Thurston auditor rules candidate C Davis isn’t registered to vote where he lives

Update: This story has been updated to include parts of a written response from C Davis.

Thurston County Auditor Mary Hall on Friday issued a ruling that Thurston County Commission candidate C Davis does not live at the location listed on his voter registration.

Hall upheld the voter registration challenge filed by Andrew Saturn, a former candidate for local public office who identifies as Socialist. A hearing in the case was conducted Aug. 27.

Under state law, Davis can update his address or appeal the decision to Superior Court, an Auditor’s Office press release says. Hall told The Olympian Friday that Davis would appear on the general election ballots, even though candidates are required to be registered voters.

In a statement emailed to The Olympian Friday evening, Davis wrote that he has updated his address “to make the powers that be happy,” and that he believes Auditor Hall’s actions “were entirely a reaction” to an effort launched by Jon Pettit filed against Davis’s opponent in the race, Carolina Mejia. A judge dismissed Pettit’s challenge to Mejia’s candidacy Friday.

The Aug. 27 hearing featured allegations beyond Davis’s voter registration. Saturn alleged Davis had been taking advantage of a system meant to serve homeless voters and tribal communities, and a private investigator testified that he discovered “24 aliases and impostors” while running a background check on Davis.

Davis registered to vote at a “non-traditional address” in 2018, it was revealed at the hearing, after he provided the Auditor’s Office a cross-street near the address where he’s registered.

Registering that way is “an important tool for people who are experiencing homelessness” or otherwise displaced, Mason County Auditor Paddy McGuire previously told The Olympian. It’s also used in tribal communities and was part of the Native American Voting Rights Act, according to Kathy Sakahara, democracy issue advocate for the League of Women Voters of Washington.

Saturn alleged at the hearing that Davis was taking advantage of that system and actually lives on the 1200 block of Bigelow Avenue Northeast. He presented evidence that included police reports responding to calls from Davis at that address and other records tying him to the location.

Thurston County Assessor’s records show Davis owns the property at the Bigelow address. In 2007, the records show “C Davis” bought the property from “Celeste Davis.” The property is a third of a mile north of where he registered, and Thurston County GeoData shows the Bigelow address is part of District 1, where he’s running.

In response to the Auditor’s repeated requests for Davis to say where he lives, he answered with variations of “it depends,” saying he sometimes stays at the Bigelow address and sometimes stays elsewhere. Eventually, he said there was “nothing inaccurate” about the cross streets he provided in 2018 when he registered.

In his Friday email, Davis also, in part, wrote that he felt the hearing was biased.

“The hearing was very biased, as I was instructed to focus on the issue of the assigned address and not go off on tangents,” Davis wrote in his email. “Mr Pluto, I mean Saturn, on the other hand, spent 20 minutes with nonsense conspiracy theories. He even went so far as to say that since I don’t use my real name on Facebook, I was an impostor.”

He also brought up a voter registration challenge filed against Olympia City Council member Lisa Parshley in 2017. In that case, a challenger alleged she lived in the Boston Harbor area and registered at an Olympia building zoned only for commercial use.

Parshley said she lived in the Olympia building to be closer to her downtown business. The county Canvassing Board found she may have been violating city code or a lease agreement, but not state voter registry guidelines, according to Olympian archives.

In her decision Friday, Hall wrote that evidence and testimony presented at the hearing and public records from the assessor’s office indicated it is “highly probable” that the Bigelow duplex is Davis’s residence for purposes of voter registration, and that the residence is presumed to continue.

Public records from the Assessor’s Office showed not just that Davis owns the Bigelow duplex, but that he has an “active senior exemption from certain taxes.” To claim that exemption, Hall writes, the owner has to own the property and it has to be their principal place of residence.

Hall decided Davis’s voter registration is improper, affirming Saturn’s challenge.

The Auditor’s authority in this voter registration challenge is limited to whether a voter resides at the location listed on the voter registration card, Hall said in a prepared statement.

“My decision only relates to his voter registration address and does not extend any further,” Hall said. “It’s important all voters register with the actual address where they reside so they receive the correct precinct ballot.”

Mason County Auditor McGuire previously told The Olympian that it’s a separate question whether his registration is fraudulent. According to state law, knowingly falsifying voter registration information is a felony.

The Olympian could not reach the Thurston County Prosecutor’s Office Friday to ask whether there’s potential for charges in this case.

Hall’s decision, along with other documents regarding this challenge, are posted here: https://www.thurstoncountywa.gov/auditor/Pages/elections-challenges.aspx

This story was originally published September 4, 2020 at 2:42 PM.