New York: Cuomo Seeks Fixes to ‘Rampant’ Problems in New York’s Campaign Contribution System | The New York Times

With little movement on state ethics laws, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced a late push in the legislative session on Wednesday to tighten restrictions on election laws governing money given to candidates through so-called independent expenditure committees. In particular, the governor will suggest clarifying criteria — via a legal opinion and legislation to be introduced — for determining if a candidate is improperly coordinating with a committee, including whether the candidate and committee have overlapping donor bases, past staff members in common or the same consultants. Shared office space or information would also be considered evidence of improper coordination under the governor’s plan, outlined in a speech given on Wednesday at Fordham Law School, as would similarities in campaign material produced by a candidate and a committee.

New York: Audit: New York City Elections Board Lost Track Of Voting Machines | Associated Press

City Board of Elections officials have lost track of more than 1,450 pieces of equipment, including some voting machines, according to an audit released Monday. “If you can’t count inventory, how can New Yorkers trust you to count their votes?” said Comptroller Scott Stringer, who led an army of auditors carrying out the task. Election officials examined Board of Elections inventories over nearly three years, ending last February. Tracing more than 5,000 items out of about 11,000 inventoried, they scoured five board warehouses and other facilities to match the entries.

New York: Elections chief defends botched primary; Challenges loom | The Villager

Facing accusations of fraud and disenfranchisement, the New York City Board of Elections voted unanimously last week to certify the results of New York’s hotly contested April 19 presidential primary. But the results are sure to leave many unsatisfied. The board threw out nearly 91,000 of the 121,056 provisional ballots cast by voters who had been unable to vote on primary day either because their names were taken off the rolls or because their party affiliation had been dropped or switched to a different party without their knowing. So roughly three-quarters of the affidavits were deemed invalid and not counted, according to the tallies posted on the Board of Elections Web site last Friday. That’s in addition to all those who did not file affidavits because they were not aware they could or because their polling places ran out of them.

New York: Elections Board Certifies Primary Vote, Rejects 91,000 Provisional Ballots | The Indypendent

After presiding over a chaotic Democratic presidential primary on April 19, the New York City Board of Elections released its certified election results Friday afternoon showing that it has rejected 91,000 provisional affidavit ballots, or about three out of every four cast that day. Diana Finch, who has served as a poll worker for nearly a decade, said the number of affidavit ballots in her Bronx election district far exceeded the usual number. “The envelopes that are provided to each election district to put the affidavit ballots in were all filled to bursting at my poll site, we had to squeeze the affidavit ballots in,” Finch told The Indypendent. “Clearly the Board of Elections never anticipated having so many affidavits.”

New York: Judge rejects challenge to New York’s ‘closed primary’ system | New York Daily News

New York State’s presidential primary results can be certified by the city and state Boards of Elections without any interference from the courts, a Manhattan judge ruled Monday. State Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron rejected a plea by a Manhattan attorney to rule that the state’s “closed primary” system violates the state constitution because independents can’t vote at all and those who do participate must be enrolled in their respective political parties six months before the election. Mark Warren Moody asked the judge to issue a temporary restraining order to block the certification of the April 19 primary results, but Engoron refused, saying it’s not likely that Moody would win on the merits of his argument.

New York: State may expand online voter registration | The Journal News

New York may see an expansion of online voter registration after Attorney General Eric Schneiderman ruled Tuesday that the practice is legal. The opinion came in response to questions from Suffolk County officials asking if state law permits the county to implement an online voter registration system. Currently, the state Department of Motor Vehicles offers online voter registration for New Yorkers that uses an electronic signature, but not elsewhere. Schneiderman said his opinion of county online voter registration is a “new era of truly online voter registration,” and he encouraged county elections boards to develop online registration systems.

New York: Everyone Is Angry at the New York City Board of Elections | Observer

It hasn’t exactly been a banner week for the New York City Board of Elections, and it’s only Monday. The fallout of a problem-plagued presidential primary last week continued today with an offer of $20 million in extra city funding from Mayor Bill de Blasio—but only if the board cleans up its act. That would include making “systemic changes” based on recommendations from an outside consultant and publicly posting all job vacancies, improving poll worker staffing with better pay and better training, and communicating more clearly with voters about poll sites, election days and registration statuses. “We’ve said this is, in effect, a challenge grant,” Mr. de Blasio said. “There’s a lot we’d like to help the Board of Elections do, but we must see commitment to reform and modernization, or we’re not going to spend the taxpayers’ dollars.”

