Monthly Archives: May 2016

For many, exercising their right to vote is more complicated than just filling in a box. Across the state there are voting machines for people with a variety of disabilities. But KTVB spoke with one voter who’s blind and says those expensive terminals weren’t any help. Boise resident Bill Morgan votes in every election he can. However, he says oftentimes it can be a struggle getting to the polls. In addition, if the machines to help people with disabilities are hard to navigate, some people may find voting discouraging. “I think it’s the most important thing I can do as a citizen,” Morgan said. “People died so that I could vote.” Being blind, he’s been using accessible voting machines in general elections for the past several years. “I will vote any way I can,” Morgan told KTVB. “But if I can make my own ‘X’ that just makes me feel proud. I like that.”

Illinois: Senate approves automatic voter registration bill | Chicago Tribune

Senate Democrats pushed through legislation Thursday that would automatically register drivers to vote when they get their licenses, a change supporters argued would eliminate red tape and get more people to the polls. Republicans were fiercely opposed, saying eligibility should be tightened by requiring voters to show photo identification before they could register. Doing so, they contended, would prevent voter fraud and keep illegal immigrants from voting — arguments Democrats said were solutions in search of a problem. “The notion that voter fraud is rampant in Illinois is just unproven and undocumented,” said Sen. Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, who has pushed bills supporting online and same-day voter registration and pointed out that Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner spoke in favor of the concept just hours earlier.

Editorials: At least courts are protecting voting rights in Kansas | The Wichita Eagle

The mess that Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach has made of voter registration draws yawns at the Statehouse. At least the courts continue to look out for the thousands of Kansans who would have registered to vote since 2013 if not for the Kobach-pushed law requiring they produce U.S. citizenship documents. The most recent ruling came Tuesday from U.S. District Judge Julie Robinson in Kansas City, Kan. She ordered Kobach to register more than 18,000 prospective voters who’d filed applications at motor vehicle offices, as per the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, but whose registrations were stalled or canceled for lack of citizenship proof. (Though more than 32,000 registrations were in limbo at one point, before Kobach started purging them last fall after 90 days, Robinson’s ruling covers only those applications filed in the process of obtaining driver’s licenses.)

Missouri: Governor weighing voter photo ID: ‘It is a concept I disagree with.’ | MissouriNet

A proposal that would establish how voter photo ID would work in Missouri is in the hands of Governor Jay Nixon (D). The bill would set up the system for requiring voters to show a photo ID at the polls. It would allow those who lack one to sign a document swearing, under penalty of perjury, that they don’t have one at all – in which case they would be allowed to vote, and the state would pay the costs to get them one. Like any other bill Nixon could veto it, sign it into law, or allow it to become law without acting on it. He told reporters he doesn’t support requiring a photo ID to vote.

Montana: Attorney General seeks partial stay in campaign spending ruling | Helena Independent Record

Montana Attorney General Tim Fox’s office filed a motion for an immediate partial stay with U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals after a ruling by U.S. District Judge Charles Lovell struck down the state’s campaign contribution limits. The brief was filed late Thursday afternoon, and the attorney general’s office which represents Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl, argued that unless the Ninth Circuit grants the immediate request, suspending contribution limits “will cause confusion and undermine the integrity of Montana’s electoral process.” “Military and absentee voting has begun … and the primary election is less than 20 days away,” the brief said. “… there can be no doubt that unlimited donations from political parties would create mass chaos in Montana’s election.”

Utah: Democratic chief claims county clerks are running a GOP registration drive | The Salt Lake Tribune

Utah Democratic Party Chairman Peter Corroon is complaining that county clerks statewide are essentially running a taxpayer-funded drive to register new Republicans. But election officials say he is misconstruing their efforts, which are aimed at helping voters receive whichever by-mail party ballot they choose in time for the June 28 primary. The dispute comes, in part, because 20 of the state’s 29 counties are conducting elections mostly by mail this year. So clerks wrote letters to the 41 percent of Utahns who are not affiliated with any party, asking whether they want a Democratic or Republican ballot. Letters warn that if voters choose to receive a GOP ballot, they will then be registered as Republicans. That’s because the GOP allows only registered Republicans to vote in its closed primary, but Democrats allow anyone of any party to vote in its open primary.

