“What are you looking for, Bill?”
Genoa Township Clerk Rick Soucy recalled asking the question on Election Day morning when he spotted Trustee Bill Reiber in an employee’s office that is not open to the public, reviewing security footage from cameras placed throughout the township hall.
The moment capped an extraordinary five-day stretch in which Reiber shared a Facebook post about election staffing and “optics”; asked Livingston County Republican Party Chair Deb Drick to send an election challenger to Genoa Township Hall; and then reviewed security footage, sources said, to determine whether Township Supervisor Kevin Spicher, Soucy and fellow Trustee Todd Walker were near where ballots were kept following Monday night’s Board of Trustees meeting. The security-footage episode ultimately prompted intervention from two township attorneys over the legal limits of access to non-public areas of the township hall.
The events came in the waning hours of a contentious, months-long Republican primary campaign in which the LCRP endorsed Candie Hovarter over appointed Clerk Soucy (a dues-paying member of the LCRP), and resident Debbie McCormick. Drick complied with Reiber’s request and ultimately credentialed her husband, county Commissioner Jay Drick, to serve as challenger. He spent about 13 hours observing ballot processing and tabulation Monday and Election Day Tuesday.
The LCRP, Jay Drick, and Reiber had put money behind Hovarter: The party, Jay Drick, and Reiber contributed $500, $100, and $200, respectively, to her campaign. In the months leading up to the election, Reiber also canvassed door-to-door on Hovarter’s behalf.
The Livingston Post sent Reiber 16 detailed questions about his Facebook post, his request for a challenger, his review of township security footage, and whether he had any concerns about the election. He chose not to address any of the questions.
It began with a Friday Facebook post
The chain of events began five days before the election, when Reiber used Facebook to publicly question a personnel decision made by Soucy involving one of the township’s trained election workers.
Reiber wrote July 31 that he had learned people “trained as poll watchers” were being replaced with “in-house people.”
“If true, the optics of this decision couldn’t get any worse…” Reiber wrote.
Deb Drick later identified that personnel matter as the reason Reiber requested an election challenger.
“Apparently, one of the Genoa-trained poll workers scheduled to work election night was notified a few days before the election they weren’t needed and would be replaced with ‘in-house’ people,” Drick said. “Upon learning of the incident, Trustee Reiber then asked me if I could certify a challenger for election night.”
Soucy confirmed that he released a trained election worker — not a poll watcher as Reiber had described in his Facebook post — and said an outside employee ultimately was not needed.
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A challenger at Reiber’s request
Deb Drick said Reiber asked her to provide an election challenger.
Drick said she initially told Reiber to find someone and that she would certify the person if qualified. When Reiber could not find anyone, she began contacting potential challengers herself.
“Trustee Reiber could not find anyone to be certified but still wanted a challenger,” Drick said. “I called several people I knew, but they were already scheduled elsewhere. I then asked Jay, as he was available.”
Election challengers are credentialed representatives of political parties or other qualifying organizations who are permitted under Michigan law to observe election procedures and raise challenges.
“Knowing Deb Drick, I wasn’t surprised that she sent someone here,” Soucy said. “But I was a little surprised it was Jay Drick, her husband, the county commissioner.”
No other political party or organization sent a challenger to Genoa Township for the primary, Soucy said, and there were no challengers during the township’s May election.
“Both parties can give challengers and they don’t have to have a reason for being there,” Soucy said. “That’s fine, they have the right to do that.”
He added, “I don’t think they’ve ever challenged another election in Genoa Township.”
Emails between Deb Drick and the Genoa Township Clerk’s Office document how quickly the challenger was put in place.
“The Livingston County Republican Party is sending an AV Counting Board Challenger to Genoa Township on Tuesday August 4, 2026,” Drick wrote at 8:41 a.m. Monday.
Thirty-six minutes later, she expanded the assignment.
“The challenger will also attend today’s counting as well,” Drick wrote at 9:17 a.m.
Jay Drick spent approximately five hours Monday inside Genoa Township Hall as the LCRP’s credentialed election challenger and returned Tuesday for another eight hours.
“Jay was very respectful, and he wasn’t disruptive,” Soucy said. “He only had one question on Day One — he was questioning why we were flattening out the ballots.”
Election workers flatten the ballots, which are folded in thirds, before they are fed into the township’s high-speed tabulator.
“We showed him the law that that’s what we should do, and then he was fine with it,” Soucy said.
Michigan election guidance for absent voter counting boards specifically instructs election workers to “unfold and flatten ballots” before stacking them for tabulation.
Soucy said Jay Drick raised no other questions during the two days.
‘What are you looking for, Bill?’
The challenger Reiber had requested was already in place by the time he turned to the cameras Tuesday morning. Soucy said Reiber asked an IT administrator to help him access security footage from throughout the township hall.
Soucy said Reiber’s review stemmed from concern that Soucy, Spicher, and Walker had remained in the building near the room where ballots were kept after Monday night’s board meeting.
Township Attorney Joe Seward of Seward Henderson PLLC, who had attended Monday night’s Board meeting and stayed behind, rejected Reiber’s assertions.
