Ophilia Ford Ousted

The Tennessee state senate voted 17-14 to set aside the controversial results of a special election for Senate District 29 held last September and ousted provisionally-seated Democrat Ophelia Ford.

First, some history. District 29 was previously held by John Ford, one of the most disgraceful politicians to ever occupy the political landscape in Memphis. John Ford is a member of the Ford dynasty which has controlled Memphis politics for decades but whose power appears to be fading. John Ford was arrested in the FBI sting Tennessee Waltz and he resigned, leaving the seat open.

John's sister, Ophelia Ford, ran for the seat against Republican Terry Roland. The Fords have occupied this seat for 32 years and no one believed it could be taken away. It is a heavily Democrat area occupied by mainly African-Americans that feel indebted to the Fords for having taken care of them for so long. The Fords are black and Roland is a white businessman. Bush received only 20% of the votes in this district.

Incredibly, on election night Roland seemed to be on his way to win. With all the precints in save one, Roland was up by 84 votes. At the last minute a ballot box was found that just put Ophelia over the top by 12 votes. The Ford powerhouse had delivered another last-minute miracle save.

Then the investigations began. Guess who voted? Dead people. Felons. People living in empty lots. Seemingly orchestrated by the Ford family as well documented by Thaddeus Mathews but a lot of credit must go to John Harvey, a lieutenant with the county's sheriff's department, who performed exhaustive research of the voter rolls and found:

... hundreds of voters who apparently have two active voter registrations, and several appear to have voted twice in the same election.

One last bit of information: in November of 2004 Republicans took a majority in the Tennessee Senate for the first time since reconstruction.

And so the stage was set for a challenge to the Ford family and yesterday's shocker:

The state Senate voted 17-14 Tuesday night to void Shelby County's special Senate District 29 election and remove Ophelia Ford from her brother's former seat, but must do so again Thursday before it becomes effective.

If Thursday's vote is the same, Ford would lose the seat immediately and the Shelby County Commission would appoint an interim senator to serve until the Nov. 7 general election.

Ophelia , of course, abstained from the vote. Republican Micheal Williams of Maynardville also abstained. He is the chairman of an investigating committee that will make its report on Thursday and Williams felt the Senate should wait for that report.

Without Williams' vote, Republicans needed one Democrat to cross over and they got it from Don McLeary of Humboldt who stands for reelection this fall.

Ophelia immediately played the race card:

"It's about racism. It's about 'Jim Crow'-ism," Ford said after the vote. "I'm black. It is 85% black vote in that district, District 29. They want this seat." She may file a federal lawsuit over the ouster, she said.

One wonders what dead voters have to do with race. Ah well.

Ophelia 's next move will be a play made famous by Gore in 2000: she'll try to litigate her way into office:

She said she will file a federal court suit challenging her removal. A federal court challenge, on civil rights grounds, is seen as the only legal avenue to contest her removal because the Tennessee Constitution gives the Senate sole authority to seat its members, a provision that would likely remove state courts from the process.

This is a great boost for Terry Roland who has worked tirelessly from the beginning of the campaign. Roland enthused:

This is great. This is the will of the people. This is what democracy is all about. I can't believe I'm part of it.

It remains to be seen how much of this stain will rub off on Harold Ford, Jr.'s campaign to take the federal senate seat to be vacated by Bill Frist.

On a final note, what should happen now is that the Shelby County Commission is to appoint a temporary replacement until a permanent replacement can be elected in November (both Ophelia and Terry are promising to run). The Commission has seven Republicans and six Democrats — although it should be noted that while all six Democrats are true-blue Democrats, not all seven Republicans are really all that Republican. I do not believe that the interim Senator will be a Republican no matter what the press thinks.

HT to TeamGOP

Say Uncle is impressed.

Bob Krumm says Ophelia is politically tone deaf and notes the distraction from other issues.

Blogging for Bryant says the State Senate did the right thing.

Update: Ophelia Ford was able to find a sympathetic judge to issue a temporary restraining order against the Tennesse State Senate, thus blocking the resolution that throws her back on the street. From TeamGOP:

Reportedly, Memphis Federal District Court Judge Bernice Donald, used the fair voting act to stop the duly elected state Senators in Tennessee from upholding their duties.

Perhaps Judge Donald believes that the fair voting act was to protect dead voters and felons.

It should also be noted that Judge Bernice Donald was nominated to the bench on Pearl Harbor Day in 1995 by none other than William Jefferson Clinton. Will we never stop suffering from that man's legacy?

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Posted on Wednesday at 9:16 AM in category Senate
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