Yearly Archives: 2016

North Carolina’s photo ID voting requirement resulted in confusion, long lines and voters not being able to cast a ballot at the polls during the March 15 primary, activists said Wednesday in a conference call. “We saw poll workers being absolutely uninformed about the requirement,” said Allison Riggs, an attorney for the Southern Coalition for Social Justice. “We saw voters being turned away.” Penda Hair, an attorney representing the North Carolina NAACP in its legal challenge against the photo ID requirement, said that polling places in Winston-Salem and Durham had long lines. Voters at First Alliance Church in Winston-Salem stood in line for an hour and 45 minutes. Tim Tsujii, the Forsyth County elections director, said some polling places had long lines as they were about to close at 7:30 that night. State law requires polling places to serve all voters who are in line before the closing time. Many people who were affected by the photo ID requirement were racial minorities and poor people, activists said.

Utah: After a hectic caucus night, Democrats say state should run vote | The Herald

Utah Democrats called on state lawmakers to fund a presidential primary instead of leaving political parties to run the voting after 80,000 people swarmed the party’s caucuses, leading to hours-long lines and scarce ballots. Tuesday’s turnout was “beyond our wildest dreams,” state Democratic Party Chairman Peter Corroon said. Most of the party’s caucus sites ran out of ballots, sending staffers scrambling to print 15,000 more. “What was a historic night in Utah was marred by frustration from voters anxious to make their voices heard,” Corroon said Wednesday at a news conference. The party also couldn’t accept mail-in or absentee ballots, leaving many voters feeling disenfranchised, he said. About 132,000 Democrats voted in a state-run primary election in 2008, the last time there was a contested election on the Democratic side. Party officials estimated about half that number would caucus this year, but excitement over the lively 2016 contest fueled higher participation.

Virginia: McAuliffe vetoes bill on voter registration requirements | Richmond Times-Dispatch

Gov. Terry McAuliffe on Wednesday vetoed a bill that would require registrars to deny applications by people who leave out certain details, such as whether they are 18 years old. McAuliffe also vetoed the House version of legislation to extend coal tax credits, terming the credits ineffective. House Bill 298, sponsored by Del. Terry G. Kilgore, R-Scott, was identical to Senate Bill 44, which McAuliffe vetoed March 11, the last day of the General Assembly session. Del. Mark L. Cole, R-Spotsylvania, sponsored House Bill 9, which sought to specify in greater detail information applicants are required to provide on the voter registration form.

Wisconsin: Voter ID Law Requires an Education Campaign, Which the State Hasn’t Funded | ProPublica

On April 5, when voters cast ballots in Wisconsin’s Republican and Democratic primaries, the state’s controversial voter ID bill will face its biggest test since Governor Scott Walker signed it into law in 2011. For the first time in a major election, citizens will be required to show approved forms of identification in order to vote. The law mandates that the state run a public-service campaign “in conjunction with the first regularly scheduled primary and election” to educate voters on what forms of ID are acceptable. But Wisconsin has failed to appropriate funds for the public education campaign. The result is that thousands of citizens may be turned away from the polls simply because they did not understand what form of identification they needed to vote. Wisconsin’s failure to fund these public-service ads comes after a clash between the Government Accountability Board, the nonpartisan agency responsible for producing voter education materials, and the Republican-controlled legislature. In October, the agency met with Republican State Senator Mary Lazich, who was a primary sponsor of the voter ID bill in 2011, to inquire after funding and received a tepid response.

