Hawaii: Unusual congressional election confuses voters | Associated Press

The death of one of Hawaii’s congressmen has led to an unusual ballot and voter confusion in urban Honolulu.
The rare double election means residents in the 1st Congressional District are selecting someone to fill the late U.S. Rep. Mark Takai’s seat for the two-month unfinished term and someone to represent the district for the next two years. Takai died in office last July. The situation could lead to two different people winning the same House seat on election night, to serve the two different terms. Former U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa is one of the candidates. The Democrat is hoping to return to her old seat in Congress, which she gave up to run for Senate two years ago.

Ohio: Democrats ask Supreme Court to restore order barring voter intimidation in Ohio | Politico

Democrats made a last-ditch plea to the Supreme Court Sunday night, urging the justices to restore an injunction barring Donald Trump’s campaign and its allies from Election Day actions that could intimidate voters looking to cast their ballots in the battleground state of Ohio. The Ohio Democratic Party’s emergency application to the high court asked the justices to reimpose the restraining order a federal appeals court lifted earlier in the day, arguing the 6th Circuit had issued a finding “with no basis in law.” The application seems likely to face an uphill battle at the shorthanded Supreme Court. Five justices are typically needed to grant such relief and the court is currently split 4-4 between Democratic and Republican appointees. Partisan considerations aside, the justices are also often wary of making last-minute changes to election rules or procedures.

Pennsylvania: Judge denies injunction to end strike, will revisit Monday | Philadelphia Inquirer

A judge ruled Friday there was no urgent need to issue an injunction to end Philadelphia’s four-day transit strike, but said she would take a second look at the request before Election Day. After a 2 1/2-hour hearing Friday night, Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Linda Carpenter denied SEPTA’s request to immediately force 4,738 striking workers back on the job. She scheduled a second hearing for 9:30 a.m. Monday. “There’s enough evidence that an injunction might be appropriate,” Carpenter said. “There’s not enough evidence that injunction right now is necessary.” SEPTA had been threatening to go to court since the strike began at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday, and filed the injunction paperwork at 3 p.m. Friday. The strike has brought the city’s subways, buses, and trolleys to a standstill and caused heavy traffic on the region’s streets, highways and regional rail. “This is about the riders,” said Pasquale Deon, SEPTA’s board chairman, “and it’s just a horrible situation to put the city of Philadelphia in.”

Texas: Report: Texas has closed most polling places since court ruling | The Texas Tribune

Five Texas counties rank among the top 10 nationwide for closing the greatest percentage of their polling places since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a portion of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, according to a new report released less than a week before Election Day. And taken together, Texas counties have closed more polling places than any other state, the report found. According to the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a civil rights advocacy group, since the high court found Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional — ruling that Texas and other states with history of racial discrimination no longer needed federal pre-clearance when changing election laws — Texas counties have closed at least 403 polling places. This will be the first election in 50 years conducted without the full force of the Voting Rights Act. Fisher, Medina, Aransas and Coke and Irion counties ranked the highest in polling place reductions, closing more than half of their voting locations. In terms of total polling places closed, Texas is followed by Arizona, which closed 202 polling places. Louisiana holds third place, with 103 poll closures.

Bulgaria: Runoff expected as pro-Russia candidate tops Bulgaria race | Associated Press

A former Bulgarian Air Force officer who has called on the European Union to lift its sanctions against Russia was the probable winner of the country’s presidential election Sunday, but he did not secure enough votes to avoid a runoff, exit polls showed. The exit polls gave opposition Socialist candidate Rumen Radev a narrow lead over the candidate of the ruling center-right party, Parliament Speaker Tsetska Tsacheva, who was seen as the race’s front-runner ahead of Sunday’s voting. The Balkan nation’s relations with Russia, the future of the European Union and immigration — in the wake of thousands fleeing Africa and the Middle East — dominated the election campaign.

Canada: Trudeau government to mail every household in Canada questions on electoral reform | National Post

The Trudeau government is mailing postcards to every Canadian household this month to find out how people feel about the way they elect MPs, the National Post has learned. More than 13 million full-colour postcards were being printed up this week which, when they land in mailboxes at the end of the month, will encourage Canadians to go to a website — mydemocracy.ca or mademocratie.ca — and answer questions about their democratic values. The websites are “parked” right now with Internet web hosting company GoDaddy.com but will go live no later than Dec. 1, said a senior government official. The online consultations, which will close Dec. 31, will be the last of three extensive rounds of consultations on electoral reform under way since the spring. This means the Trudeau government is expected to declare its preference for how, if it all, to change the way MPs are elected early in the new year.

