Utah: Seven Counties Adopt All-Mail Voting System | KUTV

An all-mail voting system currently in use by seven counties across Utah for their upcoming primaries could be a model for future voting throughout the state. The Utah Legislature relaxed the vote-by-mail laws in 2012, allowing a handful of counties to try the new system. Davis County is the largest county trying out by-mail voting. The election office sent out ballots last month to all registered voters for the June 24 primary. Voters can then mail them back or drop them off at several locations. Davis County Election Manager Brian McKenzie is already excited about the turnout. “We’ve mailed out about 90,000 ballots, and as of this morning, we’ve had just over 13,000 that have been returned,” McKenzie said. “So far, we’re more than half way to meeting the turnout we had in 2010. When we compare it to 2012, we’re a little over third of the way there.”

Bulgaria: Ruling party leader calls for July election | Reuters

Bulgaria should hold an election as early as next month, the head of the ruling Socialist party said on Tuesday, saying the instability caused by having a government on “life support” was bad for the country. The Socialists have bowed to pressure both from their own coalition partner and the main opposition GERB party to hold an early election after their poor performance in last month’s European Parliament poll, gaining less than a fifth of the vote. Sergei Stanishev’s call for a vote in July is earlier than other parties would like. GERB would prefer an election to be held at the end of September or early October. The ethnic Turkish MRF, the Socialists’ junior coalition partner, would prefer November or December. Whichever date the president negotiates, any new government will have to take difficult decisions in its dealings with the EU and Russia over Moscow’s proposed building of a gas pipeline through Bulgarian territory to bypass Ukraine.

United Kingdom: US lessons for the UK government as voter registration goes digital | Diginomica

Last month we took a look at the idea of online voting in the wake of the European Union elections and a somewhat dubious critique of e-voting in Estonia. I was minded of that again today when talking to Greg Clark, Minister of State for the Cabinet Office (Cities and Constitution), as he officially launched an online overhaul of how the UK electorate goes about registering its right to vote. The current UK mechanism for this process is incredibly archaic. As things stand, the head of the household – whatever that means in this day and age! – has to fill out a paper form to send back to the local authority, specifying which members of that household are entitled to vote. Clearly this is a system that is (a) ludicrously out of touch and (b) wide open to abuse and deliberate disenfranchisement of individuals.

National: Senate Democrats Begin Efforts to Amend Constitution | Roll Call

It’s been 22 years since the last amendment to the Constitution took effect, but Senate Democrats are hoping to alter the nation’s founding document once again. The likelihood of crossing the threshold to amend the Constitution over campaign finance is slim to none, however. An amendment would have to garner support from two-thirds of the House and Senate, before being approved by three-fourths of the states. Despite that seemingly insurmountable hurdle, Senate Democrats are forging ahead with a plan to bring SJ Res 19 to the floor. This resolution would add a 28th Amendment, stating that Congress can regulate contributions and spending in federal elections. It would also give state governments the same authority in statewide contests.

National: Justice Department considers making request that would add polling sites to tribal lands | The Washington Post

The Justice Department is considering making a recommendation to Congress that would require any state or local election administrator whose territory includes part of an Indian reservation, an Alaska Native village or other tribal lands to locate at least one polling place in a venue selected by the tribal government. Associate Attorney General Tony West will announce the effort Monday morning at the National Congress of American Indians conference in Anchorage. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. also will release a video Monday that will announce the Obama administration’s plans to consult with tribal governments on a legislative proposal that would ensure that American Indians and Alaska Natives have “a meaningful opportunity to claim their right to vote.”

Arkansas: Hundreds Disenfranchised By America’s Worst Voter ID Law | ThinkProgress

Last April, Arkansas’ Republican-controlled state legislature overrode Gov. Mike Beebe’s (D) veto to enact a strict photo ID law for all voters. But while Arkansas is now one of several states which suppress voting by requiring valid photo identification to vote at the polls, a unique and poorly written provision in the bill caused hundreds of absentee voters to also have their votes rejected in last month’s primary. The Arkansas ID law requires that people who show up to vote in person early or on Election Day show “proof of identity” before casting their ballots. That proof must be a driver’s license, a photo identification card, a concealed handgun carry license, a United States passport, an employee badge or identification document, a United States military identification document, a student identification card issued by an accredited postsecondary educational institution in the State of Arkansas, a public assistance identification card, or a state-issued voter identification photo ID card. Such laws have been shown to have both adiscriminatory intent and effect — and to depress voter participation. Even one of the Arkansas law’s strongest supporters, Republican gubernatorial nominee Asa Hutchinson, was initially turned away from voting in his own primary because he forgot his photo ID last month.

