The secretary of state threw out dozens of signatures from gubernatorial candidate Marc Holtzman’s ballot petitions that appear to be valid, a Denver Post review of rejected signatures found.
Some of the people who were rejected confirm that they’re qualified and can’t understand why their signatures were disqualified. Still, Holtzman would fall short of the signature requirements in the 1st and 7th congressional districts even if the apparently valid signatures were added.
The fight – and the fate of Holtzman’s candidacy – seems to rest in the 4,239 disqualified signatures that could not immediately be matched with voter records to determine if they’re valid.
Mark Grueskin, an attorney working for Holtzman, said Holtzman’s campaign workers are also finding valid signatures that have been tossed, but he doesn’t believe there is a conspiracy to keep Holtzman off the ballot.
“I don’t think the secretary (purposely) did anything wrong,” Grueskin said.
“They just hired temporary workers not used to working in the world of elections, and in many instances they took the easy way out.”
Dana Williams, spokeswoman for Secretary of State Gigi Dennis, said she could not talk about specific signatures because of expected litigation, but she conceded that the office’s work might not be perfect.
“When checking candidate petitions, there is some human error, and that is why we do protest hearings,” Williams said, adding that Holtzman’s opponents are saying that the secretary approved signatures that are not valid.
The Post analysis found specific instances in which valid signatures were thrown out.
In the two key districts, 20 names that the secretary of state said were not in the computer, had no valid address or were not affiliated with the Republican Party are exact matches to voter record rolls, a comparison of voter registration and signatures databases found.
At least 22 additional names are so close that they probably should have been validated by secretary of state workers. Those people signed the petition using their middle names instead of first names or there was a typo in their address or another minor difference.
However, even if every name that could be matched to a district by combining rejected signatures and voter records were validated, Holtzman would fall 161 signatures short in the 1st and 268 short in the 7th. Many of the 4,239 signatures rejected by the secretary of state when workers were unable to find them in the database could not immediately be matched to congressional districts. It is possible those signatures would close the gap.
The people whose names were invalidated seemed surprised but were not upset.
“I had the qualifications to sign the petition,” said Scott Meiklejohn, a Lakewood resident.
“Campaign petitions are difficult and I’m sure a challenge to verify.”
Meiklejohn’s signature was disqualified because secretary of state workers said he was not a registered Republican, but voter rolls show he has been a Republican since 1979.
Vernon Kettering’s signature was disqualified because workers could not find him in the voter database, but he has been a registered Republican since 2002.
Kettering said he might have been disqualified because he has been too busy to vote in recent elections, but his valid registration should have qualified his signature to count.
“I didn’t think anything like that would happen,” he said.
Staff writer Arthur Kane can be reached at 303-820-1626 or akane@denverpost.com.