New York: Comptroller slams city’s ‘broken voting system’ | New York Post

Comptroller Scott Stringer vowed Sunday to “take a sledgehammer” to the city’s voting system following the disappearance of 126,000 Brooklyn Democrats from election rolls that came to light during last Tuesday’s primary. “We have a broken voting system,” Stringer told NY1. “We’ve got to take a sledgehammer to this. We have to stop pretending this is a democracy.” His office is planning to audit the Board of Elections, but Stringer said the agency shouldn’t wait for his report. “The Board of Elections has to get their act together. First, they have to admit they have a problem,” he said.

New York: State Attorney Schneiderman’s office receives more than 1,000 primary day complaints | Times Union

State Attorney Eric Schneiderman said Wednesday that his office fielded more than 1,000 complaints from voters statewide during Tuesday’s presidential primaries. “By most accounts, voters cast their ballots smoothly and successfully,” Schneiderman said in a statement. “However, I am deeply troubled by the volume and consistency of voting irregularities, both in public reports and direct complaints to my office’s voter hotline, which received more than one thousand complaints in the course of the day yesterday.” Schneiderman said his office has opened an investigation into “alleged improprieties” in Tuesday’s voting by the New York City Board of Elections, which has been rebuked by officials after some 125,000 Democratic voters were purged from the rolls in Brooklyn.

New York: Brooklyn election official ousted for error that purged Brooklyn voters | New York Daily News

The massive purge of over 100,000 Brooklyn voters from the rolls — which caused huge problems at polling sites this past Tuesday — was the result of an epic screw-up by a long-time official expected to be forced out over the debacle, sources said. Diane Haslett-Rudiano, the Board of Election’s chief clerk, was suspended without pay on Thursday, two days after the city’s botched presidential primary prompted criticism from both the winners and losers on the Democratic side.

New York: It’s Far Harder To Change Parties In New York Than In Any Other State | FiveThirtyEight

Some of Bernie Sanders’s biggest supporters may not be able to vote for him in New York’s primary on Tuesday. Unaffiliated voters are a big share of Sanders’s support, but New York makes it hard for voters to register for a party at the last minute. For example, Erica Garner, daughter of Eric Garner and a Sanders supporter, can’t vote in the Democratic primary because she didn’t change her party registration in time to qualify. It’s an issue for Republicans too: Some high-profile Donald Trump supporters — or at least two of his kids — won’t be able to partake in the fun. New York’s deadline for switching party registration was Oct. 9, 193 days before the primary. I wanted to know if a party-switch deadline six months before a primary or caucus was as unusual as it sounded, so I went through every state’s election board website to see.

New York: Voting Problems Prompt Comptroller to Vow Audit of City’s Elections Board | The New York Times

Citing concerns about potential voting irregularities during the most consequential presidential primary in years, the New York City comptroller, Scott M. Stringer, said on Tuesday that his office would audit the city’s Board of Elections in part to determine if tens of thousands of Democratic voters were improperly removed from voter rolls. Mr. Stringer said in a statement that the Board of Elections had confirmed that more than 125,000 Democratic voters in Brooklyn were dropped between November 2015 and this month. He said the decline occurred “without any adequate explanation furnished by the Board of Elections.” “There is nothing more sacred in our nation than the right to vote, yet election after election, reports come in of people who were inexplicably purged from the polls, told to vote at the wrong location or unable to get in to their polling site,” Mr. Stringer, a Democrat, said.

