Ukraine: Prison, Boxing, and Fair Elections | Forbes

Ukraine is preparing for its parliamentary elections on October 28th. The main question is as old as Ukrainian history: will it be a transparent and fare election by western standards or will the ruling party use questionable methods to win their seats in Parliament? The main players in this election are the government’s Party of Regions and the United Opposition party, Fatherland (Batkivshchyna). In addition to those, there is UDAR (Ukrainian Democratic Alliance for Reforms), lead by famous Ukrainian boxer, Vitali Klitschko, the Communist Party and about thirty other smaller groups. With Yulia Tymoshenko, former prime minister and the leader of the opposition, in prison, her party is still remarkably strong. Tymoshenko is serving her seven-year term over a gas deal with Russia and abuse of the office – charges that she denies.

United Kingdom: Prisoner Disenfranchisement as a Sovereign Issue: Britain’s Conundrum | The International

After a final ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, the UK government is believed to be planning a draft bill that will introduce limited voting rights for prisoners despite widespread opposition to the move in the legislature. The announcement of the draft bill is expected to be deferred until just before a late November deadline but after the November 17 election for police commissioner. All judgements made by the European Court of Human Rights are binding and member states are expected to abide by their judgements or face penalty, usually monetary. If Britain fails to change their prisoner voting laws, they could face a fine amounting up to £150 million.

National: Voting Rights Act: Supreme Court Weighs New Look At Law | Huffington Post

Three years ago, the Supreme Court warned there could be constitutional problems with a landmark civil rights law that has opened voting booths to millions of African-Americans. Now, opponents of a key part of the Voting Rights Act are asking the high court to finish off that provision. The basic question is whether state and local governments that once boasted of their racial discrimination still can be forced in the 21st century to get federal permission before making changes in the way they hold elections.

The Voting News Weekly: The Voting News Weekly Oct. 22-28 2012

The Atlantic Magazine considered the impact of unverifiable electronic voting machines should a razor-thin election like Florida 2000 recur next month. Ars Technica wrote about the nationwide move away from direct recording electronic voting systems and Computerworld stressed the necessity of post election audits of software-generated election results. The Christian Science Monitor identified four battleground States, where electronic voting could put election results at risk. The New Yorker published a profile of Hans von Spakovsky. The Supreme Court will consider an Arizona voter ID requirement that could have implications nationwide. “I Voted” stickers include along with absentee ballots in envelopes mailed to over 230,000 voters in Arapahoe County Colorado could cause optical scanners to incorrectly read valid votes as overvotes and a ballot printing error in Palm Beach County has created a recount-like situation before Election Day. Financial ties connecting Mitt Romney with Hart Intercivic have caused concern. Millions of votes will be cast in Virginia on the WINvote, a touchscreen voting machine manufactured by AVS, a company that went out of business five years ago and Ukrainians head to the polls today in a controversial election.

National: Think the Florida Recount Was Bad? Just Wait Until November 6 | The Atlantic

The movie Unstoppable is playing this week on HBO, and it’s hard not to watch even just the trailers for the action-adventure film without seeing parallels to the coming election. Folks, we are just a little more than two weeks away from Election Day, and we may well be the runaway train, barreling straight toward an election-night, voting-rights crash-and-burn which easily could be worse and more damaging to the nation than Bush v. Gore. Not only is there no Denzel Washington to save us, not only is there no guarantee of a happy Hollywood ending, but none of the so-called adults running the country even seems willing to publicly acknowledge the danger.

National: Paper prophets: Why e-voting is on the decline in the United States | Ars Technica

Ernest Zirkle was puzzled. The resident of Fairfield Township in Cumberland County, NJ, ran for a seat on his local Democratic Executive Committee on June 7, 2011. The official results showed him earning only nine votes, compared to 34 votes for the winning candidate. But at least 28 people told Zirkle they voted for him. So he and his wife—who also ran for an open seat and lost—challenged the result in court. Eventually, a county election official admitted the result was due to a programming error. A security expert from Princeton was called in to examine the machines and make sure no foul play had occurred. Unfortunately, when he examined the equipment on August 17, 2011, he found someone deleted key files the previous day, making it impossible to investigate the cause of the malfunction. A new election was held on September 27, and the Zirkles won. A decade ago, there was a great deal of momentum toward paperless electronic voting. Spooked by the chaos of the 2000 presidential election in Florida, Congress unleashed a torrent of money to buy new high-tech machines. Today, momentum is in the opposite direction. Computer security researchers have convinced most observers that machines like the ones in Fairfield Township degrade the security and reliability of elections rather than enhancing them. Several states passed laws mandating an end to paperless elections. But bureaucratic inertia and tight budgets have slowed the pace at which these flawed machines can be retired.

