Harris judicial candidate Pierre sues to overturn November result

Because of the voting registration failures of Paul Bettencourt, of course:

The Democratic candidate who lost a Harris County judicial race by 230 votes last month is asking a court to make him the winner, saying a variety of alleged vote count and voter registration failures by the county cost him a victory.

Democrat J. Goodwille Pierre, a lawyer who manages small business programs for the Houston airport system, is no stranger to voting rights lawsuits; he said he worked on such issues in Texas for the liberal group People For The American Way, particularly on behalf of Prairie View A&M University students registering in Waller County.

Now the first-time candidate is filing suit on behalf of his own campaign against Republican civil court Judge Joseph "Tad" Halbach of the 333rd District Court.

This lawsuit is only slightly related to the TDP's own, filed yesterday, which points to the same shenanigans.

Both suits now allege that outgoing Tax Assessor-Collector Paul Bettencourt, a Republican who also serves as voter registrar, rejected legitimate voter registration applications.

Pierre's lawsuit also cites a non-partisan ballots board's rejection of about 5,800 ballots cast by voters who, according to records from Bettencourt's office and other agencies, had not been properly registered. The ballot board chairman said some of the ballots, after being processed by Bettencourt's staff, had information obscured by correction fluid.

"Had all persons who cast a vote in this race been allowed to have their vote counted; it would have changed the outcome of the election by providing Pierre with more votes than Joseph "Tad" Halbach," the suit said. "Moreover, various irregularities make it impossible to ascertain the true outcome of the election."

Ah, the Wite-Out caper again. Recall that it was the GOP ballot board chairman who caught it?

But Republican Jim Harding, a retired Houston business executive who chairs the ballot board of about 35 people, said the counting process was delayed by faulty work by Bettencourt's staff.

The problems included hundreds of voter forms whose information the registrar's staff masked with white correction fluid and then altered with new information, Harding said.

As ballot board members determined whether ballots should be counted, he said, they wanted to have confidence in the accuracy of the registrar's research.

But "that kind of confidence is not replicated here, and then when they see this 'white-out' all over the place they get nervous," he said.

I don't know what to expect out of Pierre's complaint, other than to draw more heat to Bettencourt's misadventure. Pierre is a respected local attorney and Democratic activist; he also challenged Kaufman for the county clerk's position in 2006.

With the breaking news earlier this afternoon that Joan Huffman has likely violated campaign election law by holding a political rally in the same building as an early voting poll, one thing we know for certain is that Vince Ryan is going to be one busy guy.

Huffman violates campaign law with rally at poll

Posted about half an hour ago. Paul Bettencourt probably told her it was OK:

Joan Huffman's campaign for state Senate appears to have broken the law against campaigning on property where voting is taking place, Harris County Clerk Beverly Kaufman said today.

Republican Huffman, opposing Democrat Chris Bell in next Tuesday's state Senate District 17 runoff, hosted a barbecue luncheon for voters today inside the Tracey Gee Community Center in far west Houston. Early voting in the state Senate election is taking place through Friday in another room in the same building.

Commissioner Steve Radack, a Republican, said he attended the luncheon along with Huffman and urged people to vote for her. She is a former felony court judge.

Under state law, it is a Class C misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of up to $500, to campaign for or against a candidate "within 100 feet of an outside door through which a voter may enter the building in which a polling place is located."

Radack said a member of Kaufman's staff working at the early voting station took no action after checking into a complaint by a voter. But Kaufman said the event was "ill-advised" and should not have taken place there, regardless of the distance between the two rooms inside the community building.

Kaufman said it was up to a voter to pursue any charges against the campaign. The voter who complained to the election worker said she, indeed, would do so.

Just another reason to go vote for Chris Bell (as if you need one).