New York: After More Than 100,000 Voters Dropped In Brooklyn, City Officials Call For Action | NPR

Following widespread irregularities at polls in Brooklyn Tuesday, New York City officials are calling for major reforms at the Board of Elections. The problem was first identified in a an analysis of state voter enrollment statistics by WNYC’s Brigid Bergin. The Board of Elections then confirmed that more than 120,000 voters have been dropped from the rolls in Brooklyn alone since November. “No other borough in New York City nor county in the rest of the state saw such a significant decline in active registered Democrats. In fact, only 7 of the state’s 62 counties saw a drop in the number of Democrats. Everywhere else saw the numbers increase,” WNYC found. The more than 120,000 dropped includes 12,000 people who moved out of the borough, 44,000 people who were moved from active to inactive voter status, and 70,000 voters removed from the inactive voter list, according to the station.

New York: Republican ‘rotten boroughs’ could clinch nomination due to delegate quirk | The Guardian

Like British parliamentary elections in the 18th century, the Republican presidential primary in 2016 may be decided in rotten boroughs. While the rotten boroughs in Georgian England were the long since abandoned sites of medieval towns where aristocratic landowners could handpick members of parliament, the Republican rotten boroughs are vibrant, heavily populated urban areas in places like New York and Los Angeles. They just don’t have very many registered Republicans. The result of gerrymandered redistricting processes and the deep alienation of minority communities from the Republican party is that there are many congressional districts where registered Republicans are almost as rare as unicorns. Republican delegate apportionment rules in many states, however, mean that every congressional district receives three delegates to the convention, regardless of how many GOP voters live there. In contrast, the Democratic party’s formula for delegates is influenced by the number of votes cast for their presidential nominee in the past few elections in each district. Instead of seeking to represent every voter equally, this gives more weight to committed Democratic voters. And it means the ratio of voters to delegates is less unbalanced than it might be otherwise.

New York: Judge Rejects Move To Open Primary To Purged Voters & Independents | Gothamist

A New York Federal District Court judge held a short-notice hearing on Tuesday afternoon in relation to a lawsuit filed yesterday against the state by dozens of New York voters, alleging that their registrations in the Democratic party had been purged or altered, preventing them from voting in today’s presidential primary. The lawsuit, which claims that voters inexplicably dropped from the voter rolls are being denied their constitutional rights, called on the judge to instate a hearing process by which New Yorkers who believe their registration has been wrongfully purged might defend themselves. “Usually what happens is the Board of Elections takes your provisional ballot, and checks it against the voter rolls. If it it doesn’t match they throw it out,” said attorney Jonathan Clarke outside the courtroom this afternoon. “What we’re asking is that your vote stay counted until the Board of Elections can actually [prove you’re not registered].”

New York: 27 Percent of New York’s Registered Voters Won’t Be Able to Vote in the State’s Primary | The Nation

In June 2013, North Carolina passed the most sweeping voting restrictions in the country, requiring strict voter ID, cutting early voting and eliminating same-day registration, pre-registration for 16 and 17-year-olds, and out-of-precinct voting, among other political reforms. The state defended its cutbacks in court last summer by invoking, of all places, New York. “The state of New York has no early voting as opposed to North Carolina that has ten days of early voting,” lawyer Thomas Farr said. “The state of New York has no same-day registration. The state of New York has no out-of-precinct voting. The state of New York has no pre-registration.” It was a cynical defense of North Carolina’s law—North Carolinians don’t deserve to suffer because a state 500 miles away has different laws—but it was still unnerving to hear a Southern state invoke a progressive Northern state to rationalize making it harder to vote. The fact is, New York does have some of the worst voting laws in the country. New York has no early voting (unlike 37 states), no Election Day registration (the state constitution requires voters to register no later than 10 days before an election), and excuse-only absentee balloting (voters have to prove they’ll be out of town or have a disability.)

New York: Voters file lawsuit over alleged election fraud | New York Daily News

More than 200 outraged New York voters have joined a lawsuit claiming the party affiliation on their voter registration changed without their consent. The voters say they are unfairly being shut out of Tuesday’s primary. The suit, to be filed Monday in Brooklyn, calls for New York to be an open primary state, allowing anyone to vote in primaries regardless of party affiliation. “For many of our complainants, to have the electoral process deprived of them, it’s devastating,” Shyla Nelson, an activist and spokeswoman for Election Justice U.S.A., told the Daily News.

