Yahoo Finance Judge hearing election recount arguments pushes for specifics from NDP lawyer
A lawyer for the Newfoundland and Labrador NDP said in Supreme Court on Monday that election results in a St. John's district should be recounted because of problems with the way votes were counted.
Kyle Rees argued for a recount of votes in the St. John's East-Quidi Vidi district based on an affidavit from an election scrutineer who said some votes that were counted shouldn't have been, while others that shouldn't have been, were.
In her affidavit, NDP scrutineer Judy Vanta also said she couldn't properly observe the counting process because of COVID-19 restrictions.
Rees argued some of the ballots that were rejected should have been counted because they showed the voter's intention and didn't identify the voter, according to Vanta. But Justice Donald Burrage said nothing indicates why Vanta says the votes should have been counted.
Rees countered that Vanta couldn't guess why a particular ballot was rejected but could say it didn't meet any criteria for rejection.
When Burrage pressed Rees for clear evidence to show that individual ballots were improperly counted or rejected, Rees said Vanta would have liked to have seen every ballot.
Rees said Vanta reviewed some blue envelopes of mail-in ballots that were not opened and counted, and she believes some of those rejected ballots should count.
If a voter's signature is in the wrong place on the envelope, Rees argued, the vote should still count, but Burrage again wanted more information about specific special ballots that should have been opened.
Rees said if the recount doesn't happen there are 52 ballots that were rejected that the NDP hope to have scrutinized.
Specific evidence
Outside Supreme Court after the hearing, Rees said the party was frustrated by the need for specific evidence, because the problem is their scrutineer wasn't able to properly observe the count.
"In order to have a recount, we have to bring specific evidence. But the reason we are asking for a recount is that we were prohibited from gathering that specific evidence," Rees said.
"It's such a problem where we're in front of the court saying, 'Look, we'd love to give you all of the information that you are asking us for. We want that information, and in fact that's why we are here. So can we please open the ballot box so we can rest assured that there was no error made here?'"
A recount is automatically done if the margin of victory is ten votes or fewer. NDP Leader Alison Coffin lost to Liberal John Abbott by 53 votes, in the protracted 10-week election, which is facing three other court challenges, from defeated PC candidates Jim Lester and Sheila Fitzgerald, and another one from Coffin and a St. John's resident that argues the election process was not equally accessible to all voters.
Lawyers representing Elections NL and Liberal MHA John Abbott argued there isn't sufficient evidence to justify a recount.
Lawyer John Samms, representing Abbott, told reporters after the hearing they aren't concerned about the potential results of a recount.
"You can do 100 recounts and it's going to end up being the same result," he said.
"The law requires that there is a certain level of factual evidence that has to be proven before the court.… The affidavit evidence had said that the votes should have counted, that there were others that shouldn't have counted but the evidence didn't say why."
Burrage said he will give his decision by 2:30 p.m. on Wednesday. Elections NL chief electoral officer Bruce Chaulk was in court Monday to observe the hearing.
