Miss. Senate challenger's trial to begin Sept. 15

JACKSON, Miss. — The judge in Chris McDaniel's lawsuit challenging his Republican primary loss to incumbent Sen. Thad Cochran wants the trial to move quickly, setting the start date for Sept. 15, and ordering it to be completed by Oct. 3.

With the clock ticking toward the Nov. 4 general election, Judge Hollis McGehee's scheduling order filed Thursday says "in no event shall the trial of this matter extend beyond Friday, Oct. 3, 2014."

McGehee's order said there is a possibility of the trial breaking for a day or part of a day if there are other matters the court can't reschedule, and the date would be extended in that case, but otherwise he plans for it to move quickly and straight through.

On Wednesday, McGehee, a retired southwest Mississippi chancellor specially appointed to hear the case, expressed doubt on whether a trial could be finished before the election.

McGehee's order Thursday also says plaintiff McDaniel will be afforded 10 days of trial time to present his case, Cochran five days and then each will be allowed up to one full day for rebuttal.

In a separate filing Thursday, McGehee gave notice of his intent to "designate and appoint expert witness."

McGehee said "this matter is without precedent, a judicial review of a statewide election," and that the "scope and volume of election issues is formidable" — not to mention time restraints by trying to finish before the general election.

McGehee said he will appoint an expert witness, "an attorney with a high degree of expertise in the field of election law" to accompany lawyers in inspecting election documents and "all similar activities." His notice says the court-appointed expert would also attend depositions of witnesses, inspect any relevant documents and "give opinions on any and all issues coming before the court related to election law ..."

McDaniel, in a GOP primary that pitted tea party conservatives against establishment Republicans on both the state and national level, narrowly defeated Cochran in a June 3 primary. But he failed to garner enough votes to avoid a runoff June 24, which Cochran won by 7,667 votes.

McDaniel claims the election was "stolen" from him through illegal and improper voting and black Democrats "raiding" a GOP primary because of Cochran race baiting and other skullduggery.

McDaniel claims to have found more than 15,000 illegal or questionable votes. He is asking the judge to declare him the winner of the GOP primary or, short of that, order a new primary. But Cochran lawyers and some election officials dispute these claims. They say McDaniel volunteers have found irregularities where none exist and that the election was fair and had no more problems than the human error involved in all elections.

McGehee's scheduling order includes an Aug. 28 motions hearing and a pre-trial conference set for Sept. 12.