National: Election will all be over in 12 more days, or will it? | latimes.com

Late the night of Nov. 6, or by the wee hours of Nov. 7, Americans should know the results of the presidential election, right? Probably. But the extremely tight races in several states, shifting voter identification requirements, the increased use of “provisional” ballots and automatic recount provisions in key states all expand the possibility of a prolonged, slow-motion finish. Ten states in recent years have passed laws requiring voters to show government-issued photo identification. This, in turn, has prompted lawsuits by those who say not all eligible voters can meet the requirements.

National: Blocking the Vote | NYTimes.com

The Republican Party has made voter fraud the red herring of this election. Now it turns out the party has been forced to cut its ties to a well-paid consulting firm after cases of real voter registration abuse arose in several swing states. A thorough federal investigation of the consulting firm, Strategic Allied Consulting, is needed.

National: Despite e-voting improvements, audits still needed for ballot integrity | Computerworld

Technology and process upgrades implemented since the controversial 2000 presidential election have made electronic voting machines more secure and reliable to use, the Caltech-MIT Voting Technology Project said in a report last week. Even so, the only way to ensure the integrity of votes cast with the systems is to have mandatory auditing of the results and of all voting technologies used in an election, the 85-page report cautioned. Rather than setting security standards for election equipment, the better approach for safeguarding ballot integrity is to hand-count a sufficiently large and random sample of the paper records of votes cast electronically, it said. “The 2000 United States presidential election put a spotlight on the fragility and vulnerability of voting technology,” the report said. “It became clear that providing robust, accurate, and secure voting systems remained an important open technical problem” for the United States. The Voting Technology Project is a joint initiative between MIT and Caltech and was launched originally to investigate the causes of the voting problems in Florida in 2000 and to make recommendations based on the findings.

National: Will Voter Suppression Tactics Threaten Free and Fair Elections? | PR Watch

he wave of new voter restrictions and scare tactics being implemented for the 2012 elections — such as voter ID laws, early voting restrictions, threatening billboards, misleading mailers and vigilante poll watchers — could intimidate countless numbers of Americans from exercising their right to vote. Republicans have proposed voting restrictions in a majority of states since 2011, including strict voter ID laws and limits on early voting and voter registration. Though many of the laws have been blunted, confusion about voting requirements could still make it harder for many Americans to exercise their right to the franchise. At the same time, the Tea Party group “True the Vote” — which has been accused of voter intimidation — is pledging to send one million observers to polling places on November 6, and has been filing largely baseless lawsuits to purge voters from the rolls.

National: Obama Campaign Uses Early Voting System to Its Advantage | NYTimes.com

Having shouted himself hoarse for two days urging supporters to vote, and vote early, President Obama flew to Chicago to do so himself this afternoon, on his way to an evening rally here in Ohio. His campaign says he is the first sitting president to vote for himself ahead of Election Day. In casting his ballot early, Mr. Obama is providing a very personal endorsement of a system that was enormously successful for him in 2008, and may be the key to his re-election hopes. His narrow win in North Carolina four years ago was driven in large part by early voters, who turned out in larger numbers than those on Election Day, and tended to support Mr. Obama. They also gave him a winning margin in Iowa, Florida and Colorado.

National: E-voting puts vote accuracy at risk in four key states | CSMonitor.com

Touch-screen electronic voting machines in at least four states pose a risk to the integrity of the 2012 presidential election, according to a Monitor analysis. In four key battleground states – Pennsylvania, Virginia, Florida, and Colorado – glitches in e-voting machines could produce incorrect or incomplete tallies that would be difficult to detect and all but impossible to correct because the machines have no paper record for officials to go back and check.

National: Groups Use Fake Letters, Felony Threats to Suppress Vote | Bloomberg

When Phyllis Cleveland first saw the billboard on East 35th Street warning of prison time and a $10,000 fine for voter fraud, the city councilwoman concluded it had one purpose: to intimidate the constituents of her predominantly low-income ward in Cleveland, Ohio. “It just hit me in the gut when I saw it,” said Cleveland, who helped capture the attention of a coalition of civil rights groups that pressured Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings (CCO) Inc. to remove the billboards this week.

