The Show Trial At The Sheraton: Rosalind Answers For John Shelton

By Kleinheider Posted on September 13, 2008 at 11:31 pm

“I won that election and they stole it.”

~ Rosalind Kurita

After a full eight-hour work day of examination of evidence in the contested state Senate election in District 22, the Democratic Executive Committee today played Pontius Pilate and threw the fate of the Senator Rosalind Kurita to a joint convention of the three county executive committees which make up the district seat she has held for 12 years.

While in theory all is not lost for Kurita, the fact of the matter is that while some members of the state executive committee may be able to sleep better at night because they did not technically unseat the renegade Democratic Senator, the consequences of their actions amount to just that.

Because, in order to throw the decision to the “lower courts”, they had to first throw out the election of August 7th. Simply put, the Democratic Executive Committee invalided a democratically held election today. No, they did not straight up hand victory to the loser of government-executed election but in order to punt they had to first declare the results “incurably uncertain.” A clear sign to local party officials, already predisposed to do so, to put an end the state Senate tenure of Rosalind Kurita.

This, of course, comes just three years after many Democrats were crying out for the peoples’ voice to be heard in the case of Ophelia Ford. In that case Democrats wanted, well, democracy. Now, due to the actions of the Tennessee Democratic Party, a small group of county party officials will decide who the state senator in District 22 will be.

While the hearing this afternoon was purportedly to decide whether the election in District 22 was fairly decided, it was, of course, about something else entirely.

In 1995, in Los Angeles, California what was supposed to be a murder trial became instead an indictment of the justice system and race in America. O.J. Simpson’s trial, ostensibly, was to determine his guilt or innocence in the homicide of his wife and her lover. Instead, the American justice system was put on trial giving those black jurors the chance to exact a measure of revenge on a country they believed had wronged them and their people for generations.

This afternoon’s show trial at the Sheraton was, in many ways, a modern update on the “Trial of the Century.”

What was designed to be an investigation into the validity of an election instead became an indictment of Tennessee’s open primary system and a referendum on the Democratic Party bonafides of Rosalind Kurita. The evidence presented, most of which can be seen here was, by any objective criteria, thin. Barnes team’s case relied heavily on statistics about reliable Republican primary voters choosing to make this election one of their first forays into the Democratic primary process.

But as was pointed out by Kurita’s able legal team led by former state Senator Bob Rochelle, the time to contest the Democratic cred of primary voters was at the polling place where Tennessee law allows poll watchers to contest a voters’ allegiances. Other than that, our Tennessee code provides no remedy for the challenging of crossover voting, a traditional, time-honored Tennessee practice.

But the evidence, just like in case of Orenthal James Simpson, was not what the trial was about. While Chairman Gray Sasser was resolute in cutting off the Barnes team from mentioning Kurita’s 2007 vote for Republican Speaker Ron Ramsey, it was clear that the subtext of day need not be spoken to be heard.

Just like Carlo had to answer for Santino, Rosalind Kurita had to answer for John Wilder. Today was her reckoning.

While non-voting ex-officio member of the committee, State Senator and Democratic Caucus Chair Joe Haynes, attending an E-911 convention in Gatlinburg, had an excuse for his absence from the proceedings the fact was he was not there. Neither were any of Kurita’s Democratic colleagues in the Senate or her fellow Democratic legislators in the House at the Sheraton to show their support for a Democratic incumbent. In fact, the only representatives from the Democratic Caucus that Post Politics spotted in the room were two members of the staff of Kurita’s arch-nemesis, Senator Jim Kyle.

While not saying so directly, when asked whether she thought the decision was made based on the evidence or out of anger over her vote for Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, Kurita asserted that the proceedings pretty much spoke for themselves.

“I think you were there and you can judge for yourself,” Kurita stated matter-of-factly to reporters after the decision.

Kurita was not making any firm predictions but, based on the “makeup” of the various county committees, she did not relay any optimism to the assembled reporter scrum that the county committees would vote to affirm her election. Perhaps as foreshadowing, one of the executive committee members representing areas in Kurita’s district did not show up to this afternoon’s meeting. Another abstained.

“I don’t think that that’s a probability,” Kurita said speaking of the likelihood that the joint county convention would vote to affirm her election. “I think that was made very clear. Most of you reporters have seen me in the Senate. You know how hard I work. I take the job very seriously but at some point you just have to say maybe this just wasn’t meant to be. I did everything I knew how to do. I worked hard to serve my constituents the best I could and if they don’t want we, then, they don’t want me.”

“The reality is they don’t want me on the team, y’all,” a resigned-to-defeat Kurita reiterated. “I’m very proud of my service in the Senate and I’ll miss it.”

A composed, steely-eyed Rosalind Kurita expressed no regrets for political actions past in the immediate aftermath of the decision and contacted later was optimistic about the future noting that she was set to be a grandmother soon and that she would find “some other way to serve others.”

When asked by Post Politics if she still considers herself a Democrat after the events of the afternoon, Senator Kurita paused and said simply, “I just don’t know how to answer that right now.”

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Tags: Bob Rochelle, Clarksville, Democratic Executive Committee, Gray Sasser, Jim Kyle, Joe Haynes, Ron Ramsey, Rosalind Kurita, Tim Barnes  

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