Published 6:27 am Thursday, October 31, 2024 By Minnesota Public Radio By Clay Masters, Ellie Roth, Cathy Wurzer and Gretchen Brown, Minnesota Public Radio News Minnesota Republicans and the conservative Minnesota Voters Alliance scored a pre-election court victory that will require the state’s most-populous county to redo its makeup of a panel overseeing absentee ballots. In a ruling Tuesday, the Minnesota Supreme Court sided with the groups in a lawsuit over election judges appointed to an absentee ballot board in Hennepin County. Those entities argued that Hennepin County failed to exhaust a list of Republican-preferred election judges when filling out its ballot board.
Justices gave the county until Friday to come into compliance. The court ordered the county to redo its election judge selections in a fashion that first goes through the lists provided by the GOP even if it means taking extra steps to contact the potential judges. “To exhaust the party lists for a county absentee ballot board, a county must first attempt to appoint all potential election judges on the party lists who reside within the county.
But respondents appointed election judges to the Hennepin County Absentee Ballot Board from outside the party lists without first contacting Hennepin County residents on the lists,” Chief Justice Natalie Hudson wrote in the court’s order. Absentee ballot boards in Minnesota examine envelopes for proper signatures and take other steps to review ballots prior to.