Saudi Arabia: Civic election candidates warned against violating Saudi campaign rules | Arab News

The General Election Commission announced on Saturday that it would not allow any illegal practices by candidates during their poll campaigns. It said as many as 5,609 are contesting the municipal council elections scheduled to be held on Sept. 29.

Jedaie Al-Qahtani, spokesman of the commission, said candidates should obtain special permission from local election committees to carry out election campaigns and publicity. “Candidates should follow certain rules and regulations during campaigns in order to avoid disciplinary action,” he said.

The commission said it had observed a number of illegal practices during the last election when some candidates formed alliances while some others circulated a list of candidates on the basis of tribes and ideological inclinations.

The Voting News Weekly: TVN Weekly June 5-12 2011

“Beastly” No Vote Billboard in Bangkok

Tuesday’s primary in New Jersey witnessed numerous voting machine reporting problems on both Sequoia Advantage and ES&S iVotronic DREs. It appears unlikely there will be any independent review as local election officials are relying on the vendors to investigate themselves. After GOP officials were caught on tape last week scheming to burden Democratic challengers with ‘spoiler’ primary candidates that would require primaries before this summer’s recall elections, ‘fake’ candidates, mostly GOP operatives have dutifully filed papers. Not to be outdone, Democrats have followed suit and it looks like taxpayers will fund, and election officials will administer, a whole round of charade elections for the political benefit of the parties. After staunchly defending their internet voting platform, the Estonian parliament has bowed to pressure from OSCE observers and computer security experts and formed a task force to review the security of the system. Earlier this month the capital city Talinn moved to abolish e-voting in their municipal elections. Pauline Hanson’s challenge to her narrow loss in the New South Wales parliamentary elections in March took a bizarre turn with the revelation that several key player were in fact the same person. Voter ID proposals moved forward in North Carolina, New Hampshire, Alabama and Pennsylvania. The GOP effort to end Maine’s 40 year tradition of Election Day Registration elicited heated debate with the State Republican chairman shocking even members of his own party with accusations that Democrats “steal elections.” The ruling party’s plans to use electronic voting machines has met with fierce opposition from several other parties in Bangladesh and led to a nationwide general strike. The New York Times questions GOP efforts nationwide to make voting more burdensome and Politico posted a comprehensive review of the potential impact of state election code changes on the 2012 election.

New Jersey: Vote count glitch probed in Sussex County – ES&S iVotronic | New Jersey Herald

The unofficial results from Tuesday’s primary election are in, again, and there are no official winners, yet, but the numbers all match up, unofficially. The computer problems that shut down the counting of votes were solved the next day when a consultant from Elections, Systems & Software, the software provider for the county’s election board, suggested the board should just start over. And that is just what it did.

… The number of voters matched the number of voters recorded on the paper records that poll workers keep at each polling place, McCabe said. And there were no surprises or recall of winners with Wednesday’s tabulations, now unofficially being reviewed by the Sussex County Clerk’s Office, which must confirm the totals before they become official.

The one thing that was officially confirmed Tuesday is that the county has a glitch in the election process, and no one knows what causes it.

New Hampshire: House, Senate pass photo IDs for voters | Boston.com

Voters would have to show photo identification to vote in New Hampshire under legislation passed by the House and Senate. It now heads to the governor but the bill’s future there looks uncertain.

The version approved 14-9 by the Senate on Wednesday allows for provisional ballots for those who do not have official identification, allowing them to vote if they come back to municipal officials within three days with a government-issued photo identification.

Voters also could get a waiver from the photo identification requirement from the Secretary of State or request and receive a voucher to cover the cost of getting photo identification from the state Department of Motor Vehicles.

Colorado: Secretary of State backs Marks in Colorado election suit | Aspen Daily News

Colorado’s chief election official says he believes that an unsuccessful Aspen mayoral candidate deserves to win a lawsuit against the city demanding access to ballot images from the 2009 municipal election.