Africa: A Tale of Two Elections: Chad and Djibouti | Africa Times

Within the span of just a few days, two long-serving African leaders will go to the polls in search of new electoral mandates. As part of the “Super Sunday” of African elections in 2016, Djiboutian strongman Ismail Omar Guelleh will stand for re-election on April 8 while Idriss Déby Itno and 13 other candidates compete in the first round of Chad’s presidential vote on April 10. On the surface, Djibouti and Chad similar political contexts: both Guelleh and Déby have led their countries since the 1990s. The two leaders previously organized constitutional referendums to remove existing term limits, with Chad’s abolished in 2005 and Djibouti’s cast aside in 2010. Looking beyond time spent in office, however, the two presidents offer very different images of how African leaders positions themselves and their countries on the continent. Idriss Déby was a career military officer when he took power in a 1990 coup, bringing an end to the murderous regime of Hissene Habré. Since, he helped institute Chad’s first multiparty constitution and won the presidential elections in 1996 (being re-elected in 2001, 2006, and 2011). While much of the Chadian leader’s time in power in the 2000s and early 2010s had been spent fending off challenges, Déby’s more peaceful current term in office (domestically, at least) has seen a marked increase in his country’s regional influence. In 2013, 2,000 battle-hardened Chadian troops served on the front lines of the international campaign against jihadist groups in northern Mali, earning the gratitude of both France and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. Several months later, Chad earned election to the UN Security Council for the first time. Capping off his government’s growing international clout, Déby himself was named Chair of the African Union this past January.

Australia: Lawyers criticise ‘hopeless’ High Court challenge to new Senate voting laws | ABC

Lawyers for the Commonwealth have labelled arguments for a High Court challenge to new Senate voting laws as “hopeless”. Family First senator Bob Day is fighting the reforms, which do away with group voting in the Upper House and make it more difficult for micro-parties to be elected. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull argued the legislation — under which voters will be encouraged to vote for at least six potential senators above the line — was “good for democracy”. But Senator Day said the Government was wrong to say the laws put power back into the hands of voters.

Bangladesh: Violence rocks local elections in Bangladesh, killing 13 | The Washington Post

Deadly violence has erupted during local elections in Bangladesh, leaving at least 13 people dead this week. Analysts said the mayhem shows the country’s democracy is struggling in the face of Islamist extremism and a divisive debate over how to deal with the legacy of its 1971 civil war. The election violence Tuesday night — including vicious political clashes between rival parties as well as security forces opening fire on rioters — was considered unusual for the impoverished South Asian nation. While attacks have accompanied national elections in the past, village-level polls have usually been peaceful. But with the two main political parties disagreeing over whether, and how, to punish war crimes committed during the country’s war of independence from Pakistan, public discourse has become more extreme, analysts said. Attacks carried out by Islamist extremists have led the secular government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to crack down with an increasingly heavy hand as it aims to reassure the international community about Bangladeshi security.

Congo: Opposition Says Its Tally Shows Incumbent Lost Presidential Vote | VoA News

Opposition candidates in elections in Congo Republic said on Wednesday that President Denis Sassou Nguesso placed no better than fourth in any major district, rejecting official partial results that gave him a commanding lead. Results of Sunday’s ballot announced by the country’s electoral commission on Tuesday, and based on returns from 72 of 111 voting districts, showed Sassou Nguesso with 67 percent of the vote. Charles Zacharie Bowao, the head of a coalition of five opposition candidates, posted its summary of preliminary results – showing Sassou Nguesso trailing others – on his Twitter account.

New Zealand: Kiwis vote to keep flag after 56.6% back the status quo | The Guardian

New Zealand has voted to keep its traditional flag in a snub to the prime minister, John Key. Preliminary results announced at 8.30pm local time on Thursday showed that 1,200,003 (56.6%) of voters wanted to keep the Union flag-centred emblem. Only 915,008 (43.2%) opted for the proposed new design by Kyle Lockwood featuring a silver fern. The results of the referendum, which is estimated to have cost NZ$26m (£12m), are expected be confirmed next Wednesday. The long-serving and popular Key had strongly supported the flag change but it was not enough to win a majority, with many suspicious of him trying to use the issue to build a legacy. However, he said after the results were announced that New Zealanders should embrace the current flag and “more importantly, be proud of it”.

South Korea: Candidacy registration for general election begins | The National

Candidates for the April 13 general election began registering with the National Election Commission (NEC), Thursday. Held every four years, the upcoming election will be the first since the National Assembly agreed new constituency boundaries, in line with a Constitutional Court ruling in 2014. A total of 300 lawmakers, including 253 voted in through direct ballots held in their respective constituencies, will gain seats for the next Assembly session. The remaining 47 proportional representation seats will be allocated to parties relative to the overall number of votes they receive. Each candidate will be given an election number once they register. The NEC will accept registration until 6 p.m., Friday, at its local offices nationwide.

