Kansas: Kobach issues 90-day time limit for voter registrations | The Kansas City Star

Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach issued a rule Thursday that incomplete voter registrations will be canceled after 90 days. The decision came after voting rights groups lodged vigorous objections to the time limit. The rule takes effect Oct. 2. More than 35,000 voter registrations applications are currently “in suspense,” and about 30,000 are incomplete because registrants have yet to provide a passport or birth certificate. Such proof-of-citizenship documents have been required since January 2013, but no limit had been placed on how long county election officials had to keep the incomplete registrations. “It really violates the spirit of what our nation, our Constitution, was built on — the participation of all,” Marge Ahrens, co-president of the League of Women Voters of Kansas, said about Kobach’s decision. “It feels so disrespectful of Kansans,” she said.

Virginia: New lawsuit challenges Virginia legislative districts | Richmond Times-Dispatch

A lawsuit filed Monday in Richmond Circuit Court challenges 11 of Virginia’s legislative districts, arguing that they violate the state constitution’s requirement of compactness. The suit, backed by the nonpartisan redistricting reform group OneVirginia2021, challenges six Republican-held districts and five Democrat-held districts. The plaintiffs in the districts include members of both major parties, a tea party activist and members of nonpartisan organizations such as the League of Women Voters. The defendants are the Virginia State Board of Elections; chairman James B. Alcorn; vice chair Clara Belle Wheeler; board secretary Singleton B. McAllister; the state Department of Elections; and Edgardo Cortes, commissioner of the state Department of Elections.

Greece: Campaigning in Greece draws to close, election results in balance | Reuters

Former prime minister Alexis Tsipras on Friday brushed off election polls suggesting his leftist Syriza party might lose to its conservative rival in Greece’s election, saying he had a large group of supporters not reflected by pollsters. He was speaking on the last day of formal campaigning for Sunday’s general election with polls showing a cliffhanger vote expected and some pointing to a win by the conservative New Democracy party. Neither party, however, is expected to get the proportion of the vote needed – roughly 38 percent – to gain a majority in the 300-seat parliament, meaning a coalition is a near certainty. “There is a voting body that is below the radar, it is not being traced,” Tsipras, who was to stage a final rally later in the day, told Greece’s ANT 1 television.

Editorials: Russia's Latest Fake Election | Maxim Trudolyubov/The New York Times

After watching the local and gubernatorial elections in Russia on Sunday, one cannot help wondering: Why bother? Why does the Kremlin need to push the illusion of democracy when the results are predetermined? The only region where an opposition force worthy of the name was allowed to participate — in Kostroma oblast east of Moscow — saw voting marred by bullying and the arrests of anti-Kremlin candidates. No one could figure out why the Democratic Coalition, the only grouping of parties openly critical of President Vladimir Putin, was even allowed to run. All municipal, regional and gubernatorial elections in Russia are held on the same day, and in nearly all of them United Russia, the main pro-Kremlin party, was victorious. How could it lose when its candidates enjoyed access to unlimited resources and dominated the airwaves while their challengers were vilified as traitors?

National: America’s Aging Voting Machines Could Present Election Problems | NPR

Voting machines around the United States are coming to the end of their useful lives. Breakdowns are increasingly common. Spare parts are difficult, if not impossible, to find. That could be a serious problem for next year’s presidential elections. Allen County, Ohio, election director Ken Terry knows how bad things can get. In the last presidential election, he had to replace the Zip disks — a 1990s technology — in the main machine his county uses to count votes. The disks are no longer made. And when he finally got some from the voting machine manufacturer: “They actually had a coupon in them. They were sealed and everything. And the coupon had expired in … 1999,” he said. And, to make matters worse, Terry said his voting machines use memory cards that hold only 250 megabytes of data — a tiny fraction of what you can store today on a $6 thumb drive. “You know, by today’s standards that’s just absurd,” he said.

California: Will California guarantee the right to know the names of political donors? | The Washington Post

When Silicon Valley entrepreneur Jim Heerwagen decided to invest in an effort to reduce the influence of big money on politics, he considered a push for a constitutional amendment to overturn the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision. “Then I realized I could be dead or not remember where my car keys were by the time that happened,” he said. Congressional proposals to tighten federal campaign finance rules seemed like long-shots, he concluded: “They just weren’t going to go anywhere.” So Heerwagen looked to make a stand in the more hospitable political environs of California. After commissioning a poll and hiring political strategists, the former software executive and his team of election law experts are rolling out an unusual measure they hope to get on the ballot in November 2016.

