Should Al Jaeger Go To The Pokey?

Note: It took me a long time to work through this Jaeger screwup deal, and I want to approach the results, at least in my mind, slowly, so please bear with me as my thought processes turn until I get to the point at the end of this story.

I’ve been on the fringes of enough elections to know most of what is in Section 16.1 of the North Dakota Century Code, which holds North Dakota’s elections laws. So have North Dakota Secretary of State Al Jaeger and Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem. In fact, they should know exactly what those laws are, since they are charged with carrying them out and enforcing them. Sadly they are not doing that. I say sadly because the laws that govern elections should be the most sacred laws of all in a democracy. They are what makes us a shining example to the people of third world, dictator-led countries who have no election laws. Who have no elections.

Secretary of State Al Jaeger made the biggest screwup I’ve ever seen a North Dakota elected official make: He left a candidate’s name off the ballot. By leaving that candidate’s name – Joshua Voytek, a Libertarian – off the ballot, he denied that candidate the subsequent opportunity to appear on the November election ballot as the Libertarian Party’s candidate for the Public Service Commission. Period.

Wait. Erase that period. Wayne Stenehjem to the rescue. “A fiery horse, with the speed of light, a cloud of dust, and a hearty ‘Hi Yo Silver !’ Wayne Stenehjem, the Lone Ranger, rides again!”

The Associated Press reports that Jaeger realized his mistake May 24 and called Wayne Stenehjem right away to ask what to do. I can just about imagine Wayne's response:

“Aw, never mind the law, go ahead and put him on the ballot anyway,” Wayne says to Al. "If the guy sues us, there are going to be more newspaper stories, and TV stories, and it’s going to get really embarrassing for you, and you’re up for re-election this year, and you’ve been a good soldier, ruling in favor of Republicans in every election dispute, in fact you’ve been the most partisan (thank God you’re on our side) Secretary of State ever, and I’ll be running for Governor one of these days and I know I don’t want this young Mock guy in that office making sure the state is following the law if I screw up somehow, and I don’t want to piss off those Libertarians, because most of them will vote for you and me this November if we treat them right, and they’ll be pissed at the Democrats if they challenge this, and we’re going to lose in court anyway if this guy Voytek sues us, so just flout the law, and see if anybody sues us for doing that.”

Well, somebody should. Sue them. Problem is, Stenehjem and Jaeger know nobody will, because then it will look like whoever sues is trying to keep this guy off the ballot. So there’s this big ass-covering going on which makes the problem go away from the news and from the minds of voters when they go to the polls in November. Well, that’s a worrisome and dangerous precedent—allowing a state official to break the law just because it is more convenient than proceeding through the judicial system to solve the problem legally.

What should be (have been) done? Let’s go back a month, to May 24, the day Jaeger discovered his screwup, according to Associated Press stories. What did Jaeger do that day to address the problem? Nothing, officially, except to go next door to Stenehjem’s office and said “I made an oops, please help me fix it.” It looks like, from the AP story, that it took Wayne three weeks or so to finally say “Okay, Al, I’m going to get you off the hook on this one, because we’ve got the Democrats in a tight spot. They won’t dare challenge me because then they will be the bad guys for keeping this guy off the ballot.”

Well, this is nuts. Elected officials can’t just make up new laws when they break an old one. What country is this—Iran? North Korea? One of those countries that ends in “stan”? Government officials don’t like the law so they jut make up new ones? Happens in those “Axis of Evil” countries all the time, but in North Dakota?

Instead, Jaeger (likely upon Stenehjem’s advice) hid the problem until after the election and then announced that it didn’t matter, Voytek was going on the ballot anyway.

As for Stenehjem’s rationalization that “we’d lose in court anyway,” that is equally outrageous. What the hell is up with that? Who gives Wayne Stenehjem the power of the court? We don’t need a court system—we’ll just let Wayne (Ahmadinejad) Stenehjem decide what’s legal and what’s not. Way cleaner and more efficient. Let’s not screw around with a messy court system. Sheesh.