National: The U.S. has ‘worst elections of any long-established democracy,’ report finds | The Washington Post

What do Argentina, Costa Rica and Brazil have in common? They all outranked the United States in a comparison of election standards and procedures conducted by the Electoral Integrity Project. The United States ranked 47th worldwide, out of 139 countries. The survey is a measure of dozens of factors, including voter registration, campaign financing rules, election laws, the voting process and vote count. Overall, one in six elections around the world were considered electoral failures. But in general, countries in the Americas and central and eastern Europe, as well as in Asia, were considered to be on the winning side in terms of electoral integrity, with Scandinavian and Western European nations topping the lists. The report was particularly critical of nations in sub-Saharan Africa. Even amid those already low standards, Ethiopia stood out, according to the report. Last May, the country’s ruling party won all seats in parliament “following harassment of opposition parties, censorship of the media and repression of human rights.”

National: U.S. states giving more ex-felons voting rights back | Reuters

Baltimore community organizer Perry Hopkins, 55, is looking forward to stepping into a voting booth for the first time in his life this election season. Hopkins lost his never-exercised right to vote when he was convicted for drug and other offenses. He gained it back last month when Maryland joined a growing list of U.S. states making it easier for ex-convicts to vote. “To have the right to vote now is empowering. I’m stoked,” said Hopkins, who spent a total of 19 years in prison for non-violent crimes, and was one of 40,000 in the state to regain his right to vote from a legislative action. “I plan to vote in every election possible. I’m voting for mayor, I’m voting for city councilman in my district, and, yes, I’m voting for president,” said Hopkins. He hopes to vote for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the front-runner in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, on Nov. 8. Hopkins is among some 800,000 Americans who have regained the right to vote in the last two decades as about two dozen states have eased restrictions on felons casting ballots, according to the Sentencing Project, a prison reform advocacy group.

Editorials: There’s no good reason voting remains so inaccessible for so many Americans | Cindy Casares/The Guardian

President Barack Obama has said that the reason Texas doesn’t allow online voter registration isn’t because of security issues, but because state elected officials don’t want more people involved in the election process. “It is much easier to order pizza or a trip than it is for you to exercise the single most important task in a Democracy and that is for you to select who is going to represent you in government,” the president said at SXSW. “It’s done because the folks who are currently governing the good state of Texas aren’t interested in having more people participate.” It’s true. There’s simply no good reason, in this day and age, for us not to be utilizing web technology to make voting accessible to as many eligible Americans as possible – especially in a state like Texas, where voter turnout rate is abysmal. So far, Texas has the second lowest voter turnout during the presidential primary season, with just 21.5% of Texas residents 18 years or older showing up at the polls. And that’s our best turnout yet! (Louisiana has the worst turnout rate this season so far, with just 18% voter participation.)

Alabama: Irregularity prompts Dale County to change voting machine process | Dothan Eagle

Cities and towns in Dale County that believed they rented voting machines from the Dale County Commission for past elections were actually renting those machines from a former county employee, Dale County Commission Chairman Mark Blankenship said Tuesday. Blankenship said he will send letters to municipalities in the county addressing changes on how to obtain voting machines for upcoming elections after confusion over how the process was handled before. For the municipal elections this summer, Blankenship said the municipalities will be able to rent the machines from Election Systems & Software (ES & S). The county obtains its machines from ES&S as well. Blankenship said the decision came after discovering that in years past, a former county employee who had access to the county’s voting machines would take vacation from the county job in order to operate a company called Voting Machines Technology, in which municipalities were billed between $200 and $500 for use of the county’s voting machines.

