Canada: Could Canada fall prey to an election cyberattack? | Macleans

As the potential for cyberattacks to undermine the democratic process becomes alarmingly clear, Canadians can take some comfort in the fact that national elections in this country are still conducted the old-fashioned way. Canada is not immune to cybermischief aimed at suppressing the number of people who vote or manipulating how they vote. But once ballots are cast, not even the most sophisticated cyberattack could tamper with the results. That’s because Canada still relies on paper ballots, hand-marked by voters and hand-counted by officials in some 25,000 different polling stations across the country, under the watchful eye of scrutineers from each of the major political parties.

Czech Republic: President leads voting, but will face runoff election | Associated Press

Czech President Milos Zeman failed to win re-election during the first round of a presidential election Saturday and will face a runoff in two weeks against the former head of the country’s Academy of Sciences. Zeman and Jiri Drahos advanced to a second round of voting because none of the nine candidates seeking the Czech Republic’s largely ceremonial presidency received a majority of votes in the first round held Friday and Saturday. However, with almost all ballots counted by the Czech Statistics Office, Zeman had 38.6 percent of the vote, a commanding lead over Drahos’ 26.6 percent. A former diplomat, Pavel Fischer, was a distant third with 10.2 percent. Songwriter Michal Horacek finished fourth with 9.2 percent, ahead of physician Marek Hilser, who had 8.8 percent. The three pledged their support to Drahos in the runoff.

Czech Republic: In Czech Election, a Choice Between Leaning East or West | The New York Times

A people feeling left out, condescended to and ignored. A fear that outsiders fleeing war and poverty in Muslim nations threaten the homeland. And a deep distrust of institutions, especially governments that seem disconnected from daily concerns. From Poland to Pennsylvania Avenue, populist leaders have risen to power in recent years by tapping into these deeply emotional issues. In two weeks, one of the most outspoken of those leaders, President Milos Zeman, 73, of the Czech Republic, will face a test that could provide a barometer for the enduring strength of that message in this country and perhaps across the region. The second and final round of the presidential election will help decide whether the Czech nation continues to be drawn east toward Russia and China or moves back more fully into the embrace of the European Union.

Egypt: Egypt looks ahead to presidential election but little doubt about outcome | Middle East Online

Cairo- Notaries in hundreds of offices in Egypt have started registering pow­ers of attorney filed by citizens for potential presidential candidates as Egypt prepares for the start of the 2018 presidential election campaign. The vote will be March 26-28. In the event of an election run-off, the second round of the voting would be April 24. Many analysts predict that incumbent Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who has not formally announced his re-election bid, will easily win more than 50% of the vote, particu­larly given a dearth of challengers. Approximately 58 million Egyp­tians are eligible to vote in the presi­dential election, the second since the downfall of the Muslim Brother­hood regime in 2013.  The announcement of the elec­tion timetable was welcomed by political observers, who expressed hope that the vote would energise Egypt’s moribund political partici­pation.

Editorials: Honduras’s president suspiciously reversed a loss. Then the U.S. congratulated him. | The Washington Post

As in much of the rest of the world, democracy is on the defensive in Latin America, in part because it has few principled defenders. A simple comparison of two ongoing political crises, in Venezuela and Honduras, illustrates the problem. After Venezuela’s populist anti-American government rigged state gubernatorial elections in October, the United States led a campaign of condemnation and stepped up sanctions. But when Honduras’s rightist pro-American president suspiciously reversed what looked like an upset loss in a presidential election a month later, the Trump administration congratulated him.

Sweden: Prime Minister raises alarm on election meddling | EUObserver

Sweden aims to create a new public body to protect its upcoming election from Russian and other propaganda. “It is now less than eight months left to the finest day in Sweden’s democratic life, our election day … [and] only Swedish voters will determine the outcome,” Swedish prime minister Stefan Loefven said at a security conference in Stockholm on Sunday (14 January). “To the one or those who are considering trying to influence … our country: stay away!”, he said. Loefven said the main threat came from Russia, but he added that “we can not rule out that there may be others” who would try to influence the Swedish vote on 9 September.

The Voting News Weekly: The Voting News Weekly for January 8-14 2018

United States Senators have been targeted by Russian hackers, according to a report by the cybersecurity firm Trend Micro. The report claims that Fancy Bear—the same hacking group believed to be behind the hack of the Democratic National Committee in 2016—is now targeting Senators’ email accounts. Beginning last summer, the hackers have set up websites meant to look like an email system available only to people using the Senate’s internal computer network. The sites were designed to trick people into divulging their personal credentials, such as usernames and passwords.

