LACAG: New Orleans Election Officials Fail to Secure Recall Signatures to Get Rid of Corrupt Mayor
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell may be the worse Mayor in the Country. She presides over one of the most crime-plagued Cities in the Country. Orleans Parish residents have had enough. On February 22, 2023, at 3:50 PM Orleans Parish voters who are determined to recall Cantrell delivered roughly 60,000 boxed signatures to Orleans Parish Registrar of Voters Sandra Wilson at the ROV office. The recall organizers provided Wilson more than enough legitimate signatures to trigger a recall vote on Cantrell. This was a feat that nobody thought was possible. It is a real David and Goliath story for the ages that resulted from the sort of tenacity and perseverance this Country could use much more of.
Recall Chairman Belden Batiste returned to Wilson’s office two days later, on February 24, 2023, to check on her progress in verifying and certifying the recall signatures. What he saw, and filmed, was stunning. The boxes were situated on an open counter in the ROV office, completely unattended, and lids removed. It was not until ROV personnel realized that Batiste was filming that the boxes were removed, one by one, to another location in the building.
Batiste captured video evidence that the boxes of recall signatures were not properly secured upon delivery to the ROV office and remained unsecured for at least 48 business hours before being removed to what one can only hope was a more secure location. It appears that, for at least two full business days, the evidence was fully accessible to anybody. There was nothing preventing any person from manipulating this evidence in any number of ways, including but not limited to theft of petition sheets. The Orleans Parish ROV has no way of reassuring the citizens of New Orleans that this has not occurred.
We are talking here about the citizen recall of a corrupt Mayor of one of the most famous cities in America. More fundamentally, we are talking about the exercise of a core constitutional right by tens of thousands of Orleans Parish citizens. It is both alarming and unacceptable that the custody and control of the signatures upon which that recall, and that right, depend would not have been managed with greater care. These boxes should have been secured upon delivery and kept fully secured 24 hours a day, 7 days a week until properly verified and certified.
In an age when one thinks it is nearly impossible for public officials to act more brazenly, here it is. Will Wilson be held accountable? Will Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin, Louisiana’s chief election official, make a public statement about this, and express his disapproval? We must hope so. This breach of public trust is a cause for enormous concern not just for citizens in Orleans Parish but across Louisiana. Wilson must reassure the public that this most important matter, from this point forward, will be handled in a manner that is totally non-partisan and absolutely beyond reproach. Or she should resign.
Christopher Alexander is with the Louisiana Citizen Advocacy Group www.lacag.org