Nicaragua: Ortega on course for landslide reelection | Reuters

Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega powered toward his third consecutive term as president of the poor Central American country on Sunday, as voters cheered years of solid growth and overlooked criticisms he is installing a family dynasty. By fusing his militant past with a more business-friendly approach, Ortega stands in stark contrast to many once-dominant Latin American leaders, whose popularity has plummeted in recent years after failing to guarantee gains in economic prosperity. The 70-year-old former guerilla fighter, who is running with his wife, Rosario Murillo, as vice president, had 72.1 percent of votes, with 66.3 percent of polling stations counted, the electoral board said. The announcement sent hundreds of his leftist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) party supporters out into the streets of Managua to celebrate.

National: Scary Dogs! Rigged Machines! Votes From the Grave! This Election, Paranoia Reigns | The New York Times

There was the myth of Trump supporters sending wild dogs to scare off black voters in Ohio. In Texas, some of the voting booths supposedly became possessed, switching ballots cast for Donald J. Trump to Hillary Clinton. And then there was the amateur genealogist said to be committing voter fraud by jotting down names found on gravestones. A week before Election Day, warnings of a rigged vote, amplified largely by Mr. Trump himself, have led to anxiety across the country about the integrity of the electoral process. In some instances, the concerns appear to be justified, but many have resulted from simple glitches or a heightened sense of suspicion. In any case, a year of extraordinary political polarization has left voters increasingly wary about their fellow citizens and the credibility of the country’s method for picking a president. “I think there’s definitely more paranoia this year,” said Pamela Smith, the president of Verified Voting, a nonpartisan group that promotes the integrity of elections. “There has been a lot of talk about election rigging. If you think an election is going to be rigged, then you look at everything through that filter.” Many of the rumors of rigged votes have taken on a life of their own on social media, where conspiracy theories flourish and accusations fly. The reports have left election officials and the local authorities scrambling to verify claims of mischief and, often, to offer reality checks.

National: White House Readies to Fight Election Day Cyber Mayhem | NBC

The U.S. government believes hackers from Russia or elsewhere may try to undermine next week’s presidential election and is mounting an unprecedented effort to counter their cyber meddling, American officials told NBC News. The effort is being coordinated by the White House and the Department of Homeland Security, but reaches across the government to include the CIA, the National Security Agency and other elements of the Defense Department, current and former officials say. Russia has been warned that any effort to manipulate the actual voting or vote counting would be viewed as a serious breach, intelligence officials say. “The Russians are in an offensive mode and [the U.S. is] working on strategies to respond to that, and at the highest levels,” said Michael McFaul, the U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2012 to 2014. Officials are alert for any attempts to create Election Day chaos, and say steps are being taken to prepare for worst-case scenarios, including a cyber-attack that shuts down part of the power grid or the internet. But what is more likely, multiple U.S. officials say, is a lower-level effort by hackers from Russia or elsewhere to peddle misinformation by manipulating Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms.

National: Military, overseas votes raise risk of hacked election | Politico

Tens of thousands of military and overseas Americans casting ballots online this fall face a high risk of being hacked, threatening to cause chaos around Election Day if their votes get manipulated or they transmit viruses to state and local election offices. More than 30 states — including battlegrounds such as Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada and North Carolina — allow various methods of online voting for citizens living outside the U.S. While state officials insist their ballots will be counted without any serious problems, ample warnings are nonetheless being sounded from the left, right and even inside the federal government that internet votes can’t be securely transmitted in today’s everything-is-hackable environment. “It’s not something you would do with your Social Security number. You shouldn’t do it with your ballot,” warned Susannah Goodman, director of voting integrity at Common Cause. It’s a point of pride for many states that Americans abroad and overseas troops can even cast a ballot online using the latest in technology, giving these voters a say on their next commander in chief even if they’re stationed in a remote or even hostile location, like Afghanistan or Iraq.