Editorials: Resolving an Election In Extra Innings | Steven F. Huefner/Election Law@Moritz

As the prospects of a close Presidential election this fall show no signs of abating, it is worth reflecting on what might – and should – happen after Election Day in the event of an election that is too-close-to-call. My colleague Ned Foley has already addressed one aspect of this “what if” scenario, namely, the possibility that a swing state like Ohio, because it has a large number of provisional ballots or late-arriving absentee ballots, may not be able to declare a winner until some ten days after Election Day. But beyond that reality of the regular election processes, what if alleged errors or mistakes in the casting or counting of ballots lead to an election contest over the outcome in a particular state? How well prepared are states to handle post-election litigation on a very compressed timetable, and under the glare of the national spotlight?

Editorials: Why have an electoral college? | latimes.com

The electoral college is one of the most controversial and ridiculed parts of the Constitution. It is not just for the obvious reasons — the “wrong winner” elections of 1876, 1888 and 2000. The college has also focused the nation’s attention on a few swing states, allowing candidates to ignore a large percentage of the voters in their campaign. Today, the three largest states get little attention, except as ATMs for campaign fundraising.

Florida: Why Florida Should Not Be the “Next Florida”: Fixing the Debacle In Palm Beach County | Election Law @ Moritz

There’s a storm brewing in the Sunshine State, and once again Palm Beach County is at the center of the turmoil. The problem arises because of a ballot printing error on absentee ballots in Palm Beach County.The County contracted with an Arizona firm to produce the ballots, and the firm printed about 60,000 absentee ballots before anyone noticed the error: all of the races had a “header” over each section of the ballot except for the section for Judicial Retention elections. For example, before listing the presidential candidates, the ballot says “President and Vice President” in both English and Spanish in all capital letters and in boldface type. The Judicial Retention portion of the ballot, however, lists the candidates without any identifying header. Palm Beach County mailed out thousands of these absentee ballots to voters before catching the mistake.

Florida: Ion Sancho shows feds bogus mail sent to Florida voters | tallahassee.com

Several Leon County voters recently received scam letters purportedly sent by the Supervisor of Elections Office calling into question their citizenship and their ability to vote in the Nov. 6 general election. Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho said three voters contacted him Monday after receiving the letters, which were written on bogus Supervisor of Elections letterhead and mailed from Seattle, Wash. Sancho said he turned them over to federal prosecutors Monday to investigate as possible mail fraud. “This is just a silly, stupid trick that I hope someone gets caught for,” Sancho said.

Idaho: Why Idaho May Win And Lose Fight To Uncover Donors To Education Proposition Campaign | Boise State Public Radio

Idaho’s Secretary of State wants a court to order a group campaigning for Idaho’s ballot referenda to reveal its donors. Education Voters of Idaho gave more than $200,000 to another, affiliated group for ads supporting propositions 1, 2, and 3. Those ask voters if they want to keep Idaho’s Students Come First education laws. Education Voters refused an ultimatum from Secretary of State Ben Ysursa to reveal its donors. Ysursa maintains Idaho’s Sunshine Law says Education Voters has to disclose. Education Voters insists the First Amendment and the Supreme Court decision Citizens United says it doesn’t.

Indiana: Democratic chair wants investigation into LaPorte County voter purge | Herald Argus

The Democrat party chair is asking the federal government to get involved in the wrongful purge of 13,000 voters in La Porte County last year. Chairman John Jones said in a press release that he will be asking the U.S. Department of Justice Election Integrity Task Force to investigate exactly how the purge happened, which he said was an “effort led by Republican voters’ appointee Donna Harris, the wife of county Republican chairman Keith Harris.” Originally some 800 inactive voters were supposed to be purged in 2011. Voters are inactive if they fail to vote over two federal election cycles, meaning they have not voted since before the 2008 election that seated President Barack Obama in office. But the 13,303 who were canceled included voters who voted in Obama’s election.

Ohio: Romney/Hart voting conspiracy theory spreads | Cincinnati.com

Hamilton County officials find themselves facing an unexpected distraction as they prepare for next month’s presidential election: a conspiracy theory that investments by Mitt Romney’s political allies in a voting machine company could rig Ohio’s results.The topic began gaining traction on the Internet earlier this month, propelled largely by left-wing websites spreading the idea that Romney-linked investments in Hart InterCivic, a Texas-based voting machine firm, could somehow jeopardize the accuracy of Ohio’s vote count on Nov. 6.

Washington: Jefferson County WA ballot accidentally asks voters to pick a president of the Untied States | Peninsula Daily News

Jefferson County voters are casting their ballots for “President/Vice President of the Untied States.” “Yes, it’s a typo,” lamented County Auditor Donna Eldridge. Eldridge and her staff didn’t notice the mistake until it was brought to her attention Tuesday by the Peninsula Daily News, which had been alerted by a Port Townsend voter earlier in the day. The mistake appears on 22,596 ballots that were sent out to voters last Wednesday. As of Tuesday afternoon, 2,901 had been returned in the all-mail election that ends at 8 p.m. Nov. 6.

