posted by Sharon F. Blakeney on Jan 29
When Republican Scott Brown won the late Democrat Ted Kennedy’s seat in the U.S. Senate on Jan. 19, Boerne solo Sharon Blakeney was in Massachusetts, where she worked on the Brown campaign’s legal team that monitored polling places. Blakeney says Brown’s campaign retained her to serve on one of the roving teams of lawyers who monitored, documented and challenged violations of election procedures and voting irregularities at nine polling locations in Boston. Brown ran against Democrat Martha Coakley, the Massachusetts attorney general. Just having the lawyers monitoring discouraged voter fraud, says Blakeney, who has worked in a number of elections in the past. Blakeney says she was involved in the 2000 Florida presidential election litigation representing absentee voters in Ronald Taylor, etc., et al. v. Martin County Canvassing Board, etc., et al. and Harry N. Jacobs, etc., et al. v. Seminole County Canvassing Board, etc., et al.at the Florida Supreme Court. Blakeney says that in 2004, she worked in Philadelphia as an attorney for the Republican National Committee, monitoring and documenting voter fraud and other voter irregularities in the presidential election. In the 2008 presidential election, she again worked for the RNC, monitoring voting in St. Louis, Mo., Blakeney says. In Massachusetts, Blakeney had an opportunity to talk to Brown, who she had not known before the election. Following a news conference the day after the election, Blakeney joined Brown in walking his dogs (pictured). “He really is just a regular guy,” Blakeney says.
– Mary Alice Robbins