Arizona: Phoenix official backtracks after blaming voters for lines | Associated Press

Bruce Weiss stewed after waiting 2½ hours in line outside a downtown Phoenix polling place, where juice drinks, snacks and circus animal cookies were handed out by citizens hoping to pacify thousands who turned out to cast ballots in Arizona’s presidential primary. The scene was repeated Tuesday as thousands stood in lines that wrapped around sidewalks at churches, community centers and government buildings after the number of places to vote were cut back as a cost-savings measure. Some voters took shelter from the sun under umbrellas. Others brought lawn chairs. Still others gave up and went home. The last voters entered polling spots after midnight. “It’s like a complete, total failure of government,” Weiss said. Waits dragged on as long as five hours in Maricopa County — home to metro Phoenix and 1.2 million voters eligible to cast ballots — but where only 60 polling places were open. By Wednesday, the mayor of Phoenix said the cutbacks were about more than saving money. Mayor Greg Stanton, a Democrat, called for a federal investigation into whether election officials illegally put fewer polling locations in poor or minority-heavy areas.

Arizona: Native Americans Struggle To Overcome Barriers Ahead Of Arizona Elections | International Business Times

The Navajo Nation reservation, the largest concentrated population of American Indians in the United States, is tucked into Arizona’s northwest corner. Stretching across 27,000 square miles of mesas, shrubs and sand, the reservation is largely rural, often without internet access, paved roads or street signs. Employment and education rates are far below the national average, and very few people own vehicles. If residents on the reservation ever need to drive to their county seat — say, to register to vote or to cast an early-voting ballot — the journey could easily take them four hours. Ahead of Arizona’s primary on Tuesday, Democratic candidates Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have sought to reach out to Native communities and mention Native issues on the campaign trail. This year marks the first presidential election since the Supreme Court in 2013 struck down the key provision of the Voting Rights Act that required states with a history of voting discrimination to get pre-approval for new voting laws. While much of the national conversation has been focused on Southern states and laws affecting African-American and Hispanic voters, Native Americans in places like Arizona also are affected by policies that discourage them from voting, which have resulted in some of the lowest voter participation rates of any demographic group in the country.

Missouri: Senate Democrats hope for compromise on voter photo ID proposal | Missourinet

Senate Democrats say Republicans wouldn’t compromise this session on a proposed constitutional amendment involving same-sex marriages, but Minority Leader Joe Keaveny (D-St. Louis) hopes they will on proposed voter photo ID legislation. It’s an issue that creates a strong divide between Democrats and Republicans – so much of a divide that Democrats have already threatened a filibuster.“I think that both sides have seen that when you have a controversial bill, it needs to be vetted, it needs to be discussed and there has to be some push and take. With SJR 39, none of that happened,” said Keaveny.

Vermont: Campaign finance battles continue in court | Burlington Free Press

Sixteen months after Progressive/Democrat Dean Corren lost his bid for lieutenant governor, he and the Attorney General’s Office still are embroiled in a double-barreled court fight over whether Corren violated Vermont’s campaign finance law. The case may turn on whether an email blast urging support for a candidate counts as an electioneering communication and therefore a political contribution, or, because it involves the use of computers and mailing lists, is exempt from the types of contributions that need to be reported to the secretary of state. The dust-up started in October 2014, when the Vermont Democratic Party sent out an email to 19,000 recipients inviting them to a series of rallies for the party’s candidates, including Corren, a former legislator from Burlington.

Virginia: Supreme Court Skeptical of Virginia Congressman’s Claim of Right to Favorable Voting Map | Wall Street Journal

A Virginia congressman’s claim that he has a legal right to a district designed to re-elect him ran into skepticism at the Supreme Court on Monday. The court at an oral argument was examining a claim by Rep. Randy Forbes (R., Va.) that a lower court order voiding Virginia’s congressional map for violating the Voting Rights Act had in turn harmed his chance of re-election. Last year, a special three-judge federal court in Richmond, Va., found the state legislature’s congressional map was a racial gerrymander that illegally concentrated black voters into a single district, diminishing their political power elsewhere in the state. When the legislature failed to draw a new map addressing those findings, the Richmond-based court adopted a new map that swapped black and white voters in adjacent districts, increasing the Democratic population of Mr. Forbes’s congressional district to 60% from 48%.