Virginia: Virginia Democrats lose lawsuit over voter ID | The Washington Post

A federal judge on Thursday upheld Virginia’s voter- identification requirement, dealing a blow to a national push by Democrats to remove laws they say disenfranchise minority and poor voters. Republicans applauded the decision as “a victory for the integrity of Virginia’s elections,” while Democrats called it a disappointment and said they may appeal. If the lawsuit ultimately succeeds, it could give Democrats an edge in the presidential race in a swing state with a recent spate of close elections. In his 62-page opinion, U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson rejected the argument that a photo-ID requirement was “arbitrary and unfair” and severely burdened voters who tend to favor Democratic candidates.

Voting Blogs: Virginia Election Data Project | electionlineWeekly

This week, the Virginia Department of Elections released the Virginia Election Data Project, a cooperative effort between the department and local registrars with assistance from The Pew Charitable Trusts Election Initiatives. The project analyzes election and voter data provided to the Department by local election offices and presents the data visualized in a user-friendly online format. “Like most election offices, we house a huge amount of data,” explained Edgardo Cortes, commissioner of elections. “While much of it is personal information that needs to be kept securely, there are ways we can be transparent about the data related to election processes to help the public understand election administration better. This is a way for us to use objective data to improve how we administer elections by figuring out best practices and sharing them across the state.”

Wisconsin: 34 Republicans ask budget committee to fund voter ID education campaign | Wisconsin State Journal

More than two dozen Assembly Republicans have asked the Legislature’s budget-writing committee to consider approving money to educate the public on the state’s law requiring voters to show photo identification. The names of 34 Assembly Republicans appeared on a letter dated Thursday and addressed to Sen. Alberta Darling, R-River Hills, and Rep. John Nygren, R-Marinette, who head the state’s Joint Finance Committee. Twenty-eight of the lawmakers whose names appear on the letter attached their signatures. The letter asks the two lawmakers to schedule a meeting to consider a May 10 request made by the Government Accountability Board to spend $250,000 to re-start a public information campaign authorized in 2011 when the law was passed but was stopped in 2012 after a lawsuit blocked implementation of the law until this year.

Bulgaria: President Hits back at MPs over Rejection of Veto on Election Rules | Novinite

Bulgaria’s President Rosen Plevneliev will refer to the Constitutional Court the Parliament’s “hugely regrettable” decision to override his veto on changes to election rules that could hamper voting by Bulgarian citizens residing abroad. By rejecting the veto the lawmakers “bet on a policy of confrontation even at the expense of the Constitution and basic democratic rights of citizens,” Plevneliev said in a statement on Wednesday after Parliament refused to rescind recently adopted controversial changes to the Electoral Code. The changes must be revoked as they curb the opening of polling stations abroad and will infringe on the voting rights of Bulgarian expats, according to Plevneliev.

Malta: Passport buyers still given the right to vote despite red flags raised by Electoral Commission | The Malta Independent

Desk officers at the Electoral Commission sent e-mails to a number of IIP citizenship holders to inform them that they did not meet the necessary criteria, as laid out by Malta’s Constitution, to be placed on the Electoral Register. Despite this, these same individuals were still given a right to vote in Malta. In one particular e-mail exchange, an Electoral Commission desk officer sent an e-mail to an IIP citizenship holder about how according to her application, she did not meet the criteria to be able to vote. This e-mail was forwarded by the applicant to an IIP agent asking him/her to “sort this out.” The IIP agent then e-mailed the Electoral Commission (photo above) to halt the processing of the application. Again, despite the desk officer doing their job, the person was still placed on the Electoral Register.

United Kingdom: EU referendum: The non-Britons planning to vote | BBC

It might seem peculiar that a young Australian here in Britain on a two-year working holiday is allowed to have a say on whether the UK should leave the European Union. But Michael Ingle, a 27-year-old physiotherapist living in Surrey, defends his right to participate in the 23 June referendum. He says that as a taxpayer, and a citizen of the Commonwealth, what happens to Britain is important to him and will have ramifications for the wider world well beyond the cliffs of Dover. “It’s not just about Britain for me, which is why I’ve taken an interest in it,” Mr Ingle, from Sydney, says. “It’s about the West and the stability of this continent.”