The suit filed by City Hall critic and ‘09 candidate for mayor Marilyn Marks was dismissed last year by local District Judge James Boyd. Marks has appealed the dismissal.

Judge Boyd agreed with city attorneys that allowing the public to inspect photographic images made of the ballots cast in the May 5, 2009 election would violate state law protecting secret voting. City Clerk Kathryn Koch denied an open records request from Marks to view the ballot images, prompting Marks to sue for access.

North Carolina: Asheville-area politicians weigh in on North Carolina voter ID bill | The Asheville Citizen-Times

Debate over legislation requiring voters to show photo identification before casting a ballot has been passionate, with the House Republican majority prevailing on the bill.

But experts like Gibbs Knotts, a political science professor at Western Carolina University, question whether the law’s impact will match the rhetoric’s heat.

The GOP contends the measure is needed to root out voter fraud and keep elections honest, while Democrats maintain it’s a politically motivated scheme to disenfranchise voters who traditionally vote Democratic.

“I think the evidence from people who have studied this is that maybe both sides exaggerate the effect,” Knotts said.

Australia: It wasn’t him, it was me, admits man behind Pauline Hanson email leak | thetelegraph.com.au

A married father of three has been outed as the man who used a fake identity to leak an email to Pauline Hanson alerting her to “dodgy” vote counting by NSW Electoral Commission staff.

In a bizarre twist to the former One Nation leader’s appeal against her loss in the March state election, the case was urgently resumed yesterday as former history teacher Sean Castle, from Glendenning, in Sydney’s west, came forward to admit he had been posing as a man called Michael Rattner all along.

Michael Rattner was nominated in court as the man who leaked an email to Ms Hanson mentioning “dodgy electoral staff” wrongly placing 1200 votes cast in her favour in a blank ballot pile. But he did not appear in court on Wednesday as required, leading Justice Peter McClellan to issue a warrant to bring him in to give evidence.

Wisconsin: Democrats may join GOP in fielding ‘fake’ candidates in recalls | JSOnline

Wisconsin’s unprecedented recall elections could soon get even more complicated. A coalition of union groups active in state Senate recalls now advocates that Democrats field fake Republican candidates to run in primary elections against GOP state senators – just as Republicans are fielding fake Democrats to run against those who challenging GOP incumbents.

Friday evening, the Democratic Party of Wisconsin issued a statement that neither endorsed nor ruled out the idea, saying the party will “review the options available.”

The proposal from We Are Wisconsin, described in an email from Kelly Steele, communications director, was sent earlier Friday. The email argued that it was necessary to keep Republicans from hijacking the election process, and called on interested Democrats to contact the state Democratic Party and volunteer to run as Republicans in the districts of six GOP senators subject to recall elections.

Wisconsin: ‘Protest’ Democratic candidate surfaces in Darling recall election | JSOnline

A member of the Republican Party of Ozaukee County has surfaced as a possible Democratic candidate in the recall election targets Sen. Alberta Darling (R-River Hills).

Gladys Huber, listed on the Ozaukee GOP’s website as a member at large — presumably of the county party’s executive committee — has filed a registration form to run as a Democrat against Rep. Sandy Pasch (D-Whitefish Bay).

The candidacy is part of the state GOP strategy — described by Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald — to run “protest” candidates against Democrats challenging six Republican senators in recall campaigns.

 

Maine: GOP chairman’s charge that Democrats ‘steal’ election causes stir | Bangor Daily News

Tempers flared in the state Senate on Friday after the chairman of the Maine Republican Party suggested Democrats “steal elections” by taking advantage of Maine’s policy allowing voters to register at the polls on Election Day.

A proposal to end Maine’s 38-year-old policy of same-day voter registration was already one of the most contentious of the legislative session. Lawmakers have spent hours debating whether the bill would improve the integrity of Maine’s election system — as Republicans insist — or disenfranchise tens of thousands of voters — as Democrats suggest.