Jaeger should have called Mr. Voytek the day he discovered the error, more than two weeks before the election, brought him into the office, and said “Look, we made a mistake.” Then he should have provided Mr. Voytek with legal counsel, they should have filed a suit asking the Supreme Court to take original jurisdiction (they can do that—remember back in 1985 when we had two governors and they resolved that in just a couple days?). Then the decision could have been made by the court and had the force of law instead of this arbitrary unofficial verbal opinion by Stenehjem which may in the long run be challenged anyway, at a much greater cost to the state. Then there should have been a big publicity effort to get the word out to write in Voytek’s name if you’re a Libertarian and support him, and they could have even printed stickers, which has been done in other similar cases.

But no, that would have been embarrassing for Al just before an election, so it was covered up for three weeks, and then solved by collusion by a couple of Republican elected officials. All of this, I repeat, is unforgiveable. Al Jaeger should be held accountable. Not just for the screwup—that was made by someone in his office. But for the coverup. Coverups are almost always worse than the original mistake. Ask Richard Nixon.

Now, here’s the danger. Let’s say, by some fluke, Voytek wins the job in November. Let’s say Voytek attracts a huge amount of money and runs a great campaign, and wins (the Republican candidate for that PSC job, Kevin Cramer, is pretty much a party hack who just likes to see his name on the ballot for something—anything—and Brad Crabtree is pretty much an unknown). Or, maybe Cramer gets tired of the criticizing by Crabtree on decisions about MDU and Ottertail Power, and challenges Crabtree to a duel, and they are both killed (actually a more likely scenario than Voytek winning), leaving Voytek as the only living choice. NOW watch the lawsuits start to fly. That’s going to be interesting. Here’s a candidate who wasn’t even on the ballot legally, about to become an elected North Dakota Public Service Commissioner. Somebody’s going to be looking to nullify that election and hold a new one, you can count on that. Uffda. Then we got a mess.

But hold on—maybe there’s a little more to this story. Back in May, the sample ballot was printed, twice, in every one of the 53 official county newspapers. I’m finding it almost incomprehensible that the Libertarian candidate did not bother to look at the sample ballot in one of those county newspapers and notice his name was not there. I mean, I’ve never run for public office, but if I did, I’m pretty sure I’d look at the ballot to see my name on it—that would be pretty cool, at least for a first-time candidate like Mr. Voytek. But apparently Mr. Voytek didn’t even bother to do that. The AP story says “Voytek was not informed of the oversight until June 16, three weeks later.”

Something’s fishy. Didn’t Voytek vote, either? The election was June 8, more than a week before, as the AP reports, he was told his name wasn’t on the ballot. I can hardly imagine he didn’t vote. What about the Libertarian leadership? Didn’t they vote?

Or DID he see the sample ballot in the papers? DID he notice that his name wasn’t there, and call Al Jaeger to see what’s up? DID the coverup start way back when the ballots were first printed in the paper? DID Voytek call Jaeger, only to be told, back in May or early June, well before the election, “Don’t worry, we’ll put you on the November ballot anyway. But you’ve got to keep this a secret until after the primary. If you go public and make a stink, then you’re probably going to end up having to sue the state to get your name on the ballot, and that is going to be time consuming and expensive, and you might not win. But if you just keep quiet until then we’ll take care of you. Deal?”

If that’s the case, that would be a serious crime, an elected official making a deal like that well before an election. If that happened, then Jaeger should be disqualified from office and go to the pokey. And anyone else who knew about the illegal deal should go with him. Conspiracy is a crime in North Dakota. And Voytek, if he was a party to such a deal, should not be on the November ballot.

If, however, Voytek didn’t even bother to read the paper and look at the sample ballot, or didn’t bother to cast his vote, and didn’t bother to find out why his name wasn’t on the ballot until eight days after the election, and really was an innocent player in all this, then Heaven help us if that Cramer/Crabtree duel takes place and someone as dufus as that gets elected.