Campaign Diaries

All 10 of NY-20’s counties have finished processing their absentee ballots, leaving Scott Murphy with a lead of 273 votes.

Just two days ago, the Democrat was ahead by only 86 votes, but he was expected to gain further since Tedisco’s stronghold of Saratoga County had finished reporting. “By the time we get to challenged ballots, Murphy’s lead could easily top 200 votes,” I wrote - and that is exactly what has happened.

The election battle now moves to the roughly 1,700 absentee ballots that were challenged by the two campaigns during the past 10 days. That is obviously a large enough number that Tedisco can mathematically take the lead, but the challenge looks insurmountable for the Republican: His goal is now to net 273 votes out of 1,500 challenged ballots, so we can easily calculate that he would need to win 58% of the challenged ballots.

Needless to say, that is highly unlikely given that Murphy has won a majority of the paper ballots that have already been counted and that Tedisco’s camp is responsible for the majority of these ballots being put aside. While Saratoga County has not released the partisan breakdown of voters whose ballots has been challenged, we know for sure that registered Democrats are dramatically over-represented in Columbia and in Washington.

Murphy’s campaign has released its database of challenged ballots to drive the point home. Their unofficial estimates are that 810 challenged ballots were cast by registered Democrats (45%), 653 from registered Republican (36%) and that 310 were cast from third-party/unaffiliated voters. Now remember:

• 46% of all absentee ballots were returned by Republicans, and 35% were returned by Democrats.
• Among the entire electorate, the GOP’s registration edge is even larger - 15%.

Simply put, this means that the pool of absentee ballots is less Republican than the electorate at large - and the subset of challenged ballots is itself dramatically more Democratic than the pool of absentee ballots. If the breakdown above is true (and the numbers certainly match everything else we have been hearing), we shouldn’t expect Tedisco to receive more than 40% of the challenged ballots - far from the 58% he needs.

We shall know more on Monday, when counties are set to start counting most of these challenged ballots. As I explained on Thursday, a judge ruled overruled most challenges by ruling that the application filed by a voter to receive an absentee voter can not be used as ground for objecting to a ballot.

But there is a glimmer of legal hope for the Republican: His lawyers are hoping to convince Judge James Brands to modify the implications of his rulings. Their two arguments:

1. Judge Brands based his ruling on a case called Jacobs v. Biamante, which ruled that campaigns did not have the right to demand copies of voters’ applications to receive an absentee ballot. But since that ruling concerned campaigns’ demands for such applications before Election Day, Republicans are arguing that the precedent does not apply.
2. Judge Brands rejected challenges based on a voter’s absentee ballot application because the determination that those applications are valid was already made weeks ago when the state Board of Election decided to issue the absentee ballots. But Republicans are pointing out that such a ruling is impractical as it would create logistical chaos if campaigns were allowed to challenge a Board of Election’s decision to issue absentee ballots.

At best, Tedisco can hope for the judge to rule that challenged ballots should be examined one by one in court - and that would certainly draw out the process.

But whatever the merits of these arguments, I am very confused about Tedisco’s strategy. Let’s say he convinces Judge Brands to reverse last week’s ruling and then manages to get hundreds of ballots tossed out - which certainly seems to be his goal. How will he then overcome Murphy’s advantage? The Republican is now trailing by 273 votes based on already counted ballots! The more challenged ballots are tossed out, the higher the percentage of those who are counted Tedisco would have to receive to net 273 votes - as if 58% was not already high enough.