A settlement was announced on Tuesday between Luzerne County, Pennsylvania and two voters who the county acknowledged were disenfranchised after election officials failed to procure a sufficient quantity of ballot paper during the 2022 midterm elections.
The lawsuit was brought by Luzerne County voters William French and Melynda Anne Reese, according to a press release from the non-profit elections ethics organization, the Center for Election Confidence (CEC).
First filed in 2022, CEC Executive Director Lisa Dixon told The Pennsylvania Daily Star the lawsuit was only resolved weeks before the 2024 elections because county officials, “didn’t think they’d be held accountable.”
Luzerne County faced accusations of insufficient ballot paper immediately after the election, prompting former Republican congressional candidate Jim Bognet to sue over whether his race was impacted by Election Day voters who were unable to wait long periods to cast a ballot.
While Dixon told The Daily Star that Luzerne County, “wasn’t the first place a ballot shortage has happened and it hasn’t been the last,” she said the legal action will have a tangible impact on election integrity.
“Because the two voters supported by Center for Election Confidence, Mr. William French and Ms. Melynda Anne Reese, had the courage of their convictions to see this case through and stand up for their rights and the rights of every other voter who couldn’t simply stand around waiting for more ballot paper to be delivered, all Luzerne County voters can have confidence that the election this fall will be administered better than those in the past,” said Dixon.
As part of the settlement, Luzerne County will adopt written election policies and procedures, order sufficient new ballot papers after each election cycle, and enforce training for new and existing employees. It will also retain an election attorney to guide the county’s policies.
The settlement will prevent the county from “threatening the voting rights of eligible voters through incompetence,” the CEC executive director told The Daily Star.
Dixon explained, “all employees who run elections will now be regularly trained and all new Bureau of Elections employees will be trained on state and federal election laws, county election policies and procedures, procedures for procuring supplies such as ballot paper, standard procedures at polling places, and troubleshooting problems on Election Day.”
Last week, Luzerne County agreed to reprint and reissue about 6,700 ballots after Dominion Voting Systems reportedly took responsibility for misspelling a candidate’s name.
In September, Republicans gained a slim majority of registered voters in Luzerne County, which is located in northeast Pennsylvania and covers part of Scranton.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “People Counting Ballots” by City of Fort Collins, CO. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.