On Friday, the partisan tensions boiled over in the Senate thanks to comments from Maine GOP Chairman Charlie Webster.

Missouri: State voting bill lessens workload for Missouri county clerks | SouthCountyMail.com

If people think all legislative bills are designed to make people’s lives harder, an introduction to Senate Bill 282 should dispel that myth. This new piece of legislation would make it unnecessary for county clerks to go through absentee ballots to make sure no ballot cast by a recently-deceased voter is counted on election day.

Under the old rules, absentee voters, who may have cast their ballot up to six weeks in advance, must be alive when polls open on election day. Clerks had to check obituaries for votes cast by the recently deceased, confirm the death with the Department of Health, then throw those ballots out.

If Gov. Jay Nixon signs the bill, it will be welcome news to Webster County Clerk Stan Whitehurst, who worried that the rules were not always evenly applied.

Minnesota: Board approves technology to make life easier for Anoka County election officials | ABC Newspapers

New technology designed to make life easier for election officials throughout Anoka County has been approved by the Anoka County Board. The board accepted a two-year subscription contract with InTech Software Solutions, Inc., for use of MODUS Election Manager software. The cost to the county is $31,582 for this year and $67,180 for 2012.

Essentially, the new software system will store in one data base election information needed not only by county election officials, but the city clerks who run the elections in the county’s municipalities. According to Cindy Reichert, county elections manager, the system is designed to manage only logistics and election operations.

“It does not contain data concerning votes cast or voter information,” Reichert said.

Iowa: Democrats file ethics complaint against Iowa Secretary of State | Iowa Caucuses

The Iowa Democratic Party today filed an ethics complaint against Republican Secretary of State Matt Schultz, alleging he used public resources to advocate against a candidate.

Schultz earlier this week issued a statement criticizing former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman for saying he plans to skip the 2012 Iowa caucuses if he runs for the Republican presidential nomination.

Democrats believe that Schultz’s release attacks specific policy positions of Huntsman and violates state law that prohibits the use of public money to advocate political purposes. Democrats filed their complaint with the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board.

Moldova: Communist MPs allege election fraud | Morning Star

Communist MPs and their supporters rallied outside parliament in Chisinau on Thursday over alleged irregularities in elections which gave a boost to the country’s ruling pro-European Union coalition.

Protesters chanted: “Down with the Central Election Commission” and “Down with the Alliance,” referring to the governing three-party Alliance for European Integration (AEI).

The election commission says that the AEI won about 57 per cent of the vote in local councils last Sunday, while the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM) took nearly a third of the vote – more than any other single party.

 

Jamaica: Electoral Commission of Jamaica to get power to prescribe electoral boundaries | Jamaica Information Service

The House of Representatives has adopted a proposal to amend existing legislation to empower the Electoral Commission of Jamaica (ECJ) to prescribe electoral division boundaries, and prohibit the publication of a new list of electors between nomination day and Election Day.

Piloting the proposals, which are contained in an ECJ report to Parliament, Leader of Government Business in the House, Hon. Andrew Holness, on June 7, explained that this would require amendments to the Kingston and St. Andrew Corporation Act; the Parish Councils Act, and the Representation of the People’s Act.

Tanzania: Kikwete promises to resolve National Electoral Commission hitches – highlights need for more election workers | ippmedia.com

President Jakaya Kikwete has promised to solve four challenges facing the National Electoral Commission (NEC) in order to enable it to improve its performance.

Kikwete made the commitments yesterday in Dar es Salaam soon after he received the report on last October’s General Election which was handed to him by the NEC Chairman Judge (rtd) Lewis Makame during a short ceremony held at State House. Speaking soon after receiving the report, Kikwete thanked Judge Makame and members of the Commission.

While commending the commission for the job well done during the elections where CCM emerged the winner, the President said: “The work was done very well; it was a great job. We thank and congratulate you for it.”