New York: The Effects of New York’s Restrictive Voting Laws | The Atlantic

When Donald Trump confirmed to the hosts on Fox & Friends on Monday that two of his adult children, Ivanka and Eric, would not be able to vote for him in the New York primary, it seemed like one more head-smacking blunder by a disorganized campaign. How could Trump’s own kids forget to register in a state that has become crucial to his bid for the Republican nomination? Their lapse may be easy fodder for Trump’s rivals, but Ivanka and Eric’s plight is engendering far more sympathy from election reformers who are much more familiar with New York’s notoriously restrictive voting laws. “They’re just like a lot of people whom we’re hearing from on a regular basis,” Susan Lerner, the executive director of the state’s Common Cause affiliate, told me. Voting in New York is for early planners, not procrastinators. And that’s especially true for primaries.

New York: Early primary deadlines frustrate New Yorkers left unable to vote | The Guardian

A lot has changed in the presidential primaries since 9 October 2015. Back then, a CBS News poll showed Hillary Clinton beating Bernie Sanders nationally by nearly 20 points; if Joe Biden had entered the race, the same poll suggested Clinton would beat Sanders by 24 points. She was, in the minds of many liberal voters, the inevitable Democratic nominee. Another CBS News poll showed Donald Trump with a slim six-point lead over Dr Ben Carson nationally and, after two almost cartoonish debate performances, most Republicans and pundits expected the businessman’s numbers to slide and eventually eliminate him from contention. Quietly on that same day, the New York state board of elections’ deadline to change party affiliation passed, leaving any registered voters not identified as a Republican or a Democrat with no way to vote in the 19 April 2016 primary.

New York: A $200,000 Ballot Error and Other Misprints at New York City’s Board of Elections | The New York Times

The New York City Board of Elections has a proofreading problem — and even small mistakes are turning out to be costly. The board was forced to spend more than $200,000 in overnight postage last month to send corrected absentee ballots for the coming presidential primary, after it discovered an error in the Spanish version of the ballot. The mistake was discovered around the same time the board realized it had made another error: A recent notice sent to 60,000 newly registered voters included the wrong date for a Sept. 13 primary election for state and local offices. The board then mailed out a correction that may have inadvertently confused voters about the date of the higher-profile presidential primary on April 19.

New York: Court dismisses lawsuit to close ‘LLC loophole’ | Times Union

In a ruling Wednesday, state Supreme Court Justice Lisa Fisher dismissed a lawsuit against the state Board of Elections seeking to do away with the so-called “LLC loophole,” which has allowed real estate developers and other interests to give huge campaign contributions in New York elections. The LLC loophole is the result of a 1996 state Board of Elections decision, which allows each limited liability company controlled by a developer to each give up to $150,000 annually in New York elections, the same amount an individual can give. In her ruling, Fisher, who heard arguments on the matter in Greene County Supreme Court in December, said that the statute of limitations had long run out to bring a case seeking to do away with the 1996 Board of Elections’ administrative decision.

New York: After locking horns, Senate passes August primary election bill | Times Union

Following one of the more robust debates of the year, the state Senate on Wednesday approved legislation that would consolidate state and federal primaries to a single date in August. The bill, designed to follow federal mandates for getting out overseas absentee ballots, sparked debate over more than just New Yorkers’ voting habits and saving tens of millions of dollars on costly separate elections. It also hit on when people take their summer vacations, the need to stop “playing tiddlywinks” and pass legislation that ensures military personnel the right to vote, and whether time allows for lawmakers to campaign during the legislative session. It also featured the unusual move by a senator to stop yielding the floor for another senator to continue his line of questioning about the bill.

New York: Board of Elections receives flurry of ‘natural-born’ objections to Rubio, Cruz | Times Union

The state Board of Elections has received three objections contesting the “natural-born” citizenship of presidential candidates and U.S. Sens. Ted Cruz and/or Marco Rubio submitted in hopes of knocking them off the April 19 Republican primary ballot. Cruz was born in Canada, though his mother was a U.S. citizen (his father was at the time a Cuban citizen); Cruz finally shed his Canadian dual citizenship in 2014. Rubio was born in Miami, though neither of his parents were at the time naturalized U.S. citizens. Gregory-John Fischer of Suffolk County, who objected to Cruz, noted in his one-page complaint that “the willful 2014 Canadian citizenship of Ted Cruz highlights his conflicted dual-citizenship (and possibly mixed loyalties)” that underscores what Fischer sees as the intent of the framers of the Article 2 of the Constitution.