United Kingdom: Expats likely to make up only 1% of eligible Brexit voters | Financial Times

Just under 200,000 British expats have registered to vote in the EU referendum, a small fraction of the several million eligible. British expats in Europe could have been a key constituency, on the assumption that they would be concerned at losing their right of residence. British embassies across Europe were asked to launch campaigns to persuade voters to register, with the embassy in Paris offering afternoon tea at the residence in a competition. But according to the Electoral Commission, only about 196,000 online applications have been received and a recommended cut-off point to apply for a postal vote passed this week. It said estimates showed the number of British citizens overseas might be as high as 5.5m.

Zambia: Opposition Groups Unhappy With Ballot Printer Choice | VoA News

Zambian opposition parties denounced the choice of a Dubai-based company to print election ballots, and suggested that corruption and plans for vote-rigging played a role. The parties reacted after Zambia’s electoral commission announced Al Ghurair Printing and Publishing had won the contract to print the ballots that will be used in the August 11 general election. Jack Mwiimbu, head of legal affairs for the United Party for National Development (UPND), accused the electoral commission of trying to rig the polls for the governing Patriotic Front. He says the party has proof of some Zambians celebrating after the electoral commission announced the contract. He also questioned the cost of the contract — $3.5 million, a figure he says is $2 million higher than what the government paid previously.

National: Presidential candidates may be vulnerable to foreign hackers, US says | Associated Press

The United States sees evidence that hackers, possibly working for foreign governments, are snooping on the presidential candidates, the nation’s intelligence chief said on Wednesday. Government officials are working with the campaigns to tighten security as the race for the White House intensifies. The activity follows a pattern set in the last two presidential elections. Hacking was rampant in 2008, according to US intelligence officials, and both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney were targets of Chinese cyber-attacks four years later. Despite that history, cyber experts say neither Donald Trump’s nor Hillary Clinton’s campaign networks are secure enough to eliminate the risk. “We’ve already had some indications” of hacking, James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, said Wednesday at a cybersecurity event at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington. He said the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security were helping educate the campaigns. Of the attacks, Clapper predicted, “we’ll probably have more”.

National: Restrictive voting laws threaten to block millions of Latino voters, including many newly-naturalized | Government Security News

Naturalization and voter registration rates have surged in recent months, but strict new voter laws in many states are threatening to reduce the number of Latinos voters (including many newly naturalized) who will be allowed to cast ballots. More than 185,000 citizenship applications were submitted in the final three months of 2015, which is a 14 percent increase from 2014 and up 8 percent compared with the same period ahead of the 2012 elections. According to the Houston Chronicle, in Texas, naturalization ceremonies in Houston have swelled to about 2,200 per month, compared with 1,200 before, and more than 80 percent of those naturalized then register to vote, compared with 60 percent previously.

Colorado: Election officials knew of possible forged signatures on Keyser petition for a month | The Denver Post

The Colorado secretary of state’s office first learned about the possibility of fraudulent signatures — including a dead voter — on U.S. Senate candidate Jon Keyser’s petitions in April but did not refer the matter to investigators. The revelation adds a new layer of culpability to the controversy surrounding the Republican primary and raises additional questions about how Keyser qualified for the ballot. The missed opportunity was revealed by Secretary of State Wayne Williams, who said in a statement that he didn’t know his staff was warned about the questionable signatures until Tuesday.

Connecticut: This State Says It Can Automatically Register Voters Without Legislative Approval | Huffington Post

Connecticut announced this week that it will become the fifth state in the U.S. to automatically register its citizens to vote. And it’s going to do so in an innovative way. While Oregon, California, West Virginia and Vermont have each passed laws through their state legislatures enacting automatic voter registration, the process in Connecticut was initiated by state agencies. The office of Connecticut Secretary of the State Denise Merrill (D) signed an administrative agreement with the state Department of Motor Vehicles to automatically register eligible voters by August 2018. The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 requires states to give eligible voters the opportunity to register to vote when they renew their driver’s license or state identification card, or when they acquire a new one, at the DMV. Connecticut says it will transition to a system where eligible voters are registered automatically when they interact with the DMV. The state says up to 400,000 new voters could be registered through this process once the two agencies hammer out the details.