India: Indo-Nepal election management pact signed | The Hindu

A Memorandum of Understanding for mutual cooperation in election management between India and Nepal was signed by Chief Election Commissioner of India S.Y. Quraishi and his Nepal counterpart Neel Kantha Uprety in Kathmandu on Tuesday.

The agreement covers exchange of knowledge/experience in the electoral process, exchange of material and expertise, training of personnel, production and dissemination of materials, voting technology and conducting voters’ education and awareness programmes.

The Voting News Daily: Estonian Parliament Sets up E-Voting Working Group, Voter ID bill easily passes North Carolina House

Estonia: Estonian Parliament Sets up E-Voting Working Group | ERR On June 9, the Parliament’s Constitutional Committee established a working group tasked with shoring up regulations related to the country’s much-touted e-voting system. … Though Estonia’s groundbreaking national e-voting system, introduced in 2005, is widely considered reliable by international observers, it came under fire last month…

Estonia: Estonian Parliament Sets up E-Voting Working Group | ERR

On June 9, the Parliament’s Constitutional Committee established a working group tasked with shoring up regulations related to the country’s much-touted e-voting system.

… Though Estonia’s groundbreaking national e-voting system, introduced in 2005, is widely considered reliable by international observers, it came under fire last month after an OSCE review found a number of legal and procedural holes in the way it was being used.

In early June, the Tallinn City Government filed a motion with the Supreme Court to abolish e-voting at future local elections, citing many of the same concerns.

North Carolina: Voter ID bill easily passes North Carolina House | CharlotteObserver.com

North Carolina would join 13 other states requiring voters to show a photo ID under a bill passed Thursday by the Republican-led N.C. House. The measure passed 66-48 along party lines, despite Democratic protests that it would decrease turnout.

Some critics invoked comparisons to Jim Crow-era voting barriers. The bill now goes to the Senate, which is expected to endorse it. It would then go to Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue.

National: Outdated and Failing: Modernizing Our Voting System for the Rising Electorate | Rock the Vote Blog

Day after day, from college campuses to high school classrooms, we hear stories about needless bureaucratic barriers that prevent young people from voting. For young Americans, the greatest barrier to participation is the out-dated process itself. Our complicated registration process varies state-by-state, and our country’s antiquated, paper-based electoral system is riddled with restrictive rules and red tape that don’t reflect advances in technology or meet the needs of modern life.

You’d think that the most basic element of our democracy – the very right to participate in our government that is guaranteed to all of us – would be something we would constantly work to improve. Yet somehow voting is an archaic ordeal, inconsistently implemented from place to place, and disturbingly, manipulated by whether people in power want someone like you to show up at the polls.

It doesn’t need to be this hard to vote.

National: Debunking Misinformation on Photo ID | Brennan Center for Justice

Last week, the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed (“The Case for Voter ID”) by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach.  In the piece, Kobach touts restrictive voter ID bills, including the Kansas “Secure and Fair Elections Act,” which he drafted and Governor Sam Brownback signed into law a few weeks ago.  Kobach argues that (1) voter ID laws will not actually prevent any eligible citizens from voting; and (2) they will prevent in-person voter fraud, which he claims is a substantial problem.

But his arguments are built on inaccuracies, unsupported allegations, and flawed reasoning.  Because Kobach takes direct aim at the Brennan Center in this op-ed, we thought a thorough review of his claims was in order. We sent a letter to the editors at the Journal rebutting some of his claims, but the paper did not publish it.

Alabama: Voter ID bill passes Alabama Senate | Anniston Star

The Alabama Senate passed a bill 22-10 Thursday that would require voters to present photo identification at the polls. In a brief debate — limited to about 20 minutes by Senate leadership — supporters described the bill as a way to provide security to a crucial part of the democratic process.

“When you go to a convenience store, boarding a plane, or going to a courthouse, you have to show photo ID,” said Sen. Gerald Allen, R-Cottondale, a supporter of the bill.

