The Buffalo News reports that Republican candidate Jane Corwin has won a court order holding off certification of the election until later this week:
Under the judge’s 11-page order, attorneys for Corwin have until Wednesday to serve copies of the court order on the election boards of Erie, Niagara, Genesee, Orleans, Wyoming, Livingston and Monroe counties, their sheriff’s departments, the state Board of Elections and her three opponents.Pending court proceedings before Buscaglia on Thursday at the earliest, the judge also impounded all voting equipment and enjoined the canvass of paper ballots “except as directed by this court” and “temporarily enjoined and restrained from certifying” the winner pending that court hearing.
Is there any precedent for this? Well, yes. Two years ago, in the first special congressional election of the Obama presidency – also in New York – Republican James Tedisco got a similar court order . His was actually even stranger:
Corwin doesn’t ask to be certified, and her request has some strong reasoning behind it. In 2009, Doug Hoffman narrowly lost the special election for NY-23, conceded immediately based on AP vote counts, and then realized that some counts were off. He “un-conceded” the election as new absentee counts came in. He
, but the immediate concession was a blow to his credibility, and he went on to lose the GOP’s nomination for the seat in 2010.