Ukraine: With rival jailed, Ukraine president seems set for election victory | KGMI

Ukraine geared up on Friday for an election which many commentators expect to cement President Viktor Yanukovich’s rule, despite his jailed rival Yulia Tymoshenko calling on voters to stop an imminent “dictatorship”. Yanukovich’s Party of the Regions and a union of opposition forces backing Tymoshenko were scheduled to stage their final public rallies later on Friday in the capital Kiev ahead of Sunday’s poll for a new parliament.

National: Who Created the Voter-Fraud Myth? | The New Yorker

Teresa Sharp is fifty-three years old and has lived in a modest single-family house on Millsdale Street, in a suburb of Cincinnati, for nearly thirty-three years. A lifelong Democrat, she has voted in every Presidential election since she turned eighteen. So she was agitated when an official summons from the Hamilton County Board of Elections arrived in the mail last month. Hamilton County, which includes Cincinnati, is one of the most populous regions of the most fiercely contested state in the 2012 election. No Republican candidate has ever won the Presidency without carrying Ohio, and recent polls show Barack Obama and Mitt Romney almost even in the state. Every vote may matter, including those cast by the seven members of the Sharp family—Teresa, her husband, four grown children, and an elderly aunt—living in the Millsdale Street house. The letter, which cited arcane legal statutes and was printed on government letterhead, was dated September 4th. “You are hereby notified that your right to vote has been challenged by a qualified elector,” it said. “The Hamilton County Board of Elections has scheduled a hearing regarding your right to vote on Monday, September 10th, 2012, at 8:30 a.m. . . . You have the right to appear and testify, call witnesses and be represented by counsel.” “My first thought was, Oh, no!” Sharp, who is African-American, said. “They ain’t messing with us poor black folks! Who is challenging my right to vote?”

Arizona: Supreme Court voter ID case may shape the future | UPI

The fight over whether states can demand some sort of identification before allowing voters to cast ballots has finally reached the U.S. Supreme Court as the justices agreed to hear argument on Arizona’s law requiring voters to show proof of U.S. citizenship before registering. In the heat of the final days of the U.S. presidential election the case is not drawing much attention. Any argument and decision in the case won’t come until long after Election Day. And the arguments advanced by both sides in the case may seem as dry as unbuttered toast to the average American. The battle probably appeals mainly to political activists or Supreme Court wonks. But an eventual Supreme Court decision will help shape the voting landscape of the future.

Colorado: “I Voted” sticker in Arapahoe County mail may rub some the wrong way | The Denver Post

Republicans and Democrats have long been concerned about how the vote will shake out in Arapahoe County — one of the key swing counties in an undecided state — and now they have one more thing to fear: an “I Voted” sticker. More than 230,000 ballots last week were mailed to Arapahoe County’s voters in envelopes that possibly contained a participation sticker that rubbed up against the ballot and in some cases left a faint, near-linear mark that appeared exactly where voters draw a line to select their candidates.

The Voting News Daily: Think the Florida Recount Was Bad? Just Wait Until November 6, Paper prophets: Why e-voting is on the decline in the United States

National: Think the Florida Recount Was Bad? Just Wait Until November 6 | The Atlantic The movie Unstoppable is playing this week on HBO, and it’s hard not to watch even just the trailers for the action-adventure film without seeing parallels to the coming election. Folks, we are just a little more than two weeks away from…

Florida: Palm Beach County ballot flaw causes another recount | Tampa Bay Times

It’s a ballot recount in a tight presidential race that invites easy comparisons to the electoral crisis of 2000. About 27,000 absentee ballots can’t be digitally scanned because of a recently discovered design flaw. Elections workers began Monday duplicating the markings from bad ballots to new ones so that the votes could be recorded, an effort that has led some to question the accuracy of results. And it’s all happening in Palm Beach County. “By now, questions can be asked about why these type of problems keep happening in this one county,” said Ed Foley, an Ohio State University law professor and expert on election law.

Ohio: Liberal critics worry about Romney connection to voting machines in Ohio | The Washington Post

Hart InterCivic is an Austin-based voting machine company that serves local governments nationwide. Its clients include Hamilton County, Ohio, which administers elections in Cincinnati. Hart InterCivic also has in its DNA just enough traces of Bain & Co. and Mitt Romney campaign donors to trigger serious angst in the liberal blogosphere about the fate of Ohio’s must-have 18 electoral votes.