EVERETT – When Republican activist Paul Elvig heard that Canadians had crossed into Whatcom County and registered to vote, he successfully sued to get them off voter rolls before any could cast their ballots.
That was in1972.
Today, Elvig, of Everett, is back in court as a plaintiff alongside Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi in the lawsuit to throw out Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire’s victory and force a new election.
Elvig said he witnessed none of the errors and wrongful acts alleged in legal papers filed thus far. Rossi’s lawyers sought him out, he said, because of his extensive knowledge of dangers in the ballot counting process.
“We have a system that is designed for disaster,” said Elvig, who has run Republican Party operations in Snohomish and Whatcom counties. “The suit will bring out to everyone, in living color, what we live with.
“It will contribute greatly to reform. That, to me, is the overarching high moral ground. Plus, it would get justice resolved,” said Elvig, who is president of Evergreen-Washelli Cemetery.
Snohomish County Auditor Bob Terwilliger said this election contest is not the right vehicle to make the changes that Elvig and critics like him desire.
“I think the system is in need of reform through a public debate in the Legislature. I think that’s going to happen,” said Terwilliger, who spent part of the week in Olympia meeting with other county auditors and state lawmakers to discuss the Nov. 2 election.
Nearly 2.9 million people cast ballots in the governor’s race, and the ballots have been counted three times. Rossi came out the leader by 261 votes in the initial count, and by 42 votes in the mandatory machine recount. In the final hand recount, Gregoire emerged with a 129-vote victory.
Rossi contested the election in a Jan. 7 lawsuit, asking a Chelan County Superior Court judge to order a new election.
The suit alleges that on Nov. 2, votes were illegally cast by felons and by dead people. It also argues that provisional ballots were mishandled and that discrepancies between the number of votes cast and voters credited with participating in the election make it unclear who actually won.
Every county and every county auditor is named as a defendant in the lawsuit.
Elvig, 62, recalled that as chairman of the Whatcom County Republican Party in the mid-’70s, he challenged a voter’s status because the person listed a vacant field as their home address.
“That’s the old ward system of politics, where parties make sure people voting in their precinct actually live there,” he said.
Political parties don’t do that anymore, and that’s a problem, he said. If Republicans had done that in Seattle, they would have noticed that hundreds of people who registered to vote had the same address – the King County Administration Building.
Elvig is critical of politicians for liberalizing voting rules to make it easier for people to cast ballots and harder to ensure that they do so legally. The federal requirement to offer provisional ballots furthers the threat of illegal voting, he said.
“I understand the civic spirit of it, but we have gone so far the other way that we end up with a Rossi-Gregoire outcome,” he said. “I was shaking my head (after the election) and saying we will never know who won.”
On Election Day, he worked as a Republican Party observer and reported no problems in the Snohomish County polling places he visited.
Yet, given what has been reported statewide since then, he had no hesitation in joining the lawsuit.
“I do believe there was error in this election, and enough of it that we need another election,” Elvig said.
He said inserting about 400 unchecked provisional ballots into counting machines in King County was an example. “It wouldn’t take anybody in Las Vegas to figure out that could change the outcome.”
Snohomish County leaders are of two minds in the election fight. Auditor Bob Terwilliger wants the lawsuit dismissed, while the Republican majority on the Snohomish County Council wants it to continue.
“We did everything right, and we don’t see any reason to be in the lawsuit,” Terwilliger said.
Gary Nelson, chairman of the County Council, said the public needs to know for sure who won.
“We haven’t seen the facts to substantiate that he hasn’t done anything wrong,” said Nelson, a Republican and former state lawmaker.
For now, the two elected leaders have the same lawyer to carry out their different marching orders.
Senior civil deputy prosecuting attorney Gordon Sivley has filed motions on behalf of the Auditor’s Office to have the case dismissed. He also has submitted papers that side with the Democratic Party’s request for a stay until the venue issue is decided.
Sivley filed a motion to pull Snohomish County out of the suit, arguing that only the auditor should be a defendant because that is who conducted the election. On Wednesday, the County Council voted 5-0 to have that motion withdrawn so the county can remain a defendant.
Nelson said withdrawing would “further dilute the confidence of the electorate (who believe that) by removing ourselves we have something to hide. We’ve got nothing to hide. The whole process needs to be played out.”
Nelson said he would like the matter to reach the state Supreme Court, and hopes the justices will order a new election.
If they do, Elvig said the election would be run with the “same rules that failed.” But, he said, “The rules would be followed so circumspectly that (the process) would squeak. That’s the important issue.”
Reporter Jerry Cornfield: 360-352-8623 or jcornfield@ heraldnet.com
Associated Press
Attorneys share documents before the start of a hearing Thursday in Wenatchee on the Republican lawsuit challenging Washington’s gubernatorial election.
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