CAPITOL CROSSROADS: Candidates struggle with Indiana ballot hurdles

Clark County

Discussion

February 12, 2012

By TOM LoBIANCO Associated Press Sun Feb 12, 2012, 05:30 PM EST

INDIANAPOLIS — Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum and Fishers businessman Jim Wallace appear to have little in common beyond party affiliation. But both men find themselves fighting to stay on the ballot for Indiana’s Republican primary after falling just short of the signatures needed in the 7th Congressional District.

The two candidates could not be further apart as Republican primary candidates go. Santorum is running in the presidential race as a Christian conservative candidate to the right of front-runner Mitt Romney, and he struggled to raise enough money to stay afloat through the end of last year. Wallace, meanwhile, is spending close to $1 million of his own money to run for governor as a pro-business Republican to the left of U.S. Rep. Mike Pence.

But staffers for both men shared their frustrations with Marion County last week and debated a two-pronged strategy to ensure a spot on the ballot, including finding as many signatures as they could in the 7th District and parsing every signature disqualified by the county. Wallace was particularly frustrated after turning in 1,250 signatures in the district and having more than two-thirds of them disqualified.

In some cases, the Santorum team said, signatures were wrongly disqualified because spouses put quotation marks in the address line below where their husband or wife had signed, a practice accepted in other counties across the state.

“This is a flawed system,” Wallace said a few hours after filing to run for governor.

Ballot snafus transcend party lines. Indiana Democratic Party Chairman Dan Parker said on “Indiana Week In Review” that his signature was once briefly disqualified. Former Democratic Lt. Gov. Kathy Davis had her signature invalidated because she listed her address at “9th” street but Marion County’s rolls had her at “09th” street. Sen. John McCain was almost dropped from the ballot after a Democratic blogger pointed out that the eventual Republican nominee had come up short in Indiana’s 4th District.

But the high bar serves its purpose, said Democratic candidate John Gregg, who turned in thousands of signatures backing his run for governor last week.

Gregg said Indiana’s signature requirement prevents wide-open ballots jammed with less-serious candidates, as has occurred in states like California.

Before Arnold Schwarzenegger won election as governor of California in 2003, he had to terminate a field featuring more than 135 candidates, ranging from former child television star Gary Coleman to national gadfly Arianna Huffington, at that point well ensconced as a liberal after spending the ‘90s as a conservative.

All they had to do to get on the ballot was collect 65 signatures and pay the California secretary of state $3,500.

“It’s one of the things we do in Indiana so we don’t have a California-like ballot,” Gregg said.

Even so, Indiana’s rules have led to electoral chaos in before. In 2008, someone forged signatures to help then-Sen. Barack Obama clear the hurdle in Indiana’s 2nd District. The forgeries are still under investigation by the St. Joseph’s County prosecutor.

For Wallace and Santorum, the final say on ballot access will likely come from the Indiana Elections Commission, the four-member bipartisan board that hears challenges to candidate access. Dan Dumezich, the Republican chairman of the commission, said the law clearly states that candidates who don’t have enough certified signatures don’t make the ballot. But there appears to be some wiggle room.

The election commission voted unanimously four years ago to let McCain stay on the ballot. And Indiana law appears to give the voters, and the candidates, the benefit of the doubt. In the chapter addressing certifying signatures, the state errs on accepting signatures if there is a “minor” variation in name or address from what the county has on file.

“If you don’t have the signatures, you don’t make the ballot. The statute’s pretty clear,” Dumezich said. “But when we err, we tend to allow people onto the ballot to let people have a choice. But if something is plainly contrary to statute, it’s not on us to rewrite the law.”