National: E-Voting Refuses to Die Even Though It’s Neither Secure nor Secret | Scientific American

In theory, using the internet or e-mail to vote for the U.S. president sounds like a good idea. It would be easier than rushing to the nearest polling station before or after work, and it might pull in notoriously apathetic younger voters already living most of their lives via screens. But in reality these online channels have proved to be terribly insecure, plagued by cyber attacks and malicious software able to penetrate supposedly well-protected financial, medical and even military systems. Such security concerns are the most frequent and convincing arguments against online voting—there is no way to fully secure e-voting systems from cyber attack. Online voting systems are also expensive and often require voters to waive their right to a secret ballot. Still, at least 31 states and the District of Columbia do let military and expatriate voters use the internet to submit marked ballots via e-mailed attachments, fax software or a Web portal according to Verified Voting, a nonprofit organization that studies the security of electronic voting systems. Twenty-one of those states and D.C. let voters e-mail or fax in their ballots, and another five states allow some people to cast their votes via special Web sites. “You can make voting more secret with a Web site because there is no e-mail address to trace a vote back to but the information about a person’s vote and their voter ID number are still out there on a server,” says Jeremy Epstein, a senior computer scientist at nonprofit research organization SRI International.

Arizona: US appeals court says Arizona precinct voting rule stands | Associated Press

A federal appeals court panel rejected a challenge Wednesday night to an Arizona election law that throws out ballots cast by voters who go to the wrong precinct. The 2-1 opinion from a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel turned away a legal challenge mounted by Democrats. Lawyers representing the state and national Democratic parties said Arizona throws out more out-of-precinct ballots than any other state and that minorities are more likely to be affected. A federal judge in Phoenix rejected the challenge last month, ruling that the state has a valid reason not to count such votes because different races are on ballots in different precincts. The judge also said that Democrats haven’t shown that minorities were affected more than white voters. Democrats appealed, and two of the appeals court judges agreed with the lower court and rejected the challenge, which cited Voting Rights Act and Constitutional violations.

Editorials: Maryland voting audit falls short | Philip B. Stark & Poorvi L. Vora/Baltimore Sun

At the Board of Public Works Oct. 19th meeting, members passed without discussion a proposal by the State Board of Elections to pay Clear Ballot Group Inc. $275,000 for an “independent and automated solution to verify [the] accuracy” of the state’s election results. Seems reasonable, right? Especially now that the term “rigged” frequently precedes “election” in this year’s campaign rhetoric. The only problem is it won’t work. We have some experience to back this judgment: Between us, we have helped audit about 20 contests in several states and designed auditable voting systems. Methods developed by one of us are in laws in two states. It’s great that Maryland voters get to vote on paper ballots this year; paper ballots that voters can check are the best evidence of “the will of the people.” Maryland’s ballots will be scanned and then counted electronically. As required by hard-won state legislation passed in 2007, the paper ballots will be stored securely as durable evidence of what voters wanted.

North Carolina: US judge tells North Carolina counties to restore purged voter names to polls | McClatchy DC

A U.S. District Court judge ruled on Friday that four counties must restore names to voter rolls that were part of a recent mass purge. The ruling from U.S. District Judge Loretta Biggs came in response to a lawsuit filed Monday by the state NAACP. In the lawsuit, seeking an emergency halt to voter roll purges in Beaufort, Moore and Cumberland counties, NAACP representatives and several voters affected described the practice as an effort to suppress the African-American vote. At issue was whether the North Carolina law that allows individual voters in this state to challenge anyone’s registration violates the National Voter Registration Act, which “prohibits the mass removal of voters from the rolls within the 90 days prior to the election.” The organization also contends that county election boards did not follow proper notification or hearing procedures for the challenges. “[T]here is little question that the County Boards’ process of allowing third parties to challenge hundreds and, in Cumberland County, thousands of voters within 90 days before the 2016 General Election constitutes the type of ‘systematic’ removal prohibited by the [National Voter Registration Act],” Biggs wrote in her ruling.

Ohio: U.S. Supreme Court rejects final challenge to Ohio voting laws | The Columbus Dispatch

The last pending legal challenge to Ohio’s voting laws died a quick death Monday when it was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court. And thousands of Ohio voters could have their ballots thrown out as a result, the attorney who filed the lawsuit says. Justice Elena Kagan dismissed the matter after consulting with the other seven members of the high court, her one-sentence decision indicated. “This case has been ongoing in Ohio, taking many forms, under the administration of three secretaries of state, both Democratic and Republican, and it is time for the chaos and waste of taxpayer money to come to an end,” said Secretary of State Jon Husted in a statement Monday night. The attorney pushing the challenge, Subodh Chandra of Cleveland, said, “Unfortunately, Secretary of State Husted is now free in this election to disenfranchise voters who he and the elections boards know are eligible, over ‘errors’ as trivial as writing a name legibly in cursive on a form rather than in print. And Husted is free to continue his scheme to have boards in the big, urban counties disfranchise voters when smaller, white rural counties count ballots involving identical errors — and he looks the other way.”

