Cabinet hopeful outlines plan for election reform

George Sheldon, candidate for attorney general, calls for an independent, bipartisan elections board.

By ALISA ULFERTS, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published July 9, 2002

TALLAHASSEE -- Democratic attorney general candidate George Sheldon unveiled an ambitious platform of election reform Monday aimed at removing the taint of partisan politics from future recounts.

"In the end, the state will have an appropriate check on the political passions that are an important part of the democratic process, but that have no place in the elections process," Sheldon said.

Sheldon was joined at a news conference by Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho, who said he hoped other candidates adopted Sheldon's call for a constitutional amendment requiring an independent, bipartisan board of elections. Sheldon also wants the Legislature to make local elections supervisors like Sancho to be nonpartisan.

Sheldon alluded to two state Cabinet officials -- his boss, Attorney General Bob Butterworth, and Secretary of State Katherine Harris -- who were statewide chairmen for Al Gore and George W. Bush, respectively, in the 2000 presidential election.

Only one used a state position to affect the outcome of the election, Sheldon said, meaning Harris, and that's why he wants to remove any hint of partisanship from Florida elections.

Sheldon didn't mention the phone calls Butterworth made advising Volusia County elections officials on ballot recount issues despite his role in the Gore campaign.

"I'm not here to cast stones regarding the presidential election of 2000," Sheldon said. "It was not the people involved ... who caused the problem. The problem came from a system that was incapable of guaranteeing the independence of those in a position to decide."

Harris has denied that politics played any role in her decisions during the recount.

Of the six attorney general candidates, Sheldon has the least amount of money, but perhaps the closest ties to Butterworth as one of his deputies since 1999.

Sheldon hopes to get the proposed constitutional amendment on the 2004 ballot.

"I don't think there is any better thing to do with my time" than ensure the next election is fair, Sheldon said.

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