Iowa House of Representatives votes to not count the 29 uncounted ballots in Winneshiek County

Members of the Iowa House of Representatives engaged in a sometimes passionate debate Monday evening about whether to authorize the counting of 29 absentee ballots cast in the House District 55 election.  The discussion took nearly three and a half hours before the group voted 53-42 in support of a report saying the absentee ballots should not be counted.

Elections Contest Committee Chair Steven Holt, a Republican from Denison, presented the committee majority's report to the full House at the beginning of the debate at 5:00 p.m., recommending that it agree that the House "has no legal authority to open and count the 29 absentee ballots."

House Democrats immediately entered a resolution to substitute the minority report written by the two Democrats on the Elections Contest Committee.  Clinton Democrat Mary Wolfe, one of the two Democrats on the committee, told the full House, "we have a legal and moral obligation to make sure citizens in one county are treated the same as citizens in other counties."

Democrat Beth Wessel-Kroeschell of Story County argued, "29 ballots in Winneshiek County were counted on time--that's where this discussion should have ended."  Democrat Marti Anderson from Des Moines said, "I can't understand how an elected official could vote against counting the ballots."

The most fiery speech was made by Democrat Bruce Hunter, who said, "democracy demands that every vote be counted...for 29 people in Winneshiek County, democracy is dead."

But when a motion to substitute the minority report by Democrats was put to a vote, it failed, 53-45, with Decorah State Representative Michael Bergan abstaining.

House Democrats immediately went behind closed doors to caucus.

When they returned, the House again took up the majority vote, with Holt summarizing the reasons the three Republicans voted to deny Democrat Kayla Koether's petition.  The same number of representatives who voted against the minority report earlier--53--voted in favor of the majority report that the absentee ballots should not be counted.