Ivory Coast: A referendum vote mirred by a low turnout and machete attacks | International Business Times

Abidjan was largely quiet and peaceful on Sunday (30 October) when there was a visibly low turnout in Ivory Coast’s constitutional referendum following a short campaign for changes the president said will help end years of unrest. Voters were asked to approve a draft constitution containing provisions that the opposition contended will significantly strengthen the power of the presidency, with one of the proposed modification effectively scrapping a clause that sets 75 as the age limit to be able to run for president. Led by 74-year-old President Alassane Ouattara and the ruling coalition, the ‘Yes’ camp campaign kicked off last week, while Human Rights Watch claimed opposition parties’ ability to explain their position to the public during their ‘No’ campaign had been “severely undermined”. Violence was reported in between 100 and 150 polling stations out of the nations’ 10,000. In some cases, stations were held up by young men with knives and ballot boxes were taken away, while others were attacked with men armed with clubs and machetes, according to Reuters. Overall, however, the issues lay with the process, participation and inclusiveness rather than the violence.

Nicaragua: Wife and Running Mate: A Real-Life ‘House of Cards’ in Nicaragua | The New York Times

She started out as a teenage mother working as a newspaper secretary, then spent decades of revolution, conflict, power and public scandal at the side of one of the region’s most influential men. Now the first lady of Nicaragua, Rosario Murillo, has succeeded in doing something that seems more like a plotline out of the Netflix series “House of Cards”: She will be on the Nov. 6 ballot to become vice president. Her running mate? Her husband, President Daniel Ortega. The election, in which the couple’s victory and Mr. Ortega’s third consecutive term are all but certain, is a critical step in what people around Ms. Murillo describe as her decades-long climb to power. She paved the way by helping the poor and winning over the public, but also by holding political grudges and pushing aside nearly all the members of her husband’s inner circle. “Denying something to my mother is a declaration of war,” her daughter Zoilamérica Ortega said. But in many ways, the first lady’s spot on the presidential ticket is an acknowledgment of the role she already plays in the country.

National: Election Protection helps voters with call center technology | TechTarget

The peaceful transition of power every four or eight years is one of the hallmarks of American democracy. To make that transition happen, it’s up to the country’s population to partake in its democratic privilege and vote for the next president of the United States. Each presidential election brings many questions to voters, beyond which candidate shares their beliefs and principles. For some, it could be their first time voting. For others, questions could range from where the voting stations are located and if they are registered to vote. To help the American public answer these questions is the nonpartisan, nonprofit Election Protection, a nationwide organization staffed mostly by volunteers at inbound call centers that answer thousands of phone calls during the election cycle at its 866-OUR-VOTE number, as well as Spanish- and Asian-speaking lines. While calls vary in quantity throughout the year, Election Protection has to handle a huge spike leading up to a presidential election. The nonprofit is already seeing an uptick, with daily calls reaching the thousands, and it is expecting up to 100,000 calls nationwide the day before and day of the Nov. 8 vote. To combat the influx, Election Protection relies on call center technology to help answer and route the flood of calls.

National: Pro-Trump Trolls Want You To Vote For Hillary Via Text (You Can’t) | Forbes

Ah yes, the alt-right trolls, back at it again with their meme warfare. Not content with destroying the GOP and the beloved Internet frog Pepe, these tee-hee-we’re-into-Trump-and-white-supremacy “pranksters” have been making fake Hillary Clinton ads again — this time, about being able to vote via text message. Except, unlike last week’s fake Hillary Clinton ads and the associated hashtag #DraftOurDaughters, these photoshopped images, that began circulating the evening of November 1st, may have been illegal. The very least, a violation of Twitter’s TOS on deceptive content and impersonation. Cohorts of the troll that originally spread the fake ads, the now suspended “Ricky Vaughn” whose former Twitter bio described himself as a “hero of the racist alt-right” and a “known white supremacist” (oh wow so trollsy), say the photoshopped images are just intended to be a joke, a parody.

