Board Of Elections Official Suspended Over Brooklyn’s Presidential Primary Debacle

The Board of Elections has booted the official that it says is responsible for Tuesday’s disastrous Democratic primary.

Brooklyn Chief Clerk Diane Hasslet-Rudiano was suspended without pay by the the Commissioners’ Executive Committee of the Board of Elections following the debacle in which 125,000 registered Brooklyn Democrats who were dropped from the voter rolls, according to a statement released Thursday.

Haslett-Rudiano’s suspension starts “without pay, effective immediately, pending an internal investigation into the administration of the voter rolls in the Borough of Brooklyn,” as per the BOE.

The Daily News had more:

She’s in the process of being forced out over the voter roll mishaps, perhaps as early as the board’s next commissioner meeting next Tuesday, sources said.

The problems began when she was trying to clean up the voting books, which must be periodically purged to eliminate people who die, move or are ineligible for other reasons.

Sources said she skipped one of the steps that was built in to stop the system from purging eligible voters, which caused a chain reaction that led to people being improperly removed.

The New York Post claims there was a distinct political angle:

Democrat Betty Ann Canizio, the BOE Deputy Clerk for Brooklyn, is the official primarily responsible for overseeing the borough’s Democratic voting rolls while Haslett-Rudiano, a Republican, oversees her party’s rolls, sources said.

“It sounds like they cut a deal to make the Republican the scapegoat and protect Betty Ann,” said an elected Brooklyn official who’s a Democrat.

Canizio is an ally of Brooklyn Democratic Chairman Frank Seddio. She has a long history as a borough district leader of rubber-stamping his candidate nominations and political appointments. Seddio used his political muscle to help Canizio, 68, secure her $120,000-a-year post, sources said.

BOE sources say she’s routinely absent or works half days. She failed to show up for work Thursday

We’ll keep you posted as this story develops.