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Stick withdraws election challenge
Does not want to create further divisiveness in House
By: J. Lyn Carl

AUSTIN (1/5/05) - State Rep. Jack Stick (R-Austin) today withdrew his challenge of the November General Election results in House District 50, but not before he blasted "deficiencies" in the Travis County voting system.

Continuing his contest of the election he lost to Democrat Mark Strama, Stick said, would not be in the best interest of his constituents, the Texas House or his family. The contest, he said, would "require a massive effort and result in further political division" in the House.

Stick is one of three Republicans to file challenges to their General Election results. All three challenges were to be heard in "mini-trials" set later this month. The other challenges are by incumbent Rep. Talmadge Heflin and Republican candidate Eric Opiela.

"For a democracy to survive, citizens must be confident their elections are conducted fairly and impartially," said Stick, citing a number of alleged irregularities in voting in Travis County that he believes could have affected the outcome of his race.

The Austin Republican, who is not ruling out a return to political office in the future, said that in Travis County's November election, more than 2,300 individuals voted for the first time, despite having been registered to vote for more than five years and having previously never cast a vote during that time.

Bolstered by statistics from political activist Mac McGuire, Stick said more than 700 of those 2,300 lived outside Travis County and more than 200 who voted no longer live in Texas.

Stick called the list of suspense voters in Travis County "inadequate and inaccurate" and alleged that the voter rolls in the county are full of the names of people who did not vote, have not voted in years, or have died.

He said in last year's General Election, every voter on the suspense list voted early, which he said election experts say is "statistically impossible." He said there were 16,000 new registrations for the General Election, with 8,000 of those new registrations in the last 90 days of the registration period and 2,300 on the last possible day to register.

"The only thing that separates this country's elections from those of Third World countries is the level of confidence voters have in the outcome," said Stick, adding, "We have a problem with the system of voting in Travis County." But he noted, "The Legislature is bigger than this race."