Kansas: Judge slams Kansas voter ID law’s “magnitude of harm” | Associated Press

A judge said Tuesday that Kansas can’t require people to show proof of U.S. citizenship when registering to vote for federal elections at motor vehicle offices. U.S. District Judge Julie Robinson ruled that the state’s proof-of-citizenship requirements likely violate a provision in the National Voter Registration Act that requires only “minimal information” to determine a voter’s eligibility. She ordered Kansas to register thousands of voters whose paperwork is on hold because they did not comply with the requirement. But she put her preliminary injunction on hold until May 31 to give the state a chance to appeal. The state immediately said it would appeal. Unless a higher court halts Robinson’s order before the end of the month, it would take effect then, clearing the way for those residents to cast a ballot in the upcoming federal elections.

Kentucky: Clinton, Sanders’ delegate split pending | Louisville Courier-Journal

The Kentucky Democratic Party on Wednesday was waiting on final numbers from the Tuesday’s presidential primary before doling out delegates to Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Daniel Lowry, a spokesman for the party, said Democrats had hoped to get the numbers by Wednesday afternoon but that the numbers may not be finalized until sometime Thursday. He…

Montana: Officials Seek To Delay Implementation Of Campaign Finance Ruling | MTPR

Montana’s Commissioner of Political Practices is asking a federal court to put on hold a ruling that would allow political parties to donate unlimited amounts of money to campaigns. On Tuesday, a Montana District Court judge struck down limits on contributions to candidates. The judge said the limits were unconstitutional. When that happened, Montana’s old contribution limit laws went into effect, except for the laws capping how much a political party can give. Commissioner of Political Practices Jonathan Motl says he spoke with the Attorney General’s office and they will ask the judge for a stay. That would restore the current limits on political party contributions for 2016.

Utah: State trying to decide how to run future elections – by mail, paper ballot or electronically | The Salt Lake Tribune

Officials are asking legislators how they want to hold future elections — by mail, by paper ballot or electronically — because that may make a difference of millions of dollars in replacing old voting machines. Mark Thomas, state elections director for Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox, said a committee is now studying options for replacing machines statewide that are nearing the end of their lifespans. A recommendation is expected early next year. But Thomas asked the Government Operations Interim Committee for some guidance on Wednesday. If the state helps to buy new electronic machines to conduct traditional, in-person elections with new machines at hundreds of polling places statewide, it would cost an estimated $10 million to $15 million, he said. But if the state moves to vote mostly by mail, the cost would be much less — $2.2 million to $3.2 million — for fewer high-speed optical scanners to count paper ballots.

Wisconsin: Witnesses detail difficulties obtaining IDs in Wisconsin voter ID case | The Capital Times

A federal judge heard testimony Tuesday from Wisconsin residents who have faced difficulties obtaining photo IDs for themselves or family members on the second day of a trial challenging several of the state’s voting laws. Witnesses for the plaintiffs included a son who faced difficulties getting an ID for his mother in 2011, a homeless man who couldn’t afford a driver’s license but didn’t want to relinquish his driving privileges for a free ID and a mother who spent days navigating the process to get an ID for her adopted daughter. “I’m trying to teach them that this is what you do to preserve this beautiful right,” said Laura Patten of Whitefish Bay, discussing the importance of voting to her children, adopted from Romania.

Australia: Electoral Commission sends electoral roll data of Victorian voters to the wrong people | ABC

The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) has mailed private information of Victorian residents to the wrong postal addresses, in a series of privacy breaches that raises questions about the security of voter details on the electoral roll. The privacy breaches exposed the date of birth, email address, driver’s licence number, gender, previous home addresses, country of birth and mobile numbers for electorates, including those held by Environment Minister Greg Hunt and Infrastructure and Transport Minister Darren Chester. ABC’s 7.30 understands the privacy of at least seven residents has been breached by the AEC.