At an Election Assistance Commission summit, computer security experts from DHS and the private sector detailed many of the cyberthreats facing America’s voting systems. “Elections offices have become IT offices that happen to run elections,” Jeremy Epstein, deputy division director of the National Science Foundation’s Division of Computer and Network Systems noted. “We need to be focused on detection and recovery.” DHS official Bob Kolasky said the federal government is substantially more prepared to deal with a nation-state attack on election systems today than it was in the lead-up to the 2016 election. “The Department of Homeland Security is in a much better position to work with our interagency partners and the election community to respond to any lingering threats that emerge going forward,” he said.

The Supreme Court heard arguments in aa case challenging the constitutionality of Ohio’s practice of using voting inactivity to trigger purges of registered voters who are still eligible to vote. Federal laws prohibit states from removing people from voter rolls “by reason of the person’s failure to vote.” But they allow election officials who suspect that a voter has moved to send a confirmation notice. A central question in the case was whether a failure to vote could be the reason to send out the notice.

In The New York Review of Books, Zachary Roth considered the many current court challenges to partisan gerrymandering. In North Carolina, a panel of federal judges threw out congressional maps that they determined had been drawn by Republicans to seek a political advantage. However in Pennsylvania a judicial panel rejected a similar argument from a group of Democratic voters who contended te state’s maps ad been gerrymandered it to help Republicans. On Friday, the Supreme Court announced that it will review lower-court rulings that ordered Texas to redraw 11 political districts found to be discriminatory adding to a docket that already includes a gerrymandering case from Wisconsin,

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit challenging Alabama’s state law requiring people to show government issued photo ID at the polls. The judge determined that the state’s voter ID provision does not discriminate against minorities and is not an undue infringement on the right to vote since the state makes free IDs available for voting purposes. Alabama has required voters to show photo IDs at the polls since 2014.

Results of Saturday’s election in the Czech Republic mean that Russian-backed president Miloš Zeman will face pro-western runner-up, Jiří Drahoš, in a run-off election in two weeks. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel announced a deal with her Social Democrat (SPD) rivals open government coalition talks. The deal to revive a “grand coalition” that has governed since 2013 must be approved by an SPD congress planned for January 21.

National: Cybersecurity firm: US Senate in Russian hackers’ crosshairs | Associated Press

The same Russian government-aligned hackers who penetrated the Democratic Party have spent the past few months laying the groundwork for an espionage campaign against the U.S. Senate, a cybersecurity firm said Friday. The revelation suggests the group often nicknamed Fancy Bear, whose hacking campaign scrambled the 2016 U.S. electoral contest, is still busy trying to gather the emails of America’s political elite. “They’re still very active — in making preparations at least — to influence public opinion again,” said Feike Hacquebord, a security researcher at Trend Micro Inc., which published the report . “They are looking for information they might leak later.” The Senate Sergeant at Arms office, which is responsible for the upper house’s security, declined to comment.

National: Elections: Another unsecured enterprise application? | GCN

As hackers become more sophisticated, state and local election officials must ramp up their IT expertise to protect registration data and elections results. “Elections offices have become IT offices that happen to run elections,” Jeremy Epstein, deputy division director of the National Science Foundation’s Division of Computer and Network Systems said at the Jan. 10 Election Assistance Summit. “We need to be focused on detection and recovery.” When Rhode Island Secretary of State Nellie Gorbea was appointed in January 2015, she made election security a priority by growing her IT department by 40 percent to deal with increasing threats. She also worked with legislative leadership to get more funding to replace old election equipment.

National: Election Integrity or Voter Purge? | U.S. News & World Report

In a case that could directly affect the ongoing fight over access to the polls, the Supreme Court on Wednesday will consider whether Ohio and 17 other states can remove tens of thousands of legally registered voters from eligible-voter databases in Ohio, a perennial political battleground that President Donald Trump won by eight points in 2016. Yet the outcome of the case, Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Institute, could not only encourage other states to follow suit but also bolster conservatives’ ongoing hunt to prove voter fraud – a disproven yet persistent belief that unregistered voters and non-U.S. citizens are illegally gaining access to the ballot box. “The stakes are high in this case,” Beth Taggart, spokeswoman for the Ohio chapter of the League of Women Voters, writes in an email interview. The League’s national and local chapters are among several organizations, including the ACLU and Brennan Center for Justice, who have joined the Randolph Institute, a civil- and voting-rights advocacy group, in fighting the law.