Editorials: Entwining Two Rights in California: Voting and Driving | The New York Times

For all the early excitement stirred by the presidential primary contests, a greater test of democracy than the candidates’ cut-and-thrust will be voter participation, a vital statistic which dropped from 62.3 percent in 2008 to 57.5 percent in the last presidential election. In part because of a welter of obstructionist state laws, more than 90 million Americans did not bother or care to vote in 2012. The Democratic-majority Legislature in California, the most populous state, has just taken a major step toward resisting this alarming trend by approving a system of automatic voter registration for any citizen who obtains or updates a California driver’s license. Modeled on Oregon’s excellent “motor-voter” program, the new system cannot help but increase democratic participation.

Maryland: State commission attacks redistricting reform | Baltimore Sun

As the state’s redistricting reform commission held its first meeting at Towson University on Tuesday, co-chairman Alexander Williams Jr. noted that the group was sitting in Maryland’s 3rd Congressional District. Yet other parts of the Towson campus, Williams said, are in the 2nd Congressional District. That fact illustrates the challenge facing Williams and other members of the commission: How to create a process for drawing political maps to avoid tangled and confused districts that critics say are among the most gerrymandered in the nation. Republican Gov. Larry Hogan created the commission last month, saying he wants a constitutional amendment to put before voters in 2016 that could change how the state’s congressional and General Assembly districts are drawn. Tuesday’s meeting was the first of five scheduled around the state, and the commission’s proposal is due by Nov. 3.

Montana: Tribal leaders demand satellite voting offices | Great Falls Tribune

The Rocky Mountain Tribal Leaders Council is pressing Secretary of State Linda McCulloch to establish satellite voting offices for Native Americans in 10 Montana counties. A letter from the council is on its way to McCulloch, calling on her to “issue a directive to Montana counties that have American Indian Reservations within their boundaries telling the counties that they must establish satellite voting offices for in-person absentee voting and later voter registration on those Indian Reservations within their boundaries for the upcoming 2016 general election for the full 30 day late registration and absentee voting period, including election day.”

New Jersey: Sen. Gill to Christie: Sign voting rights bill | Montclair Times

State Sen. Nia Gill wants Gov. Chris Christie to take some time away from trying to gain voters on the presidential campaign trail to sign legislation impacting voters in his home state. The Montclair resident, who also represents her hometown as well as Clifton, East Orange, and Orange in the 34th District, was one of the primary sponsors of the “Democracy Act,” also known as S-50 and A-4613, which was approved by both the state Senate and Assembly in June. The bill would extend elections from one day to 15 days, allow for online voter registration, set up automatic voter registration through the state Motor Vehicle Commission, establish pre-registration for 17-year-olds, and allow non-English speakers to able to vote and register to vote in their native language.

New Mexico: Lawmakers OK funding for Duran impeachment panel | NM Political Report

Shortly following Secretary of State Dianna Duran’s first court appearance Tuesday morning, state lawmakers approved a House subcommittee to consider impeaching her. Lawmakers in the interim Legislative Council, which is made up of members of both the House and Senate, approved $250,000 in funding to pay for the impeachment special committee. The funding will likely go towards the hire of outside counsel. State House of Representatives Speaker Don Tripp, R-Socorro, appointed a panel of bipartisan lawmakers to investigate whether Duran should be impeached last week. He told committee members that he anticipated the panel would want money to spend on lawyers. Tripp also made the committee members official during the Legislative Council meeting.

Ohio: Voting Machines Reaching the End of the Line | Public News Service

The end of the line is nearing for Ohio’s electronic voting machines, which a new report indicates could cause trouble during the 2016 election. According to the Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law, 90 percent of Ohio counties are using machines that are 10 years old. Report co-author Christopher Famighetti says that’s much longer than the machines are designed to last. “Most of us don’t keep our laptops, desktops, over a decade, and that’s the type of technology that most of the machines in use today are using,” he explains.

Texas: Travis County to Update Aging Voting Technology With New Tablet-Based System | KUT

Yesterday morning, we heard a story about the nation’s aging voting machines and the problems they could present in the future. But that same report, which warns of trouble ahead for some municipalities, also details how Travis County has developed a new voting system, set to premiere in time for 2018 elections. To anyone over 18, the following scene might sound familiar. “It looks like you’re standing in front of an ATM machine with kind of a pad-like device in front of you, and you click through and make selections for the candidates or the propositions that you’re choosing, and then you cast your vote,” says Ronald Morgan, Travis County’s Chief Deputy Clerk.

