Vermont secretary of State says Kavanaugh’s correction still unsatisfactory

Vermont Secretary of State James Condos (D) criticized Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s correction to a claim he made in a Monday opinion about the state’s efforts for accommodating an increase in early voting, saying the justice “simply got this wrong.” 

Condos issued a statement on Thursday in response to the correction, which Kavanaugh made after Condos wrote a letter to the high court criticizing the opinion for claiming that the state had not made any changes to its election rules to accommodate the coronavirus pandemic.

“Justice Kavanaugh simply got this wrong,” Condos said in his statement. “I’m glad he admitted a mistake and modified his opinion, but a one-word addition doesn’t go far enough.

“The opinion still misrepresents the significant changes we made here in Vermont to ensure every vote counts in the middle of a global pandemic, so that no voter has to choose between their health and their right to vote,” Condos added. 

Condos pointed to several measures the state has taken to accommodate mail-in ballots, including enabling curbside and outdoor voting and allowing clerks to process ballots 30 days ahead of Nov. 3. He then blasted the opinion of the court for its “total lack of regard for the voting rights of American citizens.” 

“We have enough work on our hands combatting foreign disinformation attacks on our democratic process, all done in an attempt to weaken voter confidence in the integrity of our elections,” Condos said. “We should not need to do the same with our own Supreme Court Justices or President.” 

The high court ruled 5-3 on Monday along ideological lines to deny Democrats’ request to extend the deadline for receiving mail-in ballots in the key battleground state of Wisconsin up to six days after Election Day. 

Kavanaugh wrote an opinion concurring with the majority, in which he said that Vermont “decided not to make any changes to their ordinary election rules, including to the election-day deadline for receipt of absentee ballots.” 

The updated version of the opinion reads, “Other States such as Vermont, by contrast, have decided not to make changes to their ordinary election-deadline rules, including to the election-day deadline for receipt of absentee ballots.”

The opinion came under significant criticism from Democrats and voting rights advocates, who say he is promoting President Trump’s unfounded claims that mail-in voting would lead to widespread voter fraud. 

He further wrote that states “want to avoid the chaos and suspicions of impropriety that can ensue if thousands of absentee ballots flow in after election day and potentially flip the results of an election.”