Editorials: Will the Court Kill the Gerrymander? | Zachary Roth/The New York Review of Books

On Tuesday, a panel of federal judges struck down North Carolina’s congressional map, ruling it an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. State Republicans had drawn district lines with such ruthlessness that they had won ten out of thirteen seats in the 2016 election—77 percent—even though they got only 53 percent of the vote. GOP lawmakers, wrote Judge James Wynn Jr., had been “motivated by invidious partisan intent.” Republicans had openly admitted as much. “Nothing wrong with political gerrymandering,” declared one of the lawmakers leading the process at a 2016 hearing. “It is not illegal.” The GOP is likely to appeal Tuesday’s ruling to the Supreme Court on those grounds. Whether courts are empowered to block partisan gerrymanders—as opposed to gerrymanders involving racial discrimination, which just about everyone agrees are unconstitutional—is a question the justices considered in October when they heard Gill v. Whitford, a challenge to Wisconsin’s state assembly map. The fate of North Carolina’s map likely hangs on how the court decides Gill. A ruling is expected before the end of June.

Alabama: Judge dismisses lawsuit challenging Alabama voter ID law | AL.com

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall issued a statement today about the U.S. District Court’s decision to dismiss a federal lawsuit that challenged the constitutionality of Alabama’s voter ID law. Today, U.S. District Judge L. Scott Coogler ordered the lawsuit filed by Greater Birmingham Ministries, Alabama NAACP and individual plaintiffs against the State of Alabama be dismissed. The lawsuit specifically targeted House Bill 19 of 2011, which requires absentee and in-person voters to show a photo ID in order to cast a regular ballot.

North Carolina: Court rules against partisan gerrymandering | The New York Times

A panel of federal judges struck down North Carolina’s congressional map on Tuesday, condemning it as unconstitutional because Republicans had drawn the map seeking a political advantage. The ruling was the first time that a federal court had blocked a congressional map because of a partisan gerrymander, and it instantly endangered Republican seats in the coming elections. Judge James A. Wynn Jr., in a biting 191-page opinion, said that Republicans in North Carolina’s Legislature had been “motivated by invidious partisan intent” as they carried out their obligation in 2016 to divide the state into 13 congressional districts, 10 of which are held by Republicans. The result, Judge Wynn wrote, violated the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection.

Pennsylvania: Judges rule Pennsylvania can keep congressional map | Associated Press

Pennsylvania can keep its congressional map, a judicial panel in Philadelphia ruled Wednesday, rejecting an argument from a group of Democratic voters who contended it should be thrown out because the state lawmakers who created the map in 2011 gerrymandered it to help Republicans. The court cast aside the argument that districts should not consider politics, saying partisanship is part of the system. “The task of prescribing election regulations was given, in the first instance, to political actors who make decisions for political reasons,” Circuit Court Judge D. Brooks Smith wrote in the majority opinion in the case. “Plaintiffs ignore this reality.” The ruling came a day after a court threw out North Carolina’s congressional map, finding it went too far to help Republicans.

Puerto Rico: Hurricane-hit Puerto Rico launches new drive for US statehood | AFP

Hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico on Wednesday launched a new drive to become the 51st US state, with the island’s governor demanding an end to “second-class” treatment of its citizens. Puerto Rico’s more than three million residents are US citizens, with no obstacles to living and working on the mainland. Yet the US commonwealth in the Caribbean has just a non-voting delegation in the US Congress in Washington, and Puerto Rico residents cannot vote for US president. “It is time to end Puerto Ricans’ second-class citizenship, and statehood is the only guarantee for that to happen,” Governor Ricardo Rossello told a press conference in Washington.

Texas: U.S. Supreme Court will review Texas redistricting | Austin American-Statesman

The U.S. Supreme Court announced Friday that it will review lower-court rulings that ordered Texas to redraw 11 political districts found to be discriminatory. Texas officials appealed the rulings, which conluded that two congressional districts and nine Texas House districts were improperly drawn along racial lines in violation of the Voting Rights Act. Acting on the Texas appeal, a divided court blocked efforts to redraw the maps in September to allow time to consider whether to grant Texas’ request to overturn the rulings. On Friday, the court announced that it combined the two appeals and will hear oral arguments this spring.