National: FBI examining fake documents targeting Clinton campaign: sources | Reuters

The FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies are examining faked documents aimed at discrediting the Hillary Clinton campaign as part of a broader investigation into what U.S. officials believe has been an attempt by Russia to disrupt the presidential election, people with knowledge of the matter said. U.S. Senator Tom Carper, a Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, has referred one of the documents to the FBI for investigation on the grounds that his name and stationery were forged to appear authentic, some of the sources who had knowledge of that discussion said. In the letter identified as fake, Carper is quoted as writing to Clinton, “We will not let you lose this election,” a person who saw the document told Reuters. The fake Carper letter, which was described to Reuters, is one of several documents presented to the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Department of Justice for review in recent weeks, the sources said. A spokeswoman for Carper declined to comment.

National: How States Moved Toward Stricter Voter ID Laws | The New York Times

Thirty-two states — a figure that has been steadily rising — now have some form of voter ID laws, based on a count by the National Conference of State Legislatures. The number of states with the strictest laws is rising as well: Voters in seven states will be required to show photo identification in order to cast their ballots this year. In 2012, only four states required it. A 2002 federal law set minimum requirements for federal elections, including identity verification for all new voters. The law leaves room for states to enact their own stricter ones. “There has been movement toward more voter ID laws, and toward stricter voter ID laws,” said Wendy Underhill, program director for elections and redistricting at the National Conference of State Legislatures. Several of these laws have been challenged in court. In July, a federal appeals court found that the Texas voter ID law discriminated against blacks and Latinos and ordered the state to assist people who did not have one of the seven valid forms of identification. A North Carolina law, which was set to take effect this year, was struck down along with several other voting procedures.

Editorials: Trump campaign promises not to intimidate voters on Election Day. That’s huge. | Richard Hasen/Slate

On Friday morning, a federal district court will hear arguments in a dispute between the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee over whether the RNC, the Trump campaign, and its allies are violating a long-standing consent decree barring the RNC from engaging in intimidation of minority voters at the polls. It’s not the only case being heard on an emergency basis this week: Democrats have filed suit against Donald Trump, Republican state parties, and Trump ally Roger Stone in the battleground states of Arizona, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. In the Nevada suit, Stone has been ordered to explain at a separate Friday hearing what his questionable “Stop the Steal” organization is planning for Election Day. But regardless of how these hearings go Friday, the lawsuits have already borne fruit by getting the campaign on the record with its plans and promises not to intimidate voters. In an important development on Thursday afternoon, the Trump campaign in response to the lawsuits sent an email to Nevada campaign workers describing for them what constitutes illegal harassment and what constitutes good behavior. By getting Trump on the record promising not to harass voters with its “ballot security” activities, the Democrats have significantly lessened the chances of Trump-driven voter intimidation on Election Day.

Editorials: The Voter Fraud Lie We Can’t Shake | Dale Ho/The New York Times

Early voting is underway, and according to Donald J. Trump, so is voter fraud. Almost daily, he proclaims that “large-scale voter fraud” is happening and that the election is “rigged.” Politicians across the spectrum have criticized this nonsense as divorced from reality, deleterious to our democracy and unprecedented in our elections. It’s good to see such a strong, bipartisan pushback, but the critics are wrong on that last point. Thinly supported allegations of electoral malfeasance have been deployed throughout American history, often by those who want to restrict the vote. In the Jim Crow South, discriminatory devices from poll taxes to all-white primaries were justified as a means of fraud prevention. In 1902, Texas adopted a poll tax. Its champions argued in The Dallas Morning News that the tax would prevent fraud and protect against “corrupt methods at the polls.” Their reasoning? If casting a vote is free, then poor people will sell their votes “for a trifle.” … In itself, there is nothing wrong with poll monitoring. States often allow certified observers to watch polls. Trained poll monitors can help prevent mishaps on Election Day, like ensuring that eligible voters don’t slip through the cracks because of poll-worker error. But undisciplined poll watching can degenerate into voter intimidation.

Editorials: Yes, broken voter ID laws will affect the 2016 election | Herman Schwartz/Reuters

“We have to make sure that this election is not stolen from us,” Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said during a recent rally in Pennsylvania, “ Everybody knows what I’m talking about.” As the poll numbers tighten, both nationally and in key battleground states, Donald Trump has ratcheted up his claims that without voter ID laws, Democrats will flood the polls with people ready to “vote 15 times.” These claims are typical of what many Republicans have been asserting for more than a decade to justify severely restrictive voter ID laws now in effect across the nation. As first enacted, these laws restricted the number of acceptable photo IDs to a handful – usually no more than seven or eight – and deliberately excluded IDs most readily available to low-income and young people through public assistance agencies, colleges and public or private employees. Texas and Wisconsin even excluded military veteran IDs, but relented after veterans groups protested.

