The Supreme Court orders that all the candidate’s votes be counted by direct nomination in Guánica

He Supreme Court This afternoon he agreed with the judgment of the Court of First Instance of San Juan, which found that direct nominations should be taken into account for the nomination of Guánica mayor by direct nomination, Edgardo Cruz Vélez, even if the voter did not spell his name correctly. or did not check the box for direct nomination.

The determination of the highest judicial forum on the island presupposes that State Electoral Commission (EEC) must check all entries in the Guánica election contest to determine how many additional votes Cruz Vélez has by direct nomination even if the voter has not placed an X in the direct nomination box.

CEE reported that on Thursday, at 9:00, the parties must convene their respective officials to make a report of the Guánica election contest.

In the race for mayor of Guánica, the EEC certified the candidate People’s Democratic Party, Ismael “Titi” Rodríguez, winner with only 52 votes. In fact, yesterday Rodríguez took the oath after completing the transition process with the incumbent mayor, Santos Seda. Rodríguez was removed from office, even though the Supreme Court ruling has not yet taken place.

The decision of the Supreme Court was made by seven associate judges for and one against, Judge Rafael Martínez Torres.

“In the cases before our examination, it is clear from the ballot that the voter wanted to vote by direct nomination. In no case can we say that we replace the criteria of the voters, when what we do is to give the vote in favor of the person that the voter wrote on the ballot paper “, read the Supreme Court ruling, written by Associate Judge Erick Kolthoff.

Associate Judges Maite Oronoz, Luis Estrella and Mildred Pabón Charneco issued an agreement. While associate judge Ángel Colón Pérez issued a competing opinion.

The legal resource that the Supreme Court saw was presented by Rodríguez, who requested the annulment of a decision of Judge Anthony Cuevas, who decided that the EEC should grant the votes cast Edgardo Cruz Vélez, candidate for mayor of Guánica, by nomination direct. in his favor, despite the fact that the voter did not mark the rectangle of the box corresponding to the direct nomination with an X on the ballot.

Rodríguez thus challenged the appeal which was originally lodged with the Court of First Instance and was exceptionally accepted by the Supreme Court without going through the Appeal.

Rodríguez argued in his legal appeal that a direct nomination vote was valid only if he had his full name and valid mark in the appropriate box. This is because the voter who interacted with an electronic counting machine was warned that by not checking the box for direct nomination, his vote was wrongly voted.

“What the petitioner suggests is that this Curia ventures to interpret not the voter’s vote, which is limited to the doctrine of the voter’s intention, but his intention when interacting with the counting apparatus. As I have already said, there may be several reasons why a voter might ignore the warning that the electronic counting device probably does so because of an alleged deficiency in his vote. But, what is truly transcendental is what he finally expressed on the ballot paper “, indicates the decision of the Supreme Court.

For his part, in written statements, Rodríguez stated that “the judgment of the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico issued this afternoon on the two cases related to the electoral event, what they are doing is to validate what has already been decided by the Tribunal of First Instance. We argue, based on the records we have, that giving multiple votes that are not marked with an X to the direct candidate does not change the final election results. It is up to the State Electoral Commission (EEC) to examine the minutes, to respect the decision of the Supreme Court and to put an end to this problem ”.