Germany: Merkel deal with Social Democrats opens way to new German government | Reuters

Chancellor Angela Merkel struck a deal with Social Democrat (SPD) rivals on Friday to open government coalition talks, easing months of uncertainty that has undermined Germany’s global role and raised questions about her political future. But the deal to revive a “grand coalition” that has governed since 2013 must be approved by an SPD congress planned for January 21. Some members fear further association with Merkel’s chancellorship could erode the influence of the party which suffered the worst result in September’s election since the modern Federal Republic was founded in 1949. “We have felt since the elections that the world will not wait for us, and in particular…we are convinced we need a new call for Europe,” Merkel, who has played a central role tackling crises over the euro and refugees, said after exploratory talks that had run through the night.

National: DHS Official On Russian Hacking: ‘A National Security Issue’ | NPR

President Trump has shown little interest in fighting the threat of Russians hacking U.S. elections. He’s shown a lot of interest in fighting voter fraud, something he insists — without evidence — is widespread. Parts of his administration are doing just the opposite. Bob Kolasky, an acting deputy undersecretary at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), told a group of election officials gathered in Washington, D.C., this week that the threat of Russian hacking in future elections is “a national security issue.” “We have seen no evidence that the Russian government has changed its intent or changed its capability to cause duress to our election system. That may not be the only concern we have in the future,” Kolasky said, adding that another nation-state or bad actor could also attempt to interfere in U.S. voting.

National: 3 ways DHS is helping states with election security | FCW

A Department of Homeland Security official said the federal government is substantially more prepared to deal with a nation-state attack on election systems today than it was in the lead-up to the 2016 election. In a Jan. 10 speech to the Election Assistance Commission in Washington D.C., Bob Kolasky, acting deputy under secretary for the National Protection and Programs Directorate, said the department has worked to expand its communication and outreach to state and local governments, which are primarily responsible for administering elections. “The Department of Homeland Security is in a much better position to work with our interagency partners and the election community to respond to any lingering threats that emerge going forward,” he said.

National: It’s Probably Not Possible To End Gerrymandering | FiveThirtyEight

Gerrymandering was once only the concern of map drawers and politics nerds. Most people didn’t know who their congressional representatives were, let alone the contours of their districts. But gerrymandering is having a moment. People don’t like it, and they want it fixed. It’s easy to understand why. As we’ve mentioned before, gerrymandering takes the blame for partisan polarization, uncompetitive elections, marginalizing minorities and rigging elections in favor of one party or the other. If you could solve those things by ending gerrymandering, why wouldn’t you?

Voting Blogs: Snow Days: Postponing Elections for Weather Emergencies | State of Elections

On March 14, 2017, municipalities in the state of New Hampshire were set to have their annual town elections. However, a powerful nor’easter was approaching New England, bringing with it near blizzard conditions, and many were concerned that the inclement weather would hinder the democratic process. Almost eighty towns decided to postpone their elections despite Governor Chris Sununu (R)’s warning that they would be exposed to potential lawsuits. The issue that arose and, as of November 1, 2017, remains in question is a conflict between state laws governing town elections. Section 669:1 of the state code requires that towns hold their elections on the second Tuesday in March, but Section 40:4 allows town moderators to reschedule the “voting day of a meeting” during weather emergencies.

Editorials: Who Will Listen to Democrats’ Warning on Russia? | The New York Times

If there has been any benefit from Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, it’s that it has raised awareness about President Vladimir Putin’s broader threat to democracies in Europe and elsewhere. In the face of complacency from Republicans fearful of what attention to these intrigues might reveal about the Trump campaign’s dealings with Russia, Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee have issued a report that appears to be the most comprehensive public accounting of Russia’s war on the West. It drives home the point that the 2016 election, which every American intelligence agency has said involved Russian interference to help elect Donald Trump, is part of a pattern in which Mr. Putin has worked to erode Western institutions and undermine faith in democratic practices.

Kentucky: Amendment to move elections of state officials clears first hurdle | Kentucky Today

A proposed constitutional amendment to move elections of Kentucky officials to even-number years cleared a Senate committee on Wednesday. SB 4, sponsored by Sen.  Chris McDaniel, R-Taylor Mill, would take effect, if approved, following the 2019 elections for Governor, Lt. Governor, Secretary of State, Attorney General, Auditor, Treasurer and Agriculture Commissioner, giving each of them a one-time, five-year term until the 2024 general election.

