Monthly Archives: November 2017

Germany moved a step closer to a snap election after Chancellor Angela Merkel’s efforts to form a government with smaller parties fell apart and the Social Democrats refused to step into the breach. Europe’s biggest economy and pre-eminent political power was plunged into deep political uncertainty late Sunday night after the collapse of exploratory talks involving Merkel’s Christian Democrats and their Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, plus the liberal Free Democrats and the Greens. That left the Social Democrats (SPD) as the only viable junior partners who could give Merkel a parliamentary majority. But SPD leaders voted unanimously Monday not to reprise the “grand coalition” of the last four years with Merkel’s conservatives, having recorded the worst result in their history in September’s general election. An extended period of political limbo in Germany means a range of decisions on the national and EU level will be on hold — most notably on French President Emmanuel Macron’s proposals to overhaul the eurozone.

Liberia: Electoral commission says fraud claims lack evidence | The Star

Liberia’s electoral commission said on Monday that claims of fraud brought by a presidential candidate in last month’s election did not have sufficient evidence, delivering a preliminary conclusion of an investigation. Former footballer George Weah was initially set to face Vice-President Joseph Boakai to determine who will replace Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. But third-place finisher Charles Brumskine and his Liberty Party contested the outcome of the first round, claiming gross irregularities, and the Supreme Court this month suspended the run-off until the electoral commission can investigate Brumskine’s claim.

Nepal: Battle for hearts, minds and ears in Nepal election | AFP

Wit days to go before elections in Nepal the battle for votes is being fought over the air waves as radio stations, many backed by political parties, beam campaign messages to the farthest corners of the Himalayan nation. Social media may now dominate political campaigns in the West, but in Nepal, where fewer than one in five people has access to the internet, radio is king. Community radio exploded in the early 1990s as Nepal’s monarchy began to loosen its grip on power, liberalising the media and allowing popular elections for a new government. It grew with the mobile revolution as cheap handsets with built-in FM receivers became widely owned, allowing news to reach areas of the landlocked mountainous country where newspapers can take days to arrive.

Nigeria: National Assembly moves to adopt electronic voting system | New Telegraph

The National Assembly yesterday said that efforts had reached an advanced stage in the process of enacting a new Electoral Act that would make provision for electronic voting ahead of the 2019 general elections. The parliament also said that it had stepped up activities geared towards redefining the regulatory framework to make elections more transparent and credible in the country. Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Judiciary, Hon. Aminu Shehu Shagari, disclosed this at an interface with me dia executives at the National Assembly, Abuja. The media roundtable was hosted by the National Institute for Legislative Studies (NILS) as part of a strategic plan to engage political actors, political office holders, media and other stakeholders on preparations for the forthcoming general elections.

Somalia: Somaliland picks ruling party’s candidate as new president | Reuters

Musa Bihi Abdi of the ruling Kulmiye party was declared the winner of Somaliland’s presidential election on Tuesday, by the election commission of the breakaway region. Situated at the northern tip of east Africa on the Gulf of Aden – one of the busiest trade routes in the world – Somaliland broke away from Somalia in 1991 and has been relatively peaceful since. The region of 4 million people has not been internationally recognized but it has recently drawn in sizeable investments from the Gulf. In the election, Abdi won just over 55 percent of the vote, while opposition leader Abdirahman Iro took nearly 41 percent, election commission chairman Iman Warsame said. Turnout was 80 percent.

United Kingdom: Electoral Commission launches inquiry into leave campaign funding | The Guardian

Vote Leave is under investigation by the Electoral Commission over whether it breached the £7m EU referendum spending limit, with allegations being made that it channelled funds for a social Brexit media campaign via £625,000 in donations to a student. The watchdog said that the new information meant it had “reasonable grounds to suspect an offence may have been committed” and said it would examine if the Boris Johnson and Michael Gove-fronted campaign had filed its returns correctly. Its unexpected intervention came as the commission was facing a legal challenge from remain grassroots campaigners, unhappy that it had dropped a previous investigation into the spending of Vote Leave and satellite Brexit campaigns that are accused of not being properly independent of it.

National: Appeals court skeptical of privacy-focused suit against Trump fraud panel | Politico

An appeals court gave a skeptical reception Tuesday to a lawsuit claiming that President Donald Trump’s voter fraud commission violated federal law by failing to study the privacy impact of a demand for voter rolls and other personal data on millions of Americans. During oral arguments, a three-judge panel from the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals didn’t say much about the possibility that the President’s Advisory Committee on Election Integrity violated a requirement Congress created in 2002 that federal agencies conduct a “privacy impact assessment” before embarking on collection of data on individuals. Instead, the judges repeatedly questioned whether the organization pressing the suit — the Electronic Privacy Information Center — had legal standing to pursue the case.