California: Leland Yee’s startling finish in California election race explained | Los Angeles Times

In a largely sleepy California election, there was one startling result: nearly 300,000 ballots cast for Leland Yee for secretary of state, good enough for third place even though he dropped out after being accused of gun running and political corruption. Yee’s tally, which is likely to grow as more than 750,000 uncounted ballots are processed, pushed him past a pair of good-government candidates also vying to be the state’s chief election officer–a bit of irony adding to a widely held notion, especially outside the state, that Californians are a bit nuts. Yet while vexing and a cause of no small amount of ridicule, state Sen. Yee’s surprising vote total can be explained by several factors beyond the supposed shallowness and stupidity of the California electorate.

California: Judge Orders Palmdale To Pay $3.5M For Voting Rights Act Violation | KHTS

The city of Palmdale was ordered to pay the plaintiffs $3,563,259 for the fees and costs related to a California Voting Rights Act lawsuit for which the city recently lost an appeal. The move comes amid a court-supervised settlement conference being held between representatives for the Santa Clarita Community College District and the plaintiffs in a similar lawsuit facing the college’s governing board. Palmdale could still seek a review of the appellate court decision to the state’s Supreme Court. An attorney for the city indicated Palmdale City Council members would direct him as to whether the city would seek a review of the appellate decision.

Editorials: California’s top-two primary a failure | Timm Herdt/Findlaw

Last month, the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California published a report assessing the early effects of California’s top-two primary system, first implemented two years ago. “To the surprise of many,” it said, “turnout was the second-lowest on record.” Time to update that report: In the top-two primary’s second showing, turnout was the lowest on record. Based on Election Day returns, statewide turnout on Tuesday was 17.8 percent. That number will go up some, perhaps 6 or 7 points, after all the late-arriving mail-in ballots are counted and the provisional ballots sorted out, but the bottom line will still be dismal. In all likelihood, turnout will fall below the previous low of 28.2 percent. And then it can be reported that the first two experiments with the top-two primary resulted in the lowest and third-lowest voter turnouts on record. The problem is, it’s not an experiment. It’s written into the California Constitution and cannot be changed without another vote of the people. It’s time to start having that discussion.

Editorials: District of Columbia attorney general election should be scheduled right away | The Washington Post

While vultures appeared on K Street, chickens were coming home to roost with the D.C. Council this week when an appeals court ruled that the council acted illegally in delaying an election for attorney general. It was not a surprising outcome, given the serial carelessness with which the council has treated this office. D.C. residents should not have to pay the price for the council’s foolishness; efforts must be made to ensure an orderly election. A three-member panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday that council members did not have the authority to overrule a charter amendment, overwhelmingly approved by voters in 2010, that provided for the first election of the attorney general in 2014. The position has been a mayoral appointee. The council pushed to make it an elected office in a fit of pique with former attorney general Peter J. Nickles, but buyer’s remorse kicked in last year, and council members voted 7 to 6 to postpone the election.

Indiana: Officials examine grim voter turnout numbers from May primary | Evansville Courier & Press

Vanderburgh County tied for the lowest turnout statewide for May’s primary election and fell below state average with 6 percent of voters casting ballots. Statewide, 13 percent of voters participated in the May 6 primary, according to numbers released this week by the Indiana Secretary of State’s office. Warrick County came in higher at 11 percent. Vanderburgh County joined St. Joseph County with the lowest turnout in the state, though four other counties, including Posey County, saw a 7 percent turnout. Primaries, especially absent of high-profile statewide or national races as was the case on May 6, are historically marked by low numbers at the polls.

