ANNANDALE-ON-HUDSON — Representatives of Bard College have filed a complaint with the enforcement division of the New York State Board of Elections against the Dutchess County Board of Elections in order to protest “the repeated violations of the New York State and federal constitutions, and state and federal statutes and regulations related to equal protection, the right to vote, youth voting rights, disability accessibility, and election law, that have occurred and continue to take place in District 5 in the Town of Red Hook.”
The complaint outlines what the college says is a pattern of discrimination and malfeasance by the county board that includes understaffing and underequipping the polling site at the Bertelsmann Campus Center at Bard, and repeated alleged actions that violate the rights of voters with disabilities.
The college took particular aim at Republican Elections Commissioner Erik Haight, whose “actions represent everything that is wrong with how elections are carried out in many parts of the United States,” said college Vice President for Academic Affairs and professor of Political Studies Jonathan Becker.
Haight disputed their assertions. “The Bard complaint is without merit,” he told Mid-Hudson News. “The Board of Elections complies with the election law, especially as it relates to minimum inspector requirements per election district.”