Alabama: Secretary of State: “Crossover Voters will not be prosecuted” | WHNT

For months now we have been wondering what will happen to the 674 people identified by the Alabama Secretary of State’s office as potential crossover voters. Friday afternoon, we finally got the answer. Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill has confirmed that none of those voters will be prosecuted. Over 600 voters were accused of illegally attempting to vote in the Republican Senate runoff on September 26 after casting ballots in the Democratic Senate primary on August 15. “Those individuals will be investigated, indicted, and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Merrill told WHNT News 19 one day after the runoff between Luther Strange and Roy Moore.

Florida: Bill to protect voter info filed in both houses | Florida Politics

A bill that would shield the personal information of voters and preregistered minor voter registration applicants has been filed in both houses of the Legislature as of Monday. Rep. Cyndi Stevenson is carrying the House version (HB 761), while Sen. Tom Lee is carrying the Senate iteration (SB 532). The bill would exempt the “legal residential address, date of birth, telephone number, and e-mail address of a voter registration applicant or voter” from public records requirements, in addition to “information concerning preregistered voter registration applicants who are 16 or 17 years of age.”

Illinois: Divided vote keeps Illinois in Crosscheck voter database | Chicago Tribune

The State Board of Elections on Monday rejected an effort to remove Illinois from the Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program, leaving the state in a controversial system aimed at flagging voters registered in multiple states. The 4-4 split along partisan lines pitted election officials’ desires to have accurate voter rolls against concerns the system can be inaccurate and vulnerable to hackers looking for personal information — with a dash of political intrigue on the side. Republicans voted against leaving the system at Monday’s election board meeting, and Democrats were for it. Illinois is among more than two dozen states participating in the program known as Crosscheck. But the program has drawn increasing criticism after other states have wiped out voter registrations based solely on its findings without following procedures spelled out in federal voting rights laws. Because Monday’s vote was tied, the state remains in the program

New Hampshire: Lawsuit Challenging Proof-of-Residence Voting Law Slated for Trial | NHPR

A lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a controversial new voter registration law is heading to trial next August, according to a recent court order. The law in question, known commonly as Senate Bill 3, adds tougher penalties for people who fail to provide certain kinds of documentation showing they live where they’re trying to vote.

Oregon: Democrats Vote To Keep Party Primary Closed | KUOW

The Oregon Democratic Party won’t allow non-affiliated voters to take part in its 2018 primary. At a party meeting in Portland on Sunday, a resolution to open the Democratic primary did not get the two-thirds majority needed to pass. The idea was to increase votes for Democratic candidates next year.

Pennsylvania: Former election czar was fired, records show | Philadelphia Inquirer

The former head of the Pennsylvania Department of State didn’t resign on his own but appears to have been ousted by Gov. Wolf, according to newly released documents. In an email he wrote to the governor on the day of his Oct. 11 resignation, Pedro Cortes indicated he didn’t know why he was being forced from office. “I have done a great deal of soul searching in the last 24 hours,” Cortes wrote. “I remain at a lost [sic] to understand why you would dispense with my services without sharing with me concerns you had about my professional performance or personal life.” “Wished I had that opportunity,” Cortes wrote.

Editorials: Texas needs to be prepared for more election hack attempts | San Antonio Express-News

The reasons remain unclear, but Russian-linked hackers targeted two Texas agencies during the 2016 presidential election. The hackers never accessed networks for the Department of Public Safety and the Texas Library and State Archives Commission, but the search for vulnerabilities by a foreign government is deeply disturbing. The Department of Homeland Security has included Texas in a group of 21 states that Russian hackers targeted during the run-up to the election. Just why DPS or the state’s library archive would be election targets is unclear. Although a Homeland Security official told Express-News reporter Allie Morris that in general terms, the hackers may have been looking for network vulnerabilities that could later be exploited in election systems. In other words, this might have been something akin to a practice run.

Virginia: State officials decide not to certify two House races amid claims that voters got the wrong ballots | The Washington Post

Virginia’s Board of Elections voted unanimously Monday to delay certification of two House races, amid new claims that dozens of voters got the wrong ballot in a tight contest that could determine control of the legislature’s lower chamber. The board called a “time out” after state Elections Commissioner Edgardo Cortés announced that in April 2016, Fredericksburg registrar Juanita Pitchford erroneously assigned 83 voters from the 28th House District to the 88th. It was not clear how many of the 83 voters actually cast ballots on Nov. 7, but the 28th District race is tight. Republican Robert Thomas leads Democrat Joshua Cole by 82 votes in the contest to fill the seat held by retiring Speaker William J. Howell (R-Stafford).

