A federal appeals court ruled Thursday that Ohio boards of elections must count ballots with errors caused by poll workers.
The Ohio ruling stems from SEIU v. Husted and NEOCH v. Husted, which both sought to block enforcement of a law that, as interpreted by the state's Supreme Court, allowed elections boards to throw out provisional ballots cast in the wrong precinct.
A federal judge ruled in August that the measure was likely unconstitutional, prompting the state to appeal to the Cincinnati-based Sixth Circuit.
The appeals court ruled that the state must count ballots cast in the wrong precinct but at the right polling place, as long as the error was the fault of a poll worker. (Some polling places serve voters from several precincts.)
A federal district court found that Ohio rejected more than 14,000 wrong-precinct ballots in 2008 and 11,000 more in 2010.
The ruling was Mr. Husted's second loss in recent weeks.
Related:
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