August 4, 2006 7:23 AM

Be careful what you ask for....

Court rules GOP can’t replace DeLay on ballot

AUSTIN - A federal appeals court panel today in a bipartisan order ruled that former U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay cannot be replaced on the November ballot for the congressional seat he vacated in June. The Republican Party said it will quickly file an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but if it loses, DeLay will have to decide whether to actively campaign for office. He has hinted that he might. Texas Republican Chair Tina Benkiser had ruled DeLay was ineligible to serve because he had moved to Virginia, opening the door for Republicans to replace him on the ballot. The Texas Democratic Party sued, saying it was a subterfuge and that he had not really moved to Virginia.

OK, so the Texas Democratic Party won this battle, which given current law, is about as it should be. No one should be able to manipulate the electoral process to their advantage, which is exactly what Tom DeLay’s sham move to Virginia was designed to do. The law being what it is, Republicans in CD22 SHOULD be forced to dance with who brung them…and that would be DeLay.

Ultimately, though, I’m not certain that either side will emerge victorious from this struggle. Yes, Republicans are in fact attempting to manipulate the CD22 ballot to their advantage. They can claim (and they already are) that Democrats are using to courts to manipulate the ballot to THEIR advantage. The argument they make is that Democrats haven’t been able to win in CD22 since, well, since practically forever, they’re now desperately trying any means at their disposal to win DeLay’s seat.

Given that CD22 is a heavily Republican district, who do you think they’re going to believe- Democrats who claim to be demanding that Republicans follow the law, or Republicans who accuse Democrats of using the courts to win a seat they haven’t been able to claim at the ballot box? Honestly, the Democrats ARE right correct. Republicans ARE trying to manipulate the electoral process to ensure that they can keep the seat in light of Tom DeLay’s ethical and legal failings. In this case, though, being correct is less important than being believed. Republicans have a huge advantage in CD22 when it comes to waging a propaganda war. They speak with one voice, and they have the money and the connections to carpet bomb the media with their propaganda talking points. While Democrats may be on the right…er, correct…side of this argument, that hardly means that they’re going to emerge victorious is the court of public opinion. Far from it.

The three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals found in the Democrats’ favor and upheld an injunction preventing the Republicans from replacing DeLay. The panel said the U.S. Constitution’s only requirement for office is that DeLay be a resident of Texas on election day.

“When Benkiser reviewed the public records sent by DeLay and concluded that his residency in Virginia made him ineligible, she unconstitutionally created a pre-election inhabitancy requirement,” said the opinion written by Judge Pete Benavides for himself and Judges James L. Dennis and Edith Clement.

Benavides and Dennis were appointed to the court by former President Bill Clinton. Clement was appointed by President Bush, and he has considered the conservative jurist for an appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court. “Five judges have now looked at this, two of them appointed by conservative presidents,” said Democratic lawyer Chad Dunn. “It’s time to move on, and Mr. DeLay needs to decide whether he wants to be in the race.”

The court also questioned the Republican Party’s contentions that leaving DeLay on the ballot would deny voters a choice in the November elections.

“There is no evidence that DeLay, the incumbent candidate of a dominant political party, will receive only minimal support,” the court said. “Here, we fail to see how removing DeLay from the ballot would protect the voters, inasmuch as it was the voters themselves who selected DeLay as the Republican candidate for the general election.”

In the end, this argument is really about whether or not Tina Benkiser and the Texas GOP has the right to manipulate the electoral process to their advantage. So far, the answer from the courts involved has been a resounding “NO”. Of course, Texas Republicans may well keep fighting this battle until they reach the friendly (majority Conservative) confines of the US Supreme Court. Their problem, though, is that they’re dealing with a fairly compressed time frame. Election Day is three months away- not a lot of time to prepare and conduct a campaign. The state also has a deadline from printing ballots. Time, then, as well as the law, appears to be on the side of Texas Democrats. Of course, that’s not going to stop Republicans from pissing and moaning about the injustice of it all…and they’ll keep repeating those propaganda talking points often enough, that the faithful will adopt them as Gospel.

Ultimately, Democrats will win the battle, but I’m not at all certain that we’re going to win the war. I suppose time will tell. In the meantime, I’m just going to sit back and listen to Jared Woodfill, Tina Benkiser, and their ilk whine about the “injustice” of it all. Yeah, it’s a real bitch when you get pummelled at your own game, eh??

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on August 4, 2006 7:23 AM.

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