New York: New York City lawmakers oppose Cuomo’s plan to boost voter registration | Daily News

Gov. Cuomo’s plan to boost voter registration in New York is meeting resistance from city lawmakers who fear it will reduce the Big Apple’s political clout, the Daily News has learned. Cuomo’s plan — which calls for drivers to be automatically registered to vote when they obtain or renew a driver’s license — could spur big registration numbers in the motorist-rich suburbs and upstate but do relatively little for the city, which has fewer drivers, lawmakers said. “That is problematic from the prospective of cities versus suburbs and rural areas where people are more likely to drive,” said Assemblyman Brian Kavanagh (D-Manhattan). “Over time, it is likely to skew the electorate in ways that are not desirable or fair.”

New York: Voter-Registration Lawsuit Settled in Unusual Accord | Wall Street Journal

The Sullivan County Board of Elections will appoint a monitor to review challenges to voter registrations to settle a lawsuit filed by Hasidic Jewish residents in what legal experts call an unprecedented agreement in New York state. A group of 10 Hasidic registered voters from the Catskills village of Bloomingburg sued the Sullivan County Board of Elections in 2015, claiming the board violated the First Amendment, the 14th Amendment and the Voting Rights Act. The plaintiffs alleged the Board of Elections engaged in a “discriminatory campaign to deprive Hasidic Jewish residents of Bloomingburg…of the fundamental right to vote.” U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest approved the settlement Monday.

New York: Early voting: Cuomo wants it; Counties have concerns | Poughkeepsie Journal

Registered voters in New York wouldn’t have to wait until Election Day to cast their ballot in person if Gov. Andrew Cuomo has his way. A measure in Cuomo’s $145 billion budget proposal would make New York the 38th state in the country to allow early voting, in which a limited number of polling places are opened ahead of elections, freeing up voters from having to cast their ballot on a specific day. Supporters of early voting say states should be doing anything they can to make voting more convenient, particularly in New York, where just 29 percent of voters cast their ballot in 2014, a gubernatorial election year.

New York: Officials split on Cuomo’s early-voting proposal | Times Herald-Record

New Yorkers would get 12 extra days to vote under a proposal Gov. Andrew Cuomo stuck in his State of the State address and it is already dividing local state legislators. As part of Cuomo’s State of the State address last Wednesday, he said he wants to allow New Yorkers to vote early at 139 locations throughout the state. The legislation would require every county to offer residents access to at least one early voting polling place and allow residents to vote 12 days before Election Day. The measure would allow voters to cast ballots for at least eight hours on weekdays and five hours on weekends. Counties would be required to have one early voting polling site for every 50,000 residents and each county’s boards of elections would determine where to site the polling places.

New York: Concerns of ‘Voter Fatigue’ as New York Schedules Four 2016 Election Days | Gotham Gazette

As New Yorkers begin a year of many voting opportunities, there are important questions that elections will help answer – like who the next U.S. President will be and which party will control the state Senate – but also concern about voter fatigue and thus, turnout. There will be at least four chances for New Yorkers to cast votes in 2016, with three different primary election days leading up to November’s general election. There will be a presidential primary vote in April; congressional primaries in June; and state legislative primaries in September. There will also be special elections sprinkled in to fill empty seats in the state Assembly and Senate.

New York: Cuomo pitches early voting before elections, automatic registration of drivers | syracuse.com

Republicans and Democrats often disagree when it comes to efforts to expand voter participation and protect against voter fraud. So it’s no shocker that Onondaga County’s two elections commissioners are taking opposite sides on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposal to allow people to vote up to 12 days before Election Days and to automatically register people as voters when they obtain or renew a driver’s license. In his proposed state budget on Wednesday, Cuomo pointed out that New York’s voter turnout rate was the 44th lowest of 50 states in the 2012 presidential election. He noted that 37 other states allow voters to cast ballots in person early, before Election Day, to encourage people to vote when its convenient for them to get to the polls.