Green Party at $70k of $113k Needed in Ohio

Green Party has raised more than $70,000 towards $113,000 Ohio recount 11/11/2004 By John Byrne RAW STORY Editor The Green Party in concert with the Libertarian Party has raised more than $70,000 towards an estimated $113,000 filing fee for a recount of Ohio ballots in the presidential election as of 6:30 p.m. Friday evening, RAW STORY has learned. The party, which posted an appeal and press release at 11 a.m. Eastern time, has received a flood of small contributions, according to Green Party Media Coordinator Blair Bobier. Their donation site is available at gp.org “All of it is coming in small donations at this point,” Bobier said. “I think it’s just starting to get traction.” Ohio has seen a spate of reports of irregularities in the voting system, and one county refused to let bipartisan observers watch the vote. In a Columbus suburb, nearly 4,000 votes were erroneously tallied for Bush, though they were not cast by actual voters. In Mahoning and Mercer Counties, electronic machines malfunctioned; the machines had to be reset. At one point showed votes of “negative 25 million,” according to the head of the local board of elections. In Howard County, a judge ruled Election Day that everyone standing in line to vote at 7:30 p.m. had to eventually be allowed inside, but the Republican Secretary of State avoided the ruling by sending everyone home at 12 a.m., since the ruling only applied to Election Day. In Warren County, officials said they had been told of a threat of terrorism, though the FBI denied any such threat. “The integrity of the voting process is at stake,” Bobier said. “A recount is just part of that. Preferably there should be an investigation.” “Our country is so concerned about creating democracy in other countries,” he added. “I think we should manufacture it here before we export it elsewhere.” Asked if he had had any communication with the Democratic Party, Bobier demurred. But he said that rank-and-file Democrats were unhappy with the party for its unwillingness to take seriously the allegations of fraud. “I think that rank and file Democrats are disgusted with their party leadership,” he said. Bobier said the Greens had no hard evidence of fraud in Ohio, but were troubled by myriad irregularities in the state. “We want to see the numbers,” he said. Bobier noted that the Party had asked Republican Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell to step asid, saying that his partisanship was “definitely a problem.” Blackwell was chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign in Ohio. “It seems like there should really be a national standard that would prohibit people having dual roles like that,” he stated. Bobier, an attorney in Oregon, has a legal background in activism work, election reform and environmental work. He founded the Pacific Green Party of Oregon and has been active in the party since the late 1980s. The Green Party won less than one percent of the popular vote in the November presidential election.

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