South Carolina: Could 2013 be the Year for Early Voting in South Carolina? | Free Times

South Carolina is one of 18 states where voters are not allowed to cast an early ballot in person without an excuse. Many Palmetto State voters, however, do so anyway by voting absentee. And while the thousands of residents voting early without a real excuse might technically be breaking the law, state elections officials have largely looked the other way because so many are doing it. Attempts to allow early voting in the state have been fought here for years — and failed with Republican opposition. But recent county elections failures have seared images of long, snaking lines at the polls and anecdotes from friends and neighbors of Election Day horror stories into the minds of large chunks of the electorate.

South Carolina: Bill aimed at fixing election filing mess still not foolproof | The Greenville News

Former state Rep. Rex Rice of Easley said he hopes he won’t be forced again to become a petition candidate because of snafus in the state’s election laws. Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday took steps to prevent the issues that forced Rice and hundreds of others from primary ballots last year from surfacing again when they approved a bill aimed at fixing last year’s election mess. Under the legislation, challengers and incumbents would file financial disclosure forms the same way, all candidates would file the forms electronically and every candidate would receive a receipt from local officials stating their paperwork was in order.

South Carolina: Lawmakers: State fails on voter ID promises | Times and Democrat

Orangeburg County lawmakers say the state is failing to tell voters they don’t need photo identification to cast a ballot under South Carolina’s new voter ID law. Tuesday’s special election in Branchville will be the first one in the state under the new law. But Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter says officials aren’t telling residents they only need a valid voter registration card to cast a ballot and photo identification is not required. The Orangeburg Democrat said she will bring up the matter in the General Assembly, which opens its new session Tuesday. But “that’s after the fact. The town is having the election” Tuesday, she lamented. “The question is who doesn’t vote because they don’t know” they don’t need a photo ID, said Sen. Brad Hutto, D-Orangeburg.

South Carolina: Voter ID Legal Fees Must Be Paid Partly By Feds, Court Rules | Huffington Post

Federal taxpayers will have to foot the bill for some legal fees incurred by the state of South Carolina when it successfully fought to implement its voter ID law over the Justice Department’s objections, a panel of federal judges ruled Friday. The same three D.C.-based federal judges who ruled in October that South Carolina could not implement the law in 2012 said in a court order that because the state successfully argued it could begin implementing the law in 2013, it “is the prevailing party” in the case. Justice Department lawyers had previously argued that “neither party fully ‘prevailed’ in this complex case” and said each party should bear its own costs and expenses.

South Carolina: State will recoup ‘tens of thousands’ of $3.5 million bill for voter ID lawsuit | TheState.com

South Carolina will recoup “tens of thousands of dollars” of the $3.5 million it spent to sue the federal government over the state’s controversial voter ID law, according to a spokesman for S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson. Wilson told a legislative panel Friday the total price tag for the state’s lawsuit was $3.5 million – more than three times his original estimate. Lawmakers on the Joint Other Funds Committee then approved a $2 million budget adjustment for Wilson’s office to pay for the lawsuit. But late Friday, a federal three-judge panel ruled that, because South Carolina was “the prevailing party,” the federal government had to pay some of the state’s expenses. Attorney General spokesman Mark Powell said Monday the office expects to recoup “tens of thousands of dollars.”

South Carolina: Voter ID lawsuit cost $3.5 million | TheState.com

It cost South Carolina $3.5 million to sue the federal government over the state’s voter ID law – but the federal government will have to pay some of that bill. Late Friday, a court ruled that because South Carolina was the “prevailing party,” the federal government had to pay some of South Carolina’s expenses. A spokesman for S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson said he did not know how much money the federal government would pay South Carolina. The state has until Jan. 11 to file a revised bill with the court.

South Carolina: Lillian McBride resigns from Richland County Election Commission | wistv.com

Embattled Richland County Election Commission executive director Lillian McBride has submitted her resignation to the commission. In a letter dated on Jan. 3 from her attorney to the commission, McBride relinquished control of the commission and took the blame for what happened on Election Day. McBride and other members of the county elections commission were criticized after voters were forced to wait as long as seven hours to vote. “In taking this action, I accept fully the responsibility for what occurred during the election on November 6, 2012,” said McBride in the letter.

South Carolina: Bill to opt out of complying with South Carolina voter ID law spurs debate | TheState.com

Republican state senators want to make it easier for people to opt out of the state’s new voter ID law – just not too easy.
Republicans tried Thursday to advance a bill that would allow voters to opt out of showing a photo ID at the polls if they signed a document saying why they had a “reasonable impediment” to getting one. State Sen. Vincent Sheheen, D-Kershaw, tried to amend the bill further to say that state and county officials may not “review the reasonableness of the voter’s explanation” as to why they could not get a photo ID.

South Carolina: Election laws anemic, lacking in accountability | TheState.com

South Carolina’s election laws are almost completely toothless and enforcement is a matter of foxes and henhouses, concerned state officials are saying in the wake of Richland County’s bungled election. “I know that this agency does not have enforcement authority,” Marci Andino, director of the State Election Commission said. “That is the structure the General Assembly wanted.” Local elections and voter registration boards are created by state law through county legislative delegations, with each running its elections independently of state government control – and accountability, state election officials say. “People can tell her to just go jump in the lake,” state Rep. James Smith, D-Richland, said of Andino. Smith last week filed a bill that would weaken local boards, which he called “fiefdoms.” He wants to shift local control to Andino’s agency.