Missouri: Early Voting Supporter Dismisses Lawmakers’ Voter Fraud Concerns | The Missourian

Some local legislators have raised concerns about voter fraud in regards to a proposal that would allow Missouri residents to vote six weeks prior to elections. But a man involved in the early voting effort said he thinks allowing people to go to the polls prior to Election Day could actually decrease the potential for fraud. More than 300,000 signatures were gathered on a petition to let voters decide whether they want to approve six weeks of early voting before elections. “I think Missouri voters are entitled to have robust, expansive early voting that will make it easier for them to have their voices heard,” said Matt Dameron of Kansas City, who was involved in the petition drive. The petition is now in the process of being certified, and the six-week early voting question could go on the November ballot.

Afghanistan: Presidential candidate survives assassination attempt | The Guardian

The frontrunner in Afghanistan’s presidential election has narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in Kabul after suicide bombers attacked his armoured car, killing three of his bodyguards and three bystanders. Two bombs hit the convoy of Abdullah Abdullah as he was driven through the city from one campaign event to another on Friday. They ripped apart the bullet-proof four-wheel drive, blew the glass out of nearby buildings and left the ground strewn with blood and twisted metal, but Abdullah emerged apparently unscathed.

Kosovo: Ruling party claims election victory | Al Jazeera

The ruling party of Prime Minister Hashim Thaci has declared victory in Kosovo’s parliamentary elections in which the Serbian minority is taking part for the first time since the territory broke away from neighbouring Serbia. An exit poll conducted by the Gani Bobi social research institute put Thaci’s Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) on 33 percent, just ahead of the opposition Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) on 30 percent. Thaci is likely to form a coalition government with smaller parties and ethnic Serbs to secure a third four-year term at the helm of the young Balkan country.

Mauritania: Election campaign kicks off | AFP

The race to be Mauritania’s next leader began on Friday, with President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz expected to hold onto power in elections marred by calls for a widespread boycott. The ex-army general, who took over the former French colony in a coup in August 2008, has been head-of-state since he was officially elected the following year for a five-year term. He launched his campaign for re-election in the southern city of Kaedi, telling supporters that since he came to power the country had made “great strides” in security and economic growth. The mainly Muslim republic, sandwiched between the west coast of Africa and the Sahara desert, is seen by Western leaders as strategically important in the fight against Al-Qaeda-linked groups within its own borders, in neighbouring Mali and across Africa’s Sahel region.

Syria: Presidential election: the regime’s extreme confidence | openDemocracy

Syria concluded its first multi-candidate presidential election in about fifty years on 3 June. The result of the election was a foregone conclusion. The incumbent president, Bashar al-Assad, has won with an announced 88.7 percent of the vote, and has secured another seven-year term for himself as Syria’s leader. However, the significance of the election does not reside in its result, nor the supposed democratic era Assad supporters think it heralds. Instead, the election is significant because it confirms how secure the regime feels about itself and its strategy for confronting the insurgency. The election is not important because the government does not control large sections of the country and was unable to set up polling booths in rebel-held localities, some of which are just a few kilometres from Damascus. According to UN estimates, nearly half of the total Syrian population is displaced, with about two to three million residing outside of Syria as refugees. Given these factors, it is clear that the requisite conditions of peace and normalcy are palpably absent for the result of these elections to be taken as indicative of the country’s mood as a whole.

Slovakia: Voting rules to change | The Slovak Spectator

A long-awaited law unifying the rules for all elections held in Slovakia finally sailed through parliament in late May. Before the law was passed, the government allowed the public a period of time to discuss the new rules and to reach a consensus across the political spectrum. Despite this, opposition parties and political transparency watchdogs have serious concerns about some of the rules. On May 29, parliament passed new election rules which are to become effective only in 2015, meaning that, stricter control over campaign financing and limits on campaign spending will not be applied in the municipal elections taking place this autumn. The new election law is replacing six laws that set out the rules for different kinds of elections in Slovakia, with the declared aim of unifying the rules for elections, and to make the running and financing of political campaigns more transparent.