Opponents of the bill questioned the cost of implementing it in a year of budget hardship. Allen said the bill would cost the state approximately $250,000 in new equipment. One critic of the bill, Sen. Tammy Irons, D-Florence, said the bill would likely cost more in advertising to get the word out about the ID requirement.

New Jersey: Malfunctioning Voting Machines Delay Primary Results in Somerset County NJ | Basking Ridge, NJ Patch

Somerset County’s primary election polls may have closed Tuesday night at 8 p.m., but the results were not posted online until Wednesday morning.

With several county districts experiencing malfunctioning machines and a few close races (including a nine-vote difference in a Branchburg race), County Clerk Brett Radi explained, “I didn’t post them because we still had some ballots that needed to be added. I didn’t want to have results that didn’t reflect what was really going on.”

“We just didn’t do a final update, because we didn’t have the ‘emergencies’ [emergency ballots used when machines malfunction],” he noted.

New Jersey: Faulty parts delay election results in Middlesex County NJ | MyCentralJersey.com

It was late Tuesday night — hours after the polls closed for the primary elections — and some candidates still had yet to learn the final vote tally. That’s because municipal clerks in Monroe, Plainsboro, South River and Woodbridge, many of whom started their day at 5 a.m., clocked out without ever learning the unofficial results because of an issue with some of the voting machines.

“To work those kind of hours and not be able to give the candidates their results is frustrating,” Monroe Township Clerk Sharon Doerfler said.

In Monroe, four of the voting machines were printing illegible numbers that ran over the top of one another. Like every other municipality, Monroe’s poll workers received an emergency number to call in the event of a malfunctioning voter machine.

New Jersey: Computer snag delays Montclair NJ Primary Election vote tally | NorthJersey.com

Due to a computer-software glitch, Montclair still didn’t have its Primary Election results as of Wednesday afternoon, and was doubtful about having them by the end of yesterday.

“A nightmare. Never had this happen before,” Township Deputy Clerk Carla Horowitz said Tuesday night as the township was struggling to tally the local results after a computer program went awry.

Late Wednesday morning, the Clerk’s Office still wasn’t able to get an accurate count of Montclair’s votes and the municipal Information Technology officer was away, so he couldn’t help.

“We worked on it this morning,” Horowitz said. “The program seems to be working a little bit better.”

North Carolina: Passionate debate resumes on North Carolina’s voter ID bill | Times Union

North Carolina House Republicans are trying to pass legislation that demands people show photo identification before they enter a voting booth, even though it appears the measure would face a veto from Gov. Beverly Perdue.

The House returned Thursday to debate further a politically divisive voter ID bill after the Republican-led chamber conducted the first of two required votes just before midnight Wednesday following just a few minutes of debate.

The bill was tentatively approved on a 67-50 party-line vote, but the GOP margin falls a few votes shy of overcoming any potential veto. Perdue’s office has been critical of the legislation, and Democrats and voting rights advocates have called it a veiled method to suppress voting among blacks, older adults and women.

North Carolina: More debate expected on Voter ID bill in NC | Beaumont Enterprise

North Carolina House Republicans are trying to pass legislation that demands people show photo identification before they enter a voting booth, even though it appears the measure would face a veto from Gov. Beverly Perdue.

The House was expected Thursday to discuss the voter ID bill more after the Republican-led chamber conducted the first of two required votes just before midnight Wednesday following just a few minutes of debate.

National: Three More Jurisdictions To ‘Bailout’ From Special Voting Rights Act Supervision | The Blog of Legal Times

A Virginia city, a California irrigation district and a Texas drainage district are the latest places to come to an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice on exiting special supervision under the federal Voting Rights Act.

Today, DOJ announced it had reached agreements with the City of Bedford, Va. (PDF) and the Alta Irrigation District in California (PDF) on approving their “bailout” from special supervision; three-judge panels in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia are expected to approve both petitions.

On Tuesday, a three-judge panel approved a bailout (PDF) for Jefferson County Drainage District No. 7 in Texas. The Justice Department had agreed to that petition in April.