Senator Phil Berger's campaign says some voters in the Senate District 26 portion of Guilford County may not have had the closely contested race on their ballots, potentially setting the stage for a formal elections protest in North Carolina's highest-stakes primary.
That complaint must be filed by 5 p.m. Tuesday. That deadline is just hours after the noon deadline for Berger's campaign to call for a machine recount.
Berger trails Rockingham County Sheriff Sam Page by 23 votes in the Senate District 26 Republican primary after Friday's canvass. It's an election that could reshape the leadership of North Carolina's General Assembly, with Berger, the Republicans' Senate leader, trailing after all ballots were counted.
And Monday's back-and-forth with the Berger campaign contacting voters to ask if they think they received the wrong ballot and the Page campaign contacting voters to warn them that signing a false affidavit could be a felony shows that the election is likely to take an ugly turn.
At least one voter in the Guilford County part of Senate District 26 told the Berger campaign he had received a ballot that did not have the Berger-Page race on it, Jonathan Felts, a Berger spokesman, said in a Monday afternoon statement.
"We then contacted other individuals who voted in that same community and have identified others who believe they were given the wrong ballot," Felts wrote.
Some of those voters have signed "sworn declarations" saying they received incorrect ballots, the Berger campaign statement said. As of about 4:45 p.m. Monday, the Guilford County Board of Elections had not received those statements, said Charlie Collicutt, the county's elections director.
Felts also said the Page campaign is reaching out to voters and warning them that questioning if they received the wrong ballot is "tantamount to a felony offense."
The location of those ballots is important. Senate District 26 is split between Rockingham County and much of rural Guilford County. Page won the Rockingham County portion of the district by effectively a 2-to-1 margin, while Berger won the Guilford County part by almost exactly the same margin.
Page campaign pushes back
In an interview with WUNC on Tuesday, Patrick Sebastian, a "post-election advisor" to the Page campaign, said the Berger campaign is calling people and asking if they will sign affidavits stating that they received an incorrect ballot.
"They're probably filing a protest," Sebastian said, calling the effort to question whether voters had received the right ballots "a Hail Mary."
Page has been receiving phone calls on his personal cell phone from people who are being contacted by the Berger campaign, Sebastian said, including at least one who doesn't live in Senate District 26.
Sebastian did acknowledge that the Page campaign sent out a text message asking voters to let Page officials know if the Berger campaign was asking them to sign a false affidavit.
"There is no way someone got the wrong ballot. This has already been looked into. ... There's just no 'there' there, but they're trying to cast doubt on it," Sebastian said.
It is difficult, Sebastian said, for elections officials to retrieve ballots cast on elections day. The Berger campaign could ask Guilford County elections officials to allow those voters to cast a new ballot in the race, he said.
Election protest coming?
Collicutt told the N.C. Newsroom late Monday that he had encouraged the Berger campaign to file a protest if it felt some voters may have been unable to cast ballots in the race.
"With what we are allowed to do at this time, I feel that we have been able to reconcile the ballots cast," Collicutt said.
Elections staff cannot review individual ballots unless a campaign files a formal protest. That protest would be filed in the county where the error is alleged to have occurred.
If the election's outcome holds, it will sway the balance of the power in North Carolina politics.
Berger has served as the Senate's president pro tempore, effectively the chamber's most powerful member, since Republicans took control of the General Assembly in 2011.
From that position, Berger has steadily overhauled the state's politics, accruing power in the General Assembly; slashing regulations and taxes; and spinning staff members out into powerful jobs across state government and consultant roles.
Page's campaign argued that Berger has lost touch with the district that sent him to Raleigh in 13 straight elections. Page, Rockingham County's longtime sheriff, pointed to Berger's efforts to bring three casinos to North Carolina, including one in their home county, as a sign that Berger no longer understood what those voters actually want.
In a message posted to social media on Sunday, Page said, "I'm looking forward to representing you in the 26th District covering Guilford and Rockingham counties. Remember, I want to work for you."
The primary's winner will face Steve Luking, a Democrat, in November's general election.
