Democratic gubernatorial candidate Chet Culver — the current state commissioner of elections — says there’s no need to change the way Iowa’s November balloting will be administered.
On Monday, New York Senator and former First Lady Hillary Clinton suggested Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell — a Republican candidate for governor in Ohio — should not run the November election there. She said it’s a “conflict of interest.”
Iowa Secretary of State Chet Culver — the commissioner of elections here — is the Iowa Democratic Party’s candidate for governor and Culver rejects the idea he shouldn’t oversee Iowa’s 2006 election.
“I am proud to be the Commissioner of Elections, the State Registrar of Voters,” Culver says. “We’ve had a tradition in this state of having a partisan in that office to make sure that someone is held accountable and responsible.” Culver points out that his predecessor Paul Pate, a Republican, ran for governor in 1998.
Culver says that’s evidence the way the Secretary of State’s office manages elections has not been a problem in Iowa. The office of Secretary of State in Iowa was created by congress even before Iowa became a state, and the person who holds the office is to oversee the activities of Iowa’s 99 county auditors.
Culver was criticized in 2004 for waiting several days before declaring that President Bush had carried the state.