cast their ballots in what is now a three-vote margin from May’s Republican primary for a state Senate seat.
The commission’s 2-1 vote on Tuesday was a setback to Paula Copenhaver’s challenge to Sen. Spencer Deery’s lead following a rancorous campaign in which she had President Donald Trump’s endorsement because of Deery’s opposition to the congressional redistricting plan pushed last year by the president.
The recount outcome, however, is not decided as the commission will meet again Aug. 18 to take up possibly more than 300 ballots the two sides have disputed.
Morales breaks with fellow Republican
Republican Secretary of State Diego Morales, the commission’s chair, sided with Democratic member Michael Claytor in voting to deny Copenhaver’s subpoena request.
Republican member Paul Mullin supported her motion to question 11 voters who disclosed in social media posts or to news reporters that they had cast Republican primary ballots in Senate District 23 to support Deery despite being Democrats or self-identified “progressives.”
Morales saw his reelection bid fail last month at the state Republican convention after losing the support of top state party leaders. That included U.S. Jim Banks, whose political organizations spent millions of dollars to support Copenhaver and other primary challengers to Republican senators who opposed redistricting.
Morales said in voting against the subpoena request that it wasn’t proper to question voters after they had cast ballots.
“This is the right thing to do, to make sure that we reject the motion to subpoena any voters because I don’t believe that’s the right thing to do,” Morales said. “I believe everybody has the right to go and vote, but they need to do it the right way. And the right way, again, is I encourage the General Assembly next session to close our primaries so we can avoid all of this.”
Primary challenger not giving up
A lawyer for Copenhaver, the Fountain County Republican chair and staffer to Lt. Gov. Micah Beckwith, argued that those voters should be questioned over whether they abided by state law that limits primary voting to those who voted for a majority of the party’s nominees in the last election.
Attorney William Bock said that non-Republicans voting in the party primary subverted the rights of GOP voters to select their party’s candidates.
Copenhaver said she intended to keep up the recount fight.
“Every Republican that voted in this Republican primary in this district should be upset to know that there were Democrats who voted in the Republican primary with no intention to support (the) Republican Party in the fall,” she told reporters after the commission meeting.
The ballot challenging process will continue, but Recount Director Evan Norris told the commission that a ballot review by State Board of Accounts auditors came up with no changes from the certified results that show Deery leading by a 6,337 to 6,334 margin.
The Deery-Copenhaver winner will face Democratic West Lafayette City Councilman David Sanders and independent candidate Joshua Brant in the November election for the heavily Republican district, which spans all or parts of six counties in the area between Lafayette and Terre Haute.
Commission denies other subpoena requests
The Recount Commission will face a tight timeline to make decisions on challenges from the two sides seeking to throw out some ballots.
Its next meeting is three days ahead of the Aug. 21 deadline set by state law for the Indiana Election Division to certify candidates for the November ballot.
Deery’s attorney, Samantha DeWester, urged commission members to deny Copenhaver’s subpoena request, arguing that remarks in social media posts were insufficient to infringe upon the principle of a secret ballot.
DeWester expressed confidence that Deery’s slim lead would survive the recount.
“It gets concerning to a certain extent, but I also have to place my beliefs and trust in the system and process, and that we aren’t going to disenfranchise Hoosier voters, several hundred of them, over wishes of one losing candidate,” she told reporters.
The Recount Commission on Tuesday voted 3-0 to deny a request from Copenhaver to issue subpoenas for testimony and documents from Tippecanoe County election officials over handling of an absentee ballot that was processed the day after the primary and added a vote to Deery’s total.
The commission also voted unanimously against Copenhaver’s request to access the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, database to check the citizenship status of who voted in the district’s primary.
DeWester argued such a review of voter rolls would only be proper before the election — and not to “retroactively go back and check this just for this district.”
Once the Recount Commission makes a final decision on the primary’s outcome, either side could then appeal that ruling directly to the state Court of Appeals.
Copenhaver’s attorney said no decision had yet been made on taking that step.
“We still have a lot of arguments related to the remaining ballots,” Bock said. “Obviously, we’re going to evaluate their decision.”
This story has been updated with additional details and comments.
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