Republicans Challenge Same-Day Registration; Court Hearing Set

As the polls closed in what was expected to be a tight race for governor in Connecticut, Republicans went to court to challenge what they say are improperly cast ballots in New Haven and Mansfield.

A Superior Court judge ordered some ballots cast by voters who registered on Election Day in New Haven and Mansfield secured for possible review. Judge Cesar A. Noble said he would hold a hearing on Friday to determine whether the ballots, totaling about 600-800, needed to be individually reviewed.

Concerned that people were improperly registered to vote while in line for same-day regis- tration, Republicans asked Noble to issue a temporary injunction to prevent those not properly registered from voting in New Haven and in Mansfield, where UConn students were waiting in long lines to register.

GOP attorney Herb Shepardson told the judge that registrars in New Haven and Mansfield told voters in line to raise their right hands and swore them in en masse, handed them ballots and let them vote.

“They were allowed to raise their right hands and were sworn in all at once and then handed ballots and allowed to vote,” Shepardson said. “We are not asking that they be thrown out, but set aside to be reviewed.”

But a city official who was

observing what happened said people were not being sworn in to vote, but were swearing they had not been previously registered. The official said they were then allowed to fill out a registration form and then cast a ballot.

Noble asked attorneys for both sides to call registrars in New Haven and Mansfield to see if they were segregating ballots between 7:30 p.m. and 8 p.m., which is the time frame in question.

At 9 p.m., there were about 50 people still in line who had been told they would be able to cast their vote in New Haven. Kevin Arnold, the moderator in New Haven, said he was not sure if those ballots would be counted because of the challenge.

Democratic attorney William Bloss said it appeared registrars were trying to make the best of a bad situation. He also questioned how it would be determined which individuals were improperly registered.

Arnold said about 100 ballots were segregated in New Haven and will be counted, but separately. Arnold said he had no direct knowledge of what Shepardson described as a mass registration of people in line.

Tad J. Bistor, a lawyer from Hartford, said he challenged 60-80 ballots in New Haven because he did not know if those voters were registered by 8 p.m. Arnold had denied the challenge but said those ballots will be segregated and possibly reviewed. Bistor would not say if he was representing a campaign.

The hearing got underway about 8:25 p.m., after polls had officially closed.