Utah: GOP’s online voting experiment has some hiccups | The Salt Lake Tribune

About one-fourth of 40,000 who applied were rejected, because they couldn’t verify their party membership, Republican chairman says. The Utah Republican Party’s first foray into online voting in Tuesday’s presidential caucus was not without snags, with voters stymied by long waits and confused by the registration process. Utah Republican Party Chairman James Evans said about 90 percent of the calls from people having problems with the online voting system were from people who thought they had registered to vote online, but either couldn’t be approved because their membership in the party couldn’t be verified or they had misplaced the personal identification number (PIN) that was emailed to them. Evans said about 40,000 applied to vote online but 10,000 of those were rejected because their records couldn’t be verified. Many didn’t realize they had been denied until they tried to vote Tuesday.

Benin: Businessman takes insurmountable lead in Benin presidential poll | Reuters

Benin’s prime minister conceded defeat to businessman Patrice Talon on Monday as preliminary results from a presidential run-off election gave the cotton magnate an insurmountable lead, paving the way for a peaceful transition of power. Talon faced off against Prime Minister Lionel Zinsou on Sunday in a poll to decide which of the two would replace President Thomas Boni Yayi, who is stepping down after serving two terms in office. The election was seen as reinforcing the democratic credentials of Benin, a bastion of stability in a troubled region where military coups are a regular occurrence and polls are often marred by violence. Preliminary results from the electoral commission put Talon ahead with 65 percent of votes, while Zinzou had 35 percent. Only votes from abroad were yet to be counted, the commission said.

Congo: Republic of Congo Awaits Vote Results Amid Telecom Blackout | VoA News

Vote counting is underway in the Republic of Congo but information is scarce, as the government has blocked all phone and internet use in the country. President Denis Sassou Nguesso is widely expected to win another term in office. The Republic of Congo held elections Sunday cut off from the world. Hours before the vote, the government of the Central African nation called on phone and Internet carriers to shut down service for 48 hours. Amnesty International denounces the move. “Shutting down communication networks is unjustified and it’s an attack on media freedom. Authorities must ensure that everyone is able to carry out its work without fear, without harassment,” said Illaria Allegrozzi.

Senegal: Sall Maneuvers for Re-Election in Senegal With Term-Limit Referendum Win | World Politics Review

March 20, a day some analysts dubbed “Africa’s Super Sunday,” included a referendum in Senegal on the question of whether to reduce presidential terms from seven to five years. By the next day, both the press and the government were projecting a sweeping victory for the “yes” camp. The divisions surrounding the vote may seem strange at first: President Macky Sall and his supporters favored the reduction, while opposition parties opposed it. Sall emerges from the referendum battle politically strengthened. He can put a nagging controversy behind him, and he positions himself to approach the next election on his own terms. The issue of presidential term limits looms large across Africa, but it has unusual parameters in Senegal. Elsewhere, the issue centers on the question of term limits, while in Senegal there has been controversy about both limits and length. Sall’s predecessor, Abdoulaye Wade, was elected to a seven-year term in 2000, but a new constitution in 2001 reduced the length of subsequent presidential terms to five years. Wade was re-elected in 2007, and the following year Senegal’s National Assembly approved a constitutional amendment reverting to seven-year presidential terms. Wade then went back on an earlier pledge and ran again in 2012, claiming that the constitutionally imposed two-term limit, passed in 2001, did not apply to his first term. That controversy was settled at the ballot box rather than in the courts, with Sall’s victory, but the issue of term length has lingered in Senegal.

United Kingdom: EU referendum: Historic vote on Britain’s future will cost UK taxpayers £142m | International Business Times

The historic referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU will cost British taxpayers’ more than £142m ($200m, €179m), according to the Conservative government. Cabinet Office minister John Penrose said the total cost for the 23 June ballot had been discussed and agreed with the Electoral Commission. “This includes the expenses incurred by Counting Officers in running the poll, grants to the designated lead campaign organisations, the delivery by Royal Mail of campaign mailings from those organisations, and the cost of the central count,” the Tory MP informed parliament on 23 March.

National: As 2016 race goes on, states debate election costs | Associated Press

Arizona officials are getting tired of footing the $6 million bill for the state’s presidential primary and want to foist the cost onto the political parties as states around the country weigh the cost of the contests. Colorado may go the other direction, bringing back state-run primaries. Utah lawmakers voted to scrap primaries in favor of caucuses in the two most recent presidential election cycles. States have come up with various ways to handle the contests every four years, and cost is a factor. About a third hold primaries for governor, Congress and other races at the same time as their White House primaries to save money on poll workers, locations and ballots, said Wendy Underhill, elections program director with the National Conference of State Legislatures.

