Judge Rules 50,000 Iowa Absentee Ballot Applications Invalid By Rick Moran
A state judge has invalidated more than 50,000 absentee ballot application forms sent to voters in Linn County, Iowa, the second-largest county in the state.
The county auditor’s office almost completely filled out the ballot applications, despite the secretary of state’s directions that only the election date be included. The auditor’s actions may have also been against a state law that forbids government workers from filling out the forms.
Judge Ian Thornhill agreed with the Trump campaign, which had sued the county over the ballot applications.
The judge sided with the Trump campaign and the Republican Party, which filed a lawsuit this month seeking to discard the absentee ballot request forms. The Trump campaign argued the forms should have been blank except for the election date and type, per the Iowa secretary of state’s directions. Local officials in Linn County, which is home to Cedar Rapids, ignored those directions and sent out the applications with more information anyway.
“It is implausible to conclude that near total completion of an absentee ballot application by the auditor is authorized under Iowa law where the legislature has specifically forbidden government officials from partially completing the same document,” Judge Ian Thornhill wrote in a Thursday ruling.
“Not every county can afford the prepopulated request forms,” the judge also noted.
The county had mailed out 140,000 ballot request forms that had been mostly filled out. They got back 50,000. But now, the county is going to have to invalidate those ballots that were returned and send out new ones.
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