Cambodia: ‘Bad Karma if Monks Lose Voting Rights’ | Khmer Times

If the Ministry of Interior refuses to issue new identification cards to the country’s estimated 50,000 monks so that they can vote in the next election, monks will find other ways to make their voices heard in the electoral process, two national leaders of monks told Khmer Times yesterday. “The ruling party will lose more support if monks are not allowed to vote,” Venerable But Buntenh, leader of the Independent Monk Network for Social Justice, said. He suggested it would be bad karma to deprive monks of their constitutionally guaranteed right to vote. “We have a lot of support through our religious activities and we can disseminate information to people and tell them that we have been deprived of the right to vote,” he said.

Kyrgyzstan: Election Worries: Biometrics, Migrants, Technical Difficulties | The Diplomat

Kyrgyzstan, as I have detailed before, is using a new biometric registration system for voting in the upcoming parliamentary election, scheduled for October 4. The law making registration — which requires submission of a fingerprint, photo and signature — mandatory in order to vote was recently upheld as constitutional by the Constitutional Chamber of Kyrgyzstan’s Supreme Court. The precise substance of the decision is unknown, but one of the human rights activists, Toktaim Umetalieva, who filed the claim against the mandatory biometrics law told AKIpress that “the decision was made in nobody’s favor in fact. That is, the Chamber recognized [the] constitutionality of the law on biometric registration, but ordered the Parliament to rework the law in terms of a precise formulation of goals and objectives, mechanisms and criteria. In such case the law can be changed significantly.” The court’s decision on the constitutionality of the law was preceded by the summer ousting of the judge originally tasked with the case after she was accused of revealing her views on the biometric data law – that it was unconstitutional – before making her ruling public.

New Zealand: Wellington opts into online election despite Ashley Madison-style hack warnings | The Dominion Post

Wellington has been warned it faces an Ashley Madison-style election hack as it opts for online voting for 2016. In a split vote, councillors have agreed to join a trial of online voting for next year’s election – despite warnings from IT experts about potential security risks with e-voting. At Wednesday’s extraordinary full council meeting, software developer Nigel McNie said online voting opened up the process to “massive risk”. “Hacking is a risk. Consider the Ashley Madison hack, which I’m sure most of you have heard of.” He said “one small hole” in the adultery hookup site led to its hack, and eventual destruction. In July, it was revealed about 36 million members globally had their details leaked in the 9.7-gigabyte data dump on the dark web.

Philippines: Voting machine production moves over China ‘sabotage’ fears | AFP

The Philippines said today it had shifted production of voting machines for the 2016 presidential election from China to Taiwan due to fears that Beijing might “sabotage” the vote. Christian Lim, a senior official at the government poll watchdog Commission on Elections (Comelec), said the agency had moved the production site to avoid the risk of China interfering with the May 9, 2016 vote, or deliberately failing to deliver the machines. “We want to emphasise that the move to Taiwan was a product of the contract negotiations because we have received intelligence reports that there may be an attempt to sabotage the elections by China,” he was quoted by television reports as telling a congressional budget hearing.

Ukraine: Snap elections ahead? | New Europe

The parties of Ukraine’s President Petro Poreshenko and Kiev’s mayor Vitaly Klitschko’s merged in August, and with local elections upcoming all eyes are on Ukraine as pro democracy parties seek to consolidate their seats against more pro-Russian sentiment. The recent actions by President Poroshenko to grant more autonomy to the separatist regions have angered the nationalists within Parliament, and the far right. Along with the parties merging, this has caused upheaval in Kiev and has raised the possibility of snap elections in which a slew of new candidates could be vying to take over for Poreshenko and Yatsenyuk’s embattled governments. There’s talk that Mikhail Saakashvilli, the current Odessa governor and former President of Georgia, will go for the position.Saakashvilli recently received 26,000 signatures on a petition to President Poreshenko demanding that Saakashvilli become Prime Minister. The petition supporting Saakashvili’s candidacy for the prime minister’s post was officially submitted on September 3. The same day, Ukraine’s Channel 5 television network, which is owned by Poroshenko, aired an interview with Saakashvili, who lambasted current Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk’s reform agenda, Radio Free Europe reports.. While Saakashvilli has said that he will not run for the position, many believe that he is still entertaining at least some notion of running for election, particularly when his popularity has risen of late.

