Secretary of State Pate pens letter to Pelosi on 2nd congressional district challenge

DES MOINES — Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate has sent U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi a letter, urging her to drop a review of Iowa’s second district congressional race.

“Iowans should have the final say in all of Iowa elections, not DC politicians,” Pate says.

The U.S. House Committee on Administration is reviewing Democrat Rita Hart’s petition calling for an examination of 22 ballots that were not counted in six-vote loss to Republican Congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks.

Pate, who is a Republican, spoke at a recent news conference at Iowa GOP headquarters.  “The General Election and the recounts were conducted in a bipartisan manner,” Pate said. “There are 12 Republican county auditors and 12 Democratic county auditors in the second district.” Pate said.

Pate says recount boards in all 24 counties were bipartisan and at the end of the process, Miller-Meeks was certified the winner by a bipartisan group of statewide elected officials. Hart says Iowans deserve to know that the candidate who got the most votes is seated to represent them in congress.

Hart is not claiming fraud, but that legally cast absentee ballots were excluded from the November recount. One was sealed with tape after the voter ripped the return envelope. Some of the others were cast by disabled people through curbside voting, but their ballots were rejected by voting machines.