Philippines: ‘VP votes may have been manipulated’ | The Manila Times

The cascade of votes for Rep. Leni Robredo that allowed her to obliterate the almost one million lead of Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. on May 10 looked strange and the “movement of the votes” appeared to have been manipulated, a statistics and political science analyst said on Tuesday. Antonio Contreras, Political Science professor at De La Salle University who also previously taught quantitative analysis at another university, said it was statistically impossible for Robredo to overtake Marcos in the race with 80 percent of the returns already counted.
Marcos was leading the count on the night of May 9 but his numbers and those for his closest rival Robredo were reversed in the early hours of May 10.

United Kingdom: Can the Queen vote in the EU referendum? | BBC

The Sun newspaper’s been told off for misleadingly reporting that the Queen’s in favour of the UK leaving the European Union. But is she allowed to vote in next month’s referendum, asks Justin Parkinson. The Queen doesn’t vote. She “has to remain strictly neutral with respect to political matters” and is “unable to vote or stand for election”, according to the Buckingham Palace website. But this isn’t the whole story. The monarch is actually entitled in law to cast a ballot in general elections. “By convention the Queen doesn’t vote, rather than because of a legal impediment,” says an Electoral Commission spokesman.

Maryland: Investigation into Baltimore elections irregularities nearing an end, state says | Baltimore Sun

State officials said Wednesday their review of Baltimore’s primary election was nearing an end, as they continued to investigate why votes outnumbered check-ins at the polls. Nikki Baines Charlson, deputy administrator at the State Board of Elections, said she expected workers to finish the review Thursday. Officials have focused on 60 precincts — about a fifth of the city’s 296 — where irregularities were “significantly” greater than in other Maryland jurisdictions. “There are probably only 20 precincts left that haven’t been reviewed at all,” Charlson said Wednesday. “We will have looked at 100 percent of the precincts by tomorrow.” Charlson said officials planned to present their preliminary findings at a meeting Thursday of the State Board of Elections.

National: Online Voting and Democracy in the Digital Age | Consumer Reports

Considering the importance of elections in the U.S., the country sure does make voting a challenge. National elections are held on a Tuesday in November, a workday for most people. In 11 states and Washington, D.C., you can register to vote on Election Day. (Maryland allows same-day voter registration only for early voting.) Other states have registration deadlines of eight to 30 days before an election. Some states have expanded voting by mail, online registration, absentee voting, and similar practices. But others have become more restrictive: 33 states request or require voters to show identification at the polls, and 17 of those states request or require a photo ID. And voters in places like Maricopa County in Arizona, where budget cutbacks have significantly reduced the number of polling spots, can find crowded conditions more reminiscent of a Depression-era breadline than a polling site in the Internet Age. Why, then, when everything from buying airline tickets to filing federal income taxes is routinely done online, is voting for most Americans still such a manual, show-up-in-person, paper-ballot-based process? … Whatever the political system, efforts to introduce Internet voting face the same overriding issue: how to make sure ballots aren’t subject to manipulation or fraud by hackers or compromised by a system failure.

Arizona: Threat of hackers keeps Arizona’s online voting program small | KPHO

Thousands of Arizona service members were offered the chance to cast a ballot over the internet in Tuesday’s special election, but state and county officials say the threat of hackers makes widespread online voting unlikely anytime soon. Election officials sent ballots to more than 4,000 Arizonans stationed out-of-state or overseas ahead of the election, either by mail or through the state’s relatively new online process. The number of ballots cast online wasn’t immediately available, but five counties distributed at least 2,172 electronic ballots, according to the Arizona Secretary of State’s Office. “I mean these people are overseas serving our country, serving us, so we want to make sure they’re able to vote,” said Maricopa County Recorder’s Office spokesperson Elizabeth Bartholomew. Maricopa County sent 1,205 electronic ballots to Arizonans in several countries, according to state data.

Editorials: Californians from both parties are working to expand voting rights | Alex Padilla/Los Angeles Times