Commissioner’s wife’s electioneering case goes off early, avoiding news coverage | Opinion
The case against Meghan Blubaugh, the wife of Sedgwick County Commissioner Jeff Blubaugh, was settled with an early morning deal before her first court appearance on a charge of illegal electioneering, which was scheduled to take place 10 a.m. Thursday.
I was at the courthouse at 10 a.m., only to find that Blubaugh and her case had already come and gone.
About all we know right now is that she was allowed to execute a diversion agreement.
That’s where prosecutors, in this case the Sedgwick County District Attorney’s office, agree to suspend the case and eventually drop all charges if a defendant pays a fee, keeps out of further trouble for a specified period of time, and meets other conditions that may be imposed.
It may be a reasonable outcome, but it was done in a way that thwarted news coverage of what has been a high-profile case since late October.
It raises the specter of a defendant who got special treatment, both at the original crime scene, where she was allowed to vote while wearing a shirt urging the election of her husband, and later in court, where she was allowed to go early.
On Oct. 29, an alert reader of mine spotted Meghan Blubaugh wearing a T-shirt with her husband’s name on it while in line to vote at the early voting site at Evangel Presbyterian Church. Jeff Blubaugh, a former Wichita City Council member, was in line with her and on the ballot that day. He later won the election, unseating incumbent Commissioner Sarah Lopez to move up to the county office.
Meghan Blubaugh’s shirt was about as clear as it gets in violating the state’s law against electioneering at and around the polls: “Electioneering includes wearing, exhibiting or distributing labels, signs, posters, stickers or other materials that clearly identify a candidate in the election . . . within any polling place on election day or advance voting site during the time period allowed by law for casting a ballot by advance voting or within a radius of 250 feet from the entrance thereof.”
In just about every election I’ve ever covered here, somebody doesn’t get the memo and shows up with a candidate’s name on a shirt, hat, button or sticker. It’s not a big deal and I’ve never seen or heard of anybody being prosecuted for it before now.
Ordinarily, poll workers politely inform the voter that they’re violating the law and offer them the chance to remove their campaign swag, or to go in the rest room and turn their shirt inside-out before voting.
If that had happened in the Blubaugh case, there would have been no criminal case, no story.
At the same time as the Blubaugh incident, two other voters in the same line got pulled out for wearing gear supporting Donald Trump. They covered up and voted with no further action.
But according to my original source and subsequent reporting by KAKE news, Meghan Blubaugh didn’t comply. The Sheriff’s Department was called. An investigation ensued, and the D.A.’s office filed charges.
The case was originally scheduled for a first appearance on Dec. 17, but it was delayed.
It was rescheduled for Thursday morning.
Standard procedure at the courthouse is that there is a “walk-in docket” for traffic cases from 8:30 to 10 a.m., with criminal first appearances following. On Thursday, Meghan Blubaugh showed up during traffic time and indicated she wanted diversion in her electioneering case.
District Attorney Marc Bennett said his office got a call up from the courtroom and a prosecutor went downstairs and handled it. He said it’s a walk-in docket and it’s not that unusual, because judges have a lot of latitude in how they schedule proceedings in their courtroom.
At this writing, we don’t know the conditions of Meghan Blubaugh’s diversion. That may come out later Thursday, maybe Friday, depending on how fast the clerk’s office processes it.
We’ll be watching and let you know when we get it.