Wisconsin: Elections officials hoping to restore jobs that were cut | Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The Wisconsin Elections Commission asked for three more workers Monday because it has seen its staff cut by 28% over two years. In the most recent round of cuts, Gov. Scott Walker in September used his veto powers to eliminate five jobs from the agency. In all, six jobs were lost because lawmakers had already agreed to trim one position. Since 2015, the agency has lost 10 positions, reducing its ranks from 36 to 26. “These realities pose a risk to the smooth administration of elections in Wisconsin, and also create a greater challenge for the agency and local election offiicials to meet their legal obligations to fully implement federal and state laws,” Michael Haas, the administrator of the Elections Commission, wrote in a recent memo.

Chile: Chile just went to the polls — and transformed its legislature | The Washington Post

On Sunday, for the seventh time since Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship ended, Chileans went to the polls to elect a president and National Congress. Only 46 percent of those eligible to vote actually did so, one of the lowest turnouts in the country’s history. In the presidential race, no candidate won a full majority, which means there will be a runoff, scheduled for Dec. 17. Although most opinion polls had shown right-wing billionaire and former president Sebastián Piñera with a clear lead of between 42 and 47 percent, the latest results show he received only 36.6 percent of the ballots. The next-place candidate, Sen. Alejandro Guillier, the center-left candidate, received just under 23 percent. Perhaps more significant than the presidential first round was the transformation of Congress. This was the first time Chile has gone to the polls since major electoral reforms. Voters weighed in on all the members of the legislature’s lower house, and almost half the Senate. What were the results?

Germany: Merkel prefers fresh elections over minority government | Deutsche Welle

German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced on Monday that she was ready to take her Christian Democratic (CDU) party into fresh elections after coalition talks with the Green party and pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) failed over the weekend. “I’m very skeptical,” about leading a minority government, Merkel told public broadcaster ZDF. The center-right politician said she was ready to lead Germany for four more years, but that she felt a majority government was necessary for stability in her country and Europe. Merkel’s statement does not necessarily mean Germany is headed for snap elections. First, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier will approach other parties to see if a last-ditch coalition can be cobbled together.

Nepal: Nepal gears up for elections amid fears of violence | Gulf Times

Nepali voters will head to polling stations across their northern Himalayan districts next Sunday in the first phase of general elections, taking a significant step forward in establishing a federal democracy in the country. The polls will take place under a new constitution passed by lawmakers in September 2015 as part of a peace process that began with the end of a decade-long civil war in 2006. The war pitted the Maoists against the state and left more than 16,000 people dead. After Maoist rebels gave up their arms, they joined the parliamentary system, resulting in Nepal shifting from a monarchy to a secular federal republic.

United Kingdom: UK to step up investigation into big tech’s Russia ties | Financial Times

MPs are stepping up their inquiry into fake news in an effort to extract answers from Facebook and Twitter about the extent of Russian interference in last year’s EU referendum and this year’s UK general election. Russian entities are known to have bought adverts on Facebook and generated election-related content before Donald Trump won last year’s US presidential election, while authorities in France and Germany have said their elections were also targeted.

National: Bipartisan Harvard Panel Recommends Hacking Safeguards for Elections | Associated Press

A bipartisan Harvard University project aimed at protecting elections from hacking and propaganda will release its first set of recommendations today on how U.S. elections can be defended from hacking attacks. The 27-page guidebook shown to Reuters ahead of publication calls for campaign leaders to emphasize security from the start and insist on practices such as two-factor authentication for access to email and documents and fully encrypted messaging via services including Signal and Wickr. The guidelines are intended to reduce risks in low-budget local races as well as the high-stakes Congressional midterm contests next year. Though most of the suggestions cost little or nothing to implement and will strike security professionals as common sense, notorious attacks including the leak of the emails of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chair, John Podesta, have succeeded because basic security practices were not followed.

National: Crooked lines: How technology, data have changed political boundaries | WTSP

With gerrymandering being one of the highest-profile cases to go before the U.S. Supreme Court this session , the issue has taken center stage as lawmakers prepare for another round of redistricting based off the 2020 census. Lawmakers across the country re-draw political district boundaries every decade, but gerrymandering happens when those lines are drawn to give themselves an unfair advantage. Redistricting is a normal and important element of U.S. government, but the line between redistricting and gerrymandering can be fuzzy. With technology drastically improving mapping software and the data behind it, there are more tools to effectively gerrymander districts than ever before. “Redistricting has always been a controversial issue because it’s political,” said Dr. Susan MacManus, a political science professor at the University of South Florida. “You really have to go back, some of the odd-shaped districts are the result of, actually, an order of the U.S. Supreme Court years ago.”

National: Top Russian Official Tried to Broker ‘Backdoor’ Meeting Between Trump and Putin | The New York Times

A senior Russian official who claimed to be acting at the behest of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia tried in May 2016 to arrange a meeting between Mr. Putin and Donald J. Trump, according to several people familiar with the matter. The news of this reached the Trump campaign in a very circuitous way. An advocate for Christian causes emailed campaign aides saying that Alexander Torshin, the deputy governor of the Russian central bank who has been linked both to Russia’s security services and organized crime, had proposed a meeting between Mr. Putin and Mr. Trump. The subject line of the email, turned over to Senate investigators, read, “Russian backdoor overture and dinner invite,” according to one person who has seen the message.