National: Startup spirit helps Omaha company ES&S innovate, thanks to Straight Shot incubator | Omaha World Herald

It can be hard in a big company for a small idea to get the attention it deserves. Sometimes, perhaps the big company should think like a startup.
That’s what Omaha-based Election Systems & Software did: carved out a small team and sent its members to startup school to develop an idea that could make voting a better process throughout the United States and beyond. ES&S Director of Emerging Technologies Rob Wiebusch and Director of Innovations Shari Little last week finished a three-month stint at the Straight Shot Accelerator, where they refined their early concept at improving voting. They want to use data to help election administrators make smarter decisions at polling places. Omaha’s ES&S makes electronic voting machines used around the world. Even though it’s the world’s leading provider of voting equipment and election support services, the company’s management said a startup mindset is what ES&S needs to maintain its lead in the business. So ES&S sent Wiebusch and Little to the 90-day startup accelerator program in June to come up with the nuts and bolts of a new product offering that will aim to make voters’ experiences at the polls go more smoothly.

National: Electronic voting machines in 43 states are out of date, study shows | Politico

When Americans head to the polls for next year’s presidential election, 43 states will be using electronic voting machines that are at least a decade old, according to a new study from New York University School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice released Tuesday. And the price tag for replacement machines could top $1 billion. Fifteen years after the term “hanging chad” entered the American political lexicon, and Congress appropriated $2 billion to move to electronic voting systems to avoid a future conundrum, those same electronic systems are still in use in many jurisdictions. “No one expects a laptop to last for 10 years. How can we expect these machines, many of which were designed and engineered in the 1990s, to keep running without increased failures?” said Lawrence Norden, deputy director of the Center’s Democracy Program, and co-author of the study, in a statement. “Old equipment can have serious security flaws, and the longer we delay purchasing new machines, the higher the risk. To avoid a new technology crisis every decade, we must plan for and invest in voting technology for the 21st century.”

National: The Policy Ramifications of Increasing Voter Turnout | The Atlantic

In 2014, just 41.9 percent of the voting-age citizen population of the United States voted. But the people who voted are not only in the minority, they form an unrepresentative minority. Millions of Americans are too young to vote. Others are disenfranchised felons, unable to vote for health reasons, missed registration deadlines, stuck at work, dissuaded by voter ID laws. In many salient ways, voters are not like nonvoters: voters are richer, whiter, and older than other Americans. And my new report, Why Voting Matters, shows how their votes produce a government that caters to their interests—and how boosting turnout would lead to a more representative democracy. Political scientists once accepted the idea that voters were a “carbon copy” of the nonvoting population. In 1999, Benjamin Highton and Raymond E. Wolfinger summarized this consensus, writing that, “simply put, voters’ preferences differ minimally from those of all citizens; outcomes would not change if everyone voted.” More recently, though, that view has come under attack. Jan Leighley and Jonathan Nagler, a pair of political scientists, argue that gaps between voters and nonvoters are real and have widened, and that the divergence in their views is particularly acute on issues related to social class and the size of government. However, measures that examine a one dimensional left-right axis obscure these divides.

California: Design firm tackles aging voting machines with smartphone technology | CBS

In this era of smartphones and the Internet, the way Americans cast their ballots is a bit outdated. Los Angeles County, which is home to the most voters in the country, uses technology that is more than 50 years old. But a campaign of innovation could soon bring change at the ballot box across the United States. In one unorthodox Silicon Valley workspace, a team of developers is trying to change the way we vote, by first determining how we want to vote, reports CBS News correspondent Carter Evans. Blaise Bertrand leads the design team at IDEO, a firm that encourages “out-of-the-box” thinking. IDEO’s human-centered approach is responsible for creating some of the most innovative products in our lifetime, from Apple’s first computer mouse to a talking defibrillator. For the past two years, they have taken on another project — developing a new voting machine for Los Angeles County.