Editorials: ‘Bad News Bears’ of elections | Heather Gerken/The Hill

The Election Assistance Commission (EAC) may be one of the most beleaguered administrative agencies in the country, with many a Washington politician trying to axe it. If Keith Olbermann were running a “worst agency in the world” contest, the EAC might even get more votes than its sister agency, the ever-so-dysfunctional FEC (the Federal Election Commission).  The EAC has been under attack from its inception – the National Association of Secretaries of State called for its destruction even before it was up and running. Two full years after the Help America Vote Act created the agency, the commission did not even have an office, let alone a mailing address or a phone number. The EAC’s first commissioners held their meetings in a local Starbucks. The EAC, however, has turned out to be the Bad News Bears. It had a rocky start, and still looks a bit ramshackle to the outside world, but, while almost no one was looking, the agency has initiated a major, positive shift in how American elections are run.

Alaska: Feds say state election officials wrong on Native language rules | Anchorage Daily News

A federal judge on Wednesday overruled state election officials and said the constitutional right to vote requires Alaska to translate all election materials into Native languages for voters with limited English skills. Siding with village plaintiffs in a voting rights lawsuit against Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell and three other Alaska election officials, U.S. District Judge Sharon Gleason ruled that as a matter of law, the state is obligated to match all English materials — including pamphlets, instructions, registration materials and ballots — with Yup’ik, Cup’ik and Gwich’in translations. Gleason still plans to conduct a trial at the end of the month into whether the state Elections Division, headed by Treadwell, is in violation of the U.S. Voting Rights Act’s language requirements, and if so, what remedial steps should be taken. The lawsuit was brought by the Anchorage office of the nonprofit Native American Rights Fund on behalf of four Native villages in western Alaska and the Interior and two Western Alaska elders with limited English proficiency. Treadwell is running for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate.

Voting Blogs: Yeah, It’s Big: Primary Election Night in Los Angeles County | Election Academy

When people discuss the election administration challenges that face large urban counties like Los Angeles County, CA it’s easy to look at the numbers (nearly 5,000 precincts and a voting population that would put them in the nation’s top ten if it were a state) and think you can understand the impact of the jurisdiction’s size on the collection and tabulation of votes. Then, you’re standing in the parking lot of the library next door to the Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk’s (RR/CC) building as a helicopter – A HELICOPTER! – is delivering ballots from far-flung precincts in places like Catalina Island and Lancaster (over the mountains) to headquarters for counting. That’s when you think to yourself – yeah, it’s big.

California: 1,000+ Sacramento vote-by-mail ballots arrive too late | KCRA

About 1,200 Sacramento County vote-by-mail ballots arrived too late to be counted in this week’s primary election, according to elections officials. Jill LaVine, the county’s registrar of voters, shook her head as she leafed through five trays of pink envelopes and examined the postmarks. “Once again, I see June 3 on these, so they were postmarked June 3,” said LaVine. Even though many of the ballots were mailed before the polls closed Tuesday, they were not received at the registrar’s office until afterwards. Under California law, that means the ballots will never be opened, counted and included in the official results. “So much work went into this and we can’t count them. So it’s sad. It’s really sad,” said LaVine.

District of Columbia: Appeals Court Overturns Attorney General Election Delay | Washington City Paper

The District will have its first attorney general election in 2014… or at least right after 2014. That’s the ruling from the D.C. Court of Appeals this afternoon, which upheld attorney general candidate Paul Zukerberg’s lawsuit against the D.C. Board of Elections in an attempt to hold the vote this year. Even though the D.C. Council voted to move the election to 2018 last year on the grounds that the bill establishing the election only required the first election to take place “after Jan. 1, 2014,” the appeals court ruled that the language meant instead that the election should take place in 2014, not any time afterwards. “We conclude that a far more natural reading of ‘shall be after January 1, 2014’ is that an election for the District’s Attorney General must be held in 2014,” the order reads.

Editorials: Investigate Florida redistricting shenanigans | Miami Herald

A historic redistricting trial, which some have called the Sunshine State’s version of “Game of Thrones” between Democrats and Republicans, ended this week. For the first time, sitting Florida legislators took the stand — after the Florida Supreme Court ruled they could not claim legislative privilege in such a case. Now we wait for Leon County Circuit Judge Terry Lewis to decide whether there was any underhanded scheming or deception when the Republican-led state Legislature carved up the state during redistricting in 2012. Did they violate the state’s new Fair Districts Amendment?