Alabama: Crossover votes: 140 confirmed; no further investigation | AL.com

There were 140 confirmed crossover votes in the Sept. 26 Republican runoff for the U.S. Senate, and none will be investigated further for possible prosecution, Secretary of State John Merrill announced in a press release today. Last month, Merrill’s office had compiled a preliminary list of 674 crossover votes in 41 counties and sent them to probate offices for verification. Of those, 534 turned out to be mistakes by a poll worker, another election worker or the voter, Merrill said. Merrill said he called the probate judges from the 20 counties with 140 confirmed crossover votes. “After these reviews and the conversations were completed, there were no instances in which a local Probate Judge deemed it necessary to pursue additional investigations that could potentially lead to prosecution,” Merrill said. “Without new information being introduced in this review, this matter is now considered closed.”

Connecticut: Post-election audits are democracy in action | The Hour

When you cast your vote, do you ever wonder whether it’s being accurately counted? The League of Women Voters supports election integrity and public confidence in our electoral process. To that end, we applaud the State of Connecticut’s post-election audits and encourage citizens to be volunteer observers when these audits are conducted. For the election that took place on Nov. 7, audits will begin on Nov. 22. After each election in Connecticut, audit locations are chosen by lottery. For example, this October the results of the September primary elections were audited at 5 percent of the polling locations where voting took place. The polling locations were in various municipalities around the state: Bridgeport, Cheshire, Greenwich, New Haven, New London, Newtown, and Stratford. Audit results are analyzed by the University of Connecticut, the Secretary of the State’s Office, and the State Elections Enforcement Commission.

Florida: State may counter “growing threat” to election security | Associated Press

Saying there is a “growing threat” to Florida’s election systems, the state may spend nearly $2.4 million in the coming year on cybersecurity efforts designed to protect election-related software and systems from outside hackers. Gov. Rick Scott included the request, which initially came from state election officials, in budget recommendations he gave to the Florida Legislature last week. Scott asked for the money even though state officials have provided limited details behind efforts to infiltrate Florida’s election systems ahead of the 2016 elections. The Florida Legislature has also not held any hearings on what happened.

Michigan: Judge shoots down challenge to Detroit absentee vote count | Michigan Radio

A Wayne County judge has thrown out a lawsuit against Detroit city clerk Janice Winfrey, saying there’s “no evidence” her office mishandled absentee ballots or violated state law in last week’s general election. The lawsuit was brought by election challengers who said Winfrey’s office used copies of absentee vote envelopes, rather than original envelopes with ballots, to verify voter information for about 1200 absentee votes dropped off at the clerk’s office on Election Day. The plaintiffs said that violated the state manual for elections officials, as well as state law.

New Hampshire: Bill seeks to bring ranked-choice voting to New Hampshire | Concord Monitor

As Maine continues a legal struggle over the same issue, New Hampshire legislators will soon be discussing the possibility of reinventing the voting system with ranked-choice ballots. The proposal, House Bill 1540, would allow voters in a race with more than two candidates seeking a single office, such as in party primaries, to rank the candidates in order of preference rather than just choosing the one they want to win. The winner would emerge from a repeated calculation of all voters’ rankings. The prime sponsor of the bill, Ellen Read, D-Newmarket, noted that variations of this voting method are used in some cities around the country, including Cambridge, Mass., as well as in a number of professional organizations and even in a few national elections, notably for the Australian parliament. “It more effectively and accurately reflects the will of the voter,” she said. “It gives more choice.”

North Carolina: ‘Race-based redistricting’ imposed on NC ‘against its will,’ lawmakers say | News & Observer

Lawmakers and the challengers of maps proposed for electing North Carolina’s General Assembly members waited until the 11th hour to respond to districts suggested by an unaffiliated mapmaker. Lawmakers were critical of the process, saying the federal judges who tapped a Stanford University law professor to draw maps for them had done so prematurely and allowed him to consider race as he looked at election districts in Cumberland, Guilford, Hoke, Mecklenburg, Wake, Bladen, Sampson and Wayne counties. The three federal judges presiding over the case that will determine what districts North Carolina’s state Senate and House members come from in the 2018 elections have yet to rule on maps the lawmakers adopted in August. The judges — James Wynn of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Catherine Eagles and Thomas Schroeder, both of the U.S. Middle District of North Carolina — ordered new lines after the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed their ruling last year that found 28 of the state legislative districts were longstanding unconstitutional racial gerrymanders.

Ohio: Supreme Court schedules January oral arguments for Ohio voter purge case | Washington Examiner