Editorials: Ballot Measures Need to Be Written in Plain Language | Whitney Quesenbery & Dana Chisnell/New York Times

The biggest complaint we hear in our research with voters is that ballot questions seem written to purposely confuse them. They’re not wrong. Weighing in at 75 words, the Florida amendment on solar energy that has so upset voters this year doesn’t look too bad. But it took us almost an hour to work out what the amendment actually says — and we are experts used to reading legal texts. What about voters like the 43 percent of American adults who read at basic or below basic levels? Ballot measures that are written in plain language are much more respectful of voters. But there are other issues at play: First, readers have to find the information in advance to inform their opinion on ballot measures. For many voters, the first time they see a ballot question is when they are faced with it in the voting booth.

California: Judge upholds California ban on voters taking selfies of ballot | CNET

The law is the law, no selfies allowed at the polls in California. That’s what a US district judge ruled Wednesday, rejecting the American Civil Liberties Union’s request for an injunction lifting the state’s ban on voters taking selfies of their ballot. The ACLU said the more than century-old law banning cameras at the polls violate voters’ freedom of speech. Nope, California voters still won’t be able to take these kinds of selfies at ballots such as this guy in Wisconsin two years ago. But Judge William Alsup took less than two hours to reach his decision, chastising the ACLU for filing a lawsuit Monday in federal court in San Francisco claiming voters’ First Amendment rights are being denied from expressing their political positions — with Election Day less than a week away.

Colorado: Federal judge considers blocking Colorado law that bans ballot selfies | The Denver Post

A 125-year-old Colorado law aimed at discouraging vote swapping for whiskey and pig feet is now at the center of a high-tech freedom of expression case involving cellphone ballot selfies. An attorney for Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey on Wednesday told U.S. District Judge Christine Arguello that Morrissey will not enforce the law despite the fact his office posted a news release on its official website warning people that it is illegal to post ballot selfies in Colorado. “There is no threat of a possible prosecution. …There is no intent by the DA’s office to chill free speech,” Andrew Ringel, Morrissey’s attorney, said in a hearing in U.S. District Court in Denver. But Arguello asked how Morrissey’s Oct. 20 warning that he issued to the media wouldn’t chill free speech.

Editorials: The world may change; but D.C. voting rights remain the same | Timothy Cooper & John Capozzi/The Hill

The last time D.C. residents went to the polls to cast a vote for or against a D.C. statehood referendum, 52 American diplomats and citizens were being held hostage in Tehran by the Ayatollah Khomeini; the AIDS-causing virus hadn’t yet been discovered, let alone controlled; and Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms had only been launched the previous year. The Cold War between East and West was at full pitch. Now China has become the world’s second largest economy and the Berlin Wall is no more. Even Eastern Europe’s democratic color revolutions have come and gone. South Africa has long since dismantled apartheid. In other words, most everything in the world appears to have changed since 1980; that is, except, of course, the non-voting status of District of Columbia residents. Our sorry political status remains conspicuously the same. We enjoy no right to equal congressional representation; nor, for that matter, are we permitted by Congress full local autonomy to run our daily affairs as only we see fit.

Florida: Voting groups say Florida leads in calls to elections hotline | Tampa Bay Times

Elections officials told a woman in Miami who moved from a different county that she could not vote. A volunteer with voting rights groups saw a poll watcher at the North Miami Public Library confront people who asked for language assistance. In Hialeah, voters struggled to get translators. Voters elsewhere complain they haven’t received mail-in ballots they requested weeks ago. These were among the 1,700 calls by Florida residents through a national elections hotline — the highest number for any state. As the 2016 presidential race hurtles toward Tuesday’s finish line, complaints handled by the National Election Protection Hotline about early voting and mail ballots provide a possible glimpse of any confusion to come.

North Carolina: Emails show how Republicans lobbied to limit voting hours in North Carolina | Reuters

When Bill McAnulty, an elections board chairman in a mostly white North Carolina county, agreed in July to open a Sunday voting site where black church members could cast ballots after services, the reaction was swift: he was labeled a traitor by his fellow Republicans. “I became a villain, quite frankly,” recalled McAnulty at a state board of elections meeting in September that had been called to resolve disputes over early voting plans. “I got accused of being a traitor and everything else by the Republican Party,” McAnulty said. Following the blowback from Republicans, McAnulty later withdrew his support for the Sunday site.