Mississippi: Why Was Miss. Tea Partier In Locked Courthouse With Ballots On Election Night? | TPM

A Mississippi tea party official with close ties to U.S. Senate candidate Chris McDaniel apparently ended up inside a locked and empty county courthouse late Tuesday night after primary election results had come in. Hinds County Republican executive chairman Pete Perry told TPM that he received a phone call around 2:00 a.m. CT on Wednesday from Janis Lane, president of the Central Mississippi Tea Party, who said she was locked inside the Hinds County courthouse. That would be where the circuit clerk and election commission offices, and the primary election ballots, are located. The incident seemed to mystify Perry, a supporter of Sen. Thad Cochran, whom McDaniel is challenging for the GOP nomination. The ballots had been secured prior to the intrusion, according to local authorities.

Mississippi: Courthouse lock-in case closed without arrests | Clarion-Ledger

The Hinds County Sheriff’s Department has concluded no criminal activity took place when three people, including a staffer for state Sen. Chris McDaniel’s U.S. Senate campaign, ended up locked inside the county courthouse hours after everyone had left following the counting of votes from Tuesday’s primaries. Scott Brewster, Janis Lane and Rob Chambers were found locked inside the courthouse early Wednesday. They allegedly entered sometime shortly after 2 a.m. and, after realizing they were locked in, called for help. A member of the Hinds County Board of Supervisors is questioning the three being alone in the building.

South Dakota: Davison County Voting Machine Fails To Read 700 Ballots | KDLT

Davison County has something no other county in South Dakota has: a new up-to-date voting machine that is supposed to count ballots easier and quicker. But the new device didn’t quite do its job last night. It failed to read around 700 ballots, creating some headaches for the County Auditor. The new voter machine in Davison County is supposed to be a big improvement over the equipment it replaced, but during Tuesday night’s election it worked almost too well. “The ballot marks on the back bled through to the front. You can’t see it with the naked eye, only the machine read it,” said Kiepke.

South Dakota: Voters Face Polling Confusion | KDLT

Polling centers have been replaced by precincts for this Primary Election. And that’s caused a lot of confusion throughout the day. Long lines have turned into mix-ups. In April’s city election, voters could go anywhere; Tuesday however, that wasn’t the case. Minnehaha County Auditor Bob Litz said, “We had our usual flurry of calls at 7 o’clock this morning from people wondering where they were supposed to go.”

Afghanistan: Election front-runner escapes car bombings in Kabul | The Washington Post

The front-runner in Afghanistan’s presidential election, Abdullah Abdullah, escaped unhurt in two explosions in the capital Friday, just over a week ahead of a runoff vote that Taliban insurgents have vowed to derail. At least seven people — three of Abdullah’s bodyguards and four pedestrians — were killed by two suicide car bombers, police and a spokesman for Abdullah said. The blasts targeted a convoy of armored vehicles carrying Abdullah, his two deputies and one of his key allies in the western part of the city, they sai

Canada: Elections chief pleased with changes to voting bill | Toronto Star

Canada’s election chief says he is pleased with the “significant improvements” made to the Fair Elections Act — a bill he originally slammed as a serious threat to Canadians’ voting rights. “I think there’s been substantive improvements to the legislation,” Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand told reporters on Thursday — his first public pronouncements since the Conservative government bowed to critics and made amendments to the legislation. The big improvements, Mayrand said, revolve around closing political-fundraising loopholes and allowing voters to continue to prove their identity through the vouching system at the ballot box. These were among his top concerns when he told the Star earlier this year that no election reform would be better than the first draft of the Fair Elections Act.

Czech Republic: Human rights minister wants voting rights for foreigners | Radio Prague

The Minister for Human Rights and Minorities Jiři Dienstbier is pushing for an amendment to the law which would give non-EU foreigners with long-term residence in the Czech Republic the right to vote, first on the local level and later also in general elections. The minister argues that once the authorities have granted a person long-term residence they should also grant them the right to co-decide about who runs the city or country that has become their second home. The laws that govern the process of granting non-EU foreigners permanent residence or citizenship in the Czech Republic are, according to the human rights’ minister, one of the toughest in the EU. People can only file for permanent residence after having resided in the country for 5 years (10 years for citizenship applications) and it is entirely up to the Czech authorities whether their request will be granted. Minister Dienstbier says that their newly acquired status should go hand-in hand with the right to vote.