South Carolina: Richland County leaders ready to see a change at the Election Commission | MidlandsConnect.com

One day after Richland County election commission board chair Liz Crum stepped down, county leaders are still looking for change. Members of the delegation that appointed election commission director Lillian McBride say she should follow suit after a reviewing a report about the elections failures. “We really have no other option but to replace the executive director, that’s really the only way publics confidence in this whole process will ever be restored”, said Senator Joel Lourie.

South Carolina: Richland’s fiasco has South Carolina lawmakers pushing to put state in charge of elections | TheState.com

Dueling, partisan bills were filed Tuesday at the State House to change the way elections are run across South Carolina. The proposals are the first statewide ripple effect from Richland County’s election meltdown that outraged thousands, disenfranchised uncounted would-be voters and held no one accountable six weeks after the fiasco. Bills sponsored by Democrats call for stripping local election boards of their power and centralizing control in the State Election Commission. The state agency also would set statewide standards for qualifications of local election directors, mandate their training and generally transfer supervision away from all 46 counties.

South Carolina: Crum: Richland County Election Commission Needs New Director | ABC Columbia

After serving a combined 14 years on both the Richland County Election Commission and the Richland County Board of Elections and Voter Registration, Liz Crum has resigned. Crum, who served as the board’s chairperson, first announced her intention to resign Monday night. Tuesday, her resignation letter made clear she was not happy with management at the Richland County Election Commission. “I have lost confidence in Ms. McBride’s ability to serve as Executive Director and to manage the office effectively,” she writes.

South Carolina: Big precincts, long lines and voting machine shortages: It’s all relative | TheState.com

My first inclination was to applaud Richland County legislators for thinking about maybe reconfiguring the county’s voting precincts, nearly two-thirds of which have more than the 1,500 voters that state law allows — nearly half of those with more than 1,000 extra voters, and one with nearly four times the legal limit. But as with so very, very many things at the perilous intersection of legislative hegemony, executive authority and local self-rule, the news is only good in relative terms. Sort of like you’re much better off when you’ve only lost your job, as opposed to losing your job, your home and your family.

South Carolina: Election workers: Missteps on past turnout spurred errors | TheState.com

Richland County’s elections office used turnout from previous elections to help decide the number of voting machines distributed last month, two poll managers and a machine technician said. That might have been one of many miscalculations by the Elections & Voter Registration office – but so far not publicly acknowledged – that prompted machine shortages that created hours-long lines and disenfranchised uncounted others. State law requires one machine for each 250 registered voters. The law has no specific provision for using turnout as a gauge.

South Carolina: Many blamed; no one disciplined yet in Richland County | TheState.com

Richland County’s election meltdown was a system failure by top election officials, including director Lillian McBride and the board that oversees the office, according to a preliminary report released Thursday. “A series of unfortunate assumptions … led us astray on Nov. 6,” is how attorney Steve Hamm summed up his assessment 30 days after the electoral fiasco widely considered among the state’s worst. Members of the Richland County Board of Elections and Voter Registration received an interim report on the Election Day debacle from attorney Steve Hamm. Hamm presents evidence he believes caused part of the problem on Election Day. A list, drawn up by a part-time staffer, that mistakenly reduced the number of machines to be delivered to the polls and then was not double checked for accuracy. Who, if anyone, will be disciplined and how?

South Carolina: More uncounted votes discovered in Richland County | TheState.com

Two days after Richland County election officials assured their bosses and the public that all votes had been counted, they learned that a voting machine from the Lincolnshire precinct, stored in a warehouse after the election, contained 27 uncounted votes. The notice came not from keen-eyed election officials but from a USC computer science professor who analyzes elections and who happened to be a poll watcher at Lincolnshire, a precinct off Monticello Road north of I-20. The analysis by professor Duncan Buell also found that in addition to the machine used by curbside voters at Lincolnshire, votes in six machines at six other precincts might not have been counted.

South Carolina: Some Lawmakers Not Satisfied with Richland County Election Hearing | wltx.com

Monday’s hearing on what caused problems with Richland County’s election left many with more questions than before. Lawmakers and county council members listened and asked questions for more than three hours and some say they are still frustrated with the situation. “I went into the meeting yesterday thinking gosh, we gonna get facts, we’re gonna be able to find out exactly what happened I left the meeting having felt like I wasted three and a half hours listening to drivel,” said Sen. John Courson.

South Carolina: Analysis: Richland had 185 fewer voting machines than 2010 | TheState.com

Richland County had 185 fewer voting machines this November compared to two years ago despite 16,300 more people at the polls, according to an independent analysis from an elections expert released Friday. Nearly three out of four precincts had fewer machines than two years ago, contributing to 12 percent of the 121,200 ballots cast after the polls closed at 7 p.m. this year, according to Duncan Buell, a University of South Carolina computer science professor who specializes in electronic voting systems. Just 2 percent of ballots were cast late in 2010. PDF: Election Report

South Carolina: South Carolina Governor Haley admits state failed to protect its residents | TheState.com

As more South Carolinians learned that hackers hold their tax return data, Gov. Nikki Haley admitted Tuesday that the state did not do enough to protect their sensitive financial information and accepted the resignation of the agency director in the middle of the controversy. “Could South Carolina have done a better job? Absolutely, or we would not be standing here,” said Haley, who had insisted in the first days after revealing the cyber attack that nothing could have prevented the breach. Hackers possess Social Security and other data belonging to 5.7 million people – 3.8 million taxpayers and their 1.9 million dependents, Haley said. The number of businesses affected has risen slightly to nearly 700,000. All of the stolen tax data dating back to 1998 was unencrypted.

South Carolina: The Great Richland County Election Debacle of 2012 | Free Times

There’s a saying: If you don’t like the weather in South Carolina, wait five minutes. This year, that might also be said for election results. The Great Richland County