Maryland: Senate to consider overriding redistricting pact veto | Herald Mail

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s veto of a redistricting measure passed last year could be the subject of an override vote Friday in the state Senate. The legislation would set up a commission to redraw congressional district lines after the federal census is conducted — but only if New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Virginia also adopt similar legislation. Hogan, who has made redistricting reform a priority of his administration, called the measure “a phony bill masquerading as redistricting reform” when he vetoed it last year. “It was nothing more than a political ploy designed with one purpose — to ensure that real redistricting reform would never actually happen in Maryland,” he said.

North Carolina: Court ruling adds uncertainty to North Carolina elections | Charlotte Observer

The potentially landmark ruling that struck down North Carolina congressional districts adds more uncertainty for candidates – and voters – barely a month before the official start of election season. The ruling Tuesday from a federal three-judge panel also carries national implications and continues more than a decade of court intervention in the drawing of North Carolina election districts. It leaves the boundaries for the state’s 13 congressional districts uncertain ahead of the Feb. 12 start of candidate filing. “Since the 2010 (U.S.) Census we’ve had seven, now eight years of perpetual redistricting,” said Andy Yates, a Republican political consultant. “This constant flux is not good for anybody.”

Ohio: Supreme Court appears sympathetic to Ohio voter purge effort | Associated Press

The Supreme Court appeared sympathetic Wednesday to states that seek to prune their voting rolls by targeting people who haven’t voted in a while. In a case from Ohio, opponents of the practice called it a violation of a federal law that was intended to increase the ranks of registered voters. Justice Sonia Sotomayor said minorities and homeless people appear to be disproportionately kicked off the rolls. But the court’s conservatives and possibly also Justice Stephen Breyer indicated that they would uphold the state’s effort. Ohio is among a handful of states that use voters’ inactivity to trigger a process that could lead to their removal from voter rolls. A ruling for Ohio could prompt other states to adopt the practice, which generally pits Democrats against Republicans.

Ohio: Voter-Purge Efforts Get Support at U.S. High Court Session | Bloomberg

U.S. Supreme Court justices suggested they may give states broader latitude to purge their voting databases of people who might have moved, as the court heard arguments Wednesday in an Ohio case that could shape who gets to cast ballots in the November election.  Justice Stephen Breyer hinted he might join his more conservative colleagues in voting to uphold an Ohio system that uses non-voting as a factor in deciding which people to remove from the rolls. Breyer questioned whether states have enough other tools to purge people who have moved away or died in far-away places. “What are they supposed to do?” he asked. “Is Rhode Island supposed to look at the Tasmanian voting records or hospital records?”

Ohio: Lawmaker Prepares to Introduce Elections Cybersecurity Bills | Government Technology

State Rep. Kathleen Clyde, a Democratic candidate for Ohio secretary of state, said Wednesday she’s preparing to introduce a pair of bills designed to safeguard the state’s elections against cyberattacks. Clyde spoke about the bills at the Ohio Association of Elections Officials annual conference in Columbus. She was motivated to draft the legislation after it was reported that Russia attempted to interfere in the presidential election in 2016. “Many believe that this problem will only continue and we need to make sure that we are preparing for any attempts to hack our voting systems,” Clyde said in a phone interview prior to the conference. Unless Clyde is able to get Republican sponsors, her bill is unlikely to get through the GOP-dominated Ohio state legislature.

Canada: Paper ballots protect against hacks, but other election cyberthreats loom | CP24

As the potential for cyberattacks to undermine the democratic process becomes alarmingly clear, Canadians can take some comfort in the fact that national elections in this country are still conducted the old-fashioned way. Canada is not immune to cybermischief aimed at suppressing the number of people who vote or manipulating how they vote. But once ballots are cast, not even the most sophisticated cyberattack could tamper with the results. That’s because Canada still relies on paper ballots, hand-marked by voters and hand-counted by officials in some 25,000 different polling stations across the country, under the watchful eye of scrutineers from each of the major political parties. “It’s highly decentralized and it’s paper-based so documents can be verified easily afterwards,” says Marc Mayrand, Canada’s chief electoral officer until his retirement just over a year ago.