“That is absolutely inaccurate,” Seward said. “Rick asked for some help to take some chairs down from the room and Todd left. Kali (Henderson, Seward’s business partner), Kevin, Rick and I stacked the chairs and we left. There were absolutely no ballots anywhere near the area we were at.”
Soucy said the board room had been rearranged for Monday night’s meeting after election work earlier in the day and needed to be reconfigured for Election Day voting Tuesday morning. He confirmed that he spoke with a staff member about resetting the room.
Soucy volunteered to show Reiber the room where ballots were kept.
Soucy said Reiber indicated he was satisfied after seeing the room but went back to the employee’s office — which is not open to the public — to continue reviewing township security footage.
That’s when Soucy contacted Seward.
Seward was in court when Reiber tried to reach him, so Seward asked his law partner, Kali Henderson, to call Reiber.
“Bill said he didn’t want to talk to her and he wanted me,” Seward said.
When Seward had a break in the hearing, he said he called Soucy and Reiber together and advised Reiber that certain areas of the township hall were not open to the public.
Seward said Reiber asked what law he could potentially be violating.
Henderson then emailed Reiber and township officials at 10:47 a.m., explaining the legal limits governing access to non-public portions of government buildings. She cited federal cases involving access to government office space.
“The public does not have an unfettered right of access to non-public portions of public buildings,” Henderson wrote. “A public building does not automatically equate to a public space in all parts of the building; there are non-public forums.”
Seward said Henderson had also recently prevailed in the Sixth Circuit in a separate case.
The footage also addressed the concern that had prompted Reiber’s review.
“I understand from Rick that the (security) video showed the ballots were locked up,” Seward said.
Reiber eventually left the office.
Drick defends Hovarter support and defers to Reiber on several fronts
Deb Drick initially included Reiber’s Tuesday morning security-footage review among the circumstances surrounding the challenger, saying it “cemented Reiber’s belief a challenger was needed.”
The chronology shows Jay Drick had already been deployed as the challenger the previous day.
When asked about that timeline, Drick clarified that the security-footage episode played no role in Reiber’s original request.
Drick said Reiber told her about the incident afterward “for justification purposes.”
“He can answer what he believes/believed,” she said. “I believe as chair I fulfilled the request made.”
Asked whether she believed ballots, vote tabulation or the integrity of the election had been at risk, Drick referred the question to Reiber. Asked whether she was alleging misconduct by Soucy, Spicher, Walker or any Genoa Township election worker, she referred to the same answer.
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LCRP endorsement, podcast and financial support
The dispute unfolded against an unusual backdrop for a Republican primary.
In addition to formally endorsing Hovarter and donating to her campaign, the LCRP hosted Hovarter on its “Right Side” podcast, hosted by Deb Drick. Hovarter was the only clerk candidate to appear on the program. Soucy, McCormick and their campaigns were never mentioned by name. A previous Livingston Post examination of the appearance found Soucy was referred to only as “somebody else” who had been appointed clerk.
Asked why the LCRP endorsed one Republican in a contested three-way primary, Deb Drick said an executive committee member made a motion to do so.
Asked whether she considered the LCRP’s endorsement and $500 contribution to Hovarter or her husband’s $100 contribution to Hovarter when selecting Jay Drick, Deb Drick said she did not.
“Jay was the available choice,” she said. “Supporting Candie, as part of the EC (executive committee), didn’t matter.”
Asked why the party then contributed money to Hovarter but not the other Republican candidates, Drick said: “Why would anyone endorse a candidate then give money to the opponents’ campaigns?”
Soucy said he was “shocked” by the LCRP’s decision to take sides and contribute money during the primary.
“They’re not supposed to take sides in a primary and they typically don’t give any money to candidates in the primary and they wait until they know who the candidates are for the general election,” Soucy said. “That’s where they throw their financial support for the general election.”
‘It was certified clean’
Soucy, who was appointed township clerk in November following the resignation of former Clerk Janene Deaton, ultimately won the three-way Republican primary with a majority of the vote.
Soucy received 51.5% of the vote, followed by Hovarter with 33.2% and McCormick with 15.3%. He will face Democrat Matthew McClanahan in November for the remainder of the clerk’s term, which expires in 2028.
When Soucy submitted Genoa’s election materials to the Livingston County Board of Canvassers Thursday morning, he said the township was not required to return to the county to fix any problems.
“It was certified clean,” Soucy said, adding that it marked the second consecutive election conducted since he became clerk in which Genoa’s submission cleared the canvassing process without requiring corrections. The first was the May 5 election, when no challengers were present.
“This is perfect,” Soucy said two of the four canvassers told him. “That’s a credit to my team. I have a very qualified team,” he said back to them.
The LCRP describes part of its mission on its website as supporting “the Republican Primary winners in their elections.”
Soucy said he now intends to ask the Livingston County Republican Party to contribute to his campaign for the November general election, now that Republican primary voters have selected him as their nominee.
Asked whether the LCRP will endorse and financially support Soucy in November, Deb Drick declined to say.
“The LCRP EC does not disclose its business or its strategies,” Drick said.
I am surprised she didn’t refer the question to Reiber. Ri