Illinois: New political mapmaking push gains ground, concerns | Chicago Tribune

For years, good-government advocates have pushed for a new way to draw Illinois House and Senate district boundaries to curb the influence of partisan politics in deciding who controls the General Assembly, only to fall short due to legal hurdles. Now a new group funded by well-heeled backers is taking another run at the issue as it tries to learn from mistakes of the past by getting an earlier start and drafting a proposal it believes can withstand an inevitable court challenge. The Independent Map Amendment effort says it’s well on its way to getting enough signatures to put the measure on next year’s ballot, aided by voter frustration over the stalemate at the Statehouse. But like last time, the latest drive is drawing opposition from a group led by African-American businessmen who said they fear changes in the process could end up reducing minority representation and influence at the Capitol. Some of them successfully challenged a similar proposal last year, aided by a lawyer with close ties to Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan, a 44-year veteran who helped write the Illinois Constitution and is opposed to changing how legislative maps are drawn.

Indiana: Counties to get state funds to help cover e-pollbook costs | The News Herald

Although the devices won’t be ready in time for the Nov. 3 election, Lake and Geauga counties soon will be purchasing e-pollbooks, thanks to state aid. About $12.7 million in funding was appropriated in the state’s biennial budget passed in June to cover up to 85 percent of each county’s purchase cost. Funds will be distributed based on the number of voters in each county, according to a news release from Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted’s office. Counties were given the go-ahead to purchase e-pollbooks Sept. 14 from the Secretary of State’s office.

New Mexico: Secretary of state pleads not guilty to charges | Albuquerque Journal

Embattled New Mexico Secretary of State Dianna Duran entered a not guilty plea today to charges of fraud, embezzlement, money laundering and other crimes for allegedly using campaign contributions to cover personal spending at casinos. Duran was stoic during the 30-minute appearance before District Judge Glenn Ellington. She did not speak to reporters while leaving the courthouse through a side exit, and her husband at one point pushed away a television reporter’s microphone. During the hearing, Duran’s attorney raised several technical complaints about the charges filed against Duran, but the judge rejected motions to dismiss part or all of the case.

Canada: Elections Canada chief hopeful voters won’t be turned away because of new ID rules | CTV

Despite the uproar over the Conservative government’s new election law, the country’s chief electoral officer said Monday he’s confident those who want to vote on Oct. 19 will get a chance to do so. Marc Mayrand said his agency is going to great lengths to inform people, particularly online and in aboriginal communities. New, legislative requirements for identification should not cause problems, as long as voters prepare themselves, he said. “I think we’ll see a good election,” he said. “We have taken various measures to ensure no one is denied the right to vote.” Mayrand downplayed opposition party warnings, which resounded during the divisive debate over Bill C-23, that thousands will be unable to vote because of the new rules. However, he placed the burden of exercising democratic rights on the shoulders of electors. “If anybody is turned away from the polls, or anybody stays home because of concerns, I think there should be no concerns there,” he said. “I think there is a way (to vote). If you’re concerned about your ability to establish your ID and address, please contact us.”

Myanmar: International alarm over Myanmar religious tension ahead of key polls | AsiaOne

The United States, Japan and other major powers on Tuesday raised fears that rising religious tensions in Myanmar could spark “division and conflict” as campaigning begins for historic elections. Myanmar goes to the polls on November 8 in what many hope will be its freest vote in generations after decades of army rule, with Aung San Suu Kyi’s opposition party widely tipped to make huge gains. But religious tensions are spiking in the Buddhist-majority country, which has seen sporadic outbursts of often deadly religious unrest in recent years, with minority Muslims facing increasing political exclusion as the influence of nationalist monks grows.

Norway: Anti-immigrant party set for worst election result in 22 years | Reuters

An anti-immigration party in Norway’s coalition government headed for its worst election result in 22 years in a local vote on Monday after its opposition to Syrian refugees put it out of step with many voters. The right-wing Progress Party had 9.7 percent with 87 percent of the votes counted, against 16.3 percent in a parliamentary vote in 2013. It was Progress’ worst election since receiving 6.3 percent of the vote in 1993. The election was also a blow to the Conservative Party, the senior partner in the two-party government which came to office in 2013 and has struggled with falling prices of oil, Norway’s main export, and rising unemployment. The Conservatives’ share fell to 22.4 percent, down 5.6 percentage points from four years ago as voters swung left.

Russia: California hackers attack Kremlin, Putin’s website | Washington Examiner

Hackers in California attacked several of the Russian government’s websites over the weekend, Russian officials said on Monday, just as the country was trying to conduct elections. “Someone attempted to hack our website and alter the data there, making 50,000 requests per minute,” said Vladimir Churov, chairman of the Central Election Commission of Russia, according to a report in the state-funded Russia Today. Such an attack is known as a distributed denial of service, which is designed to crash a website.