National: The 130-Year-Old Law That Could Determine Our Next President | Edward Foley/Politico

Political junkies and history buffs have spent weeks dreaming about the unlikeliest possible scenarios that could determine the 2016 election: contested conventions, third-party bids, a cross-party ticket. But here’s one prospect they probably haven’t thought of: There’s a legally sound scenario in which John Kasich could single-handedly pick the next U.S. president. And it’s all thanks to a federal law that’s been on the books since 1887. It’s a far-fetched outcome, to be sure, but here’s how that could happen—and why Congress should consider revising that 130-year-old law. It starts with a serious ballot dispute in November, something like the contested results in Florida during the 2000 election—the odds of which aren’t trivial. Setting aside the very real prospect of a Hillary Clinton-Donald Trump nail-biter, the risk of a recount and related litigation is higher than it was in the past, thanks to a greater number of absentee and provisional ballots, which often get counted after Election Day. In this situation, the Supreme Court could step in to resolve the dispute. But the odds of that happening have probably decreased due to the vociferous criticism of the Bush v. Gore decision. Not to mention that in the wake of Justice Antonin Scalia’s death, there could still be only eight sitting justices in November; that also makes it more likely the court will stay out of the matter this time.

National: How ‘ghost corporations’ are funding the 2016 election | The Washington Post

Two days before Christmas, a trust called DE First Holdings was quietly formed in Delaware, where corporations are required to reveal little about their workings. A day later, the entity dropped $1 million into a super PAC with ties to Jersey City, N.J., Mayor Steven Fulop, a Democrat considering a gubernatorial bid. The trust, whose owner remains unknown, is part of a growing cadre of mystery outfits financing big-money super PACs. Many were formed just days or weeks before making six- or seven-figure contributions — an arrangement that election law experts say violates a long-standing federal ban on straw donors. But the individuals behind the “ghost corporations” appear to face little risk of reprisal from a deeply polarized Federal Election Commission, which recently deadlocked on whether to even investigate such cases. Advocates for stronger campaign-finance enforcement fear there will be even more pop-up limited liability corporations (LLCs) funneling money into independent groups, making it difficult to discern the identities of wealthy players seeking to influence this year’s presidential and congressional contests.

National: Many ex-felons don’t know they can get their right to vote restored | witf

On a Tuesday afternoon in December, Richard Walker stood on the corner outside the city’s social services building and hollered.
“Hey! I’m helping people who’ve got a felony conviction like me get their rights back. You know anybody like that?” Walker, 57, called out to office workers in suits, the women in line for cheap cell phones and the young man pushing a baby stroller down East Marshall Street. Every few minutes he brought someone back to a card table where he patiently explained the forms they would need to fill out to have their right to vote restored after a felony conviction. Walker soothed their worries: It’s OK if you have outstanding fines, it’s OK if it was a long time ago, it’s all OK. For three hours, he moved nonstop. Then he tallied up the forms he had stuffed into a manila envelope and walked them across the street to the government office where they would be processed.

Editorials: America’s disturbing voter-turnout crisis: How inequality extends to polling place – and why that makes our country less fair | Sean McElwee/Salon

Automatic voter registration isn’t the sexiest way to start a political revolution, but it may be the most effective. The United States lags behind the rest of the rich world in turnout, but it leads the rich world in disparity in turnout across income and education levels, which has profound effects on policy. This so-called “turnout skew” further biases policy towards the rich, even more than it already would be because of the structural advantages the rich enjoy. Bolstering turnout could lead to a self-reinforcing feedback loop in the opposite direction. As I’ve shown, turnout in the United States is dramatically skewed by class, race and age, in both midterm and presidential elections. The class divides in U.S. turnout are dramatic when compared with other countries (see chart). These divides lead to turnout that is overwhelmingly anti-redistribution, and biases the political system toward policies that favor the wealthy.

Editorials: The Right to ‘Mobocracy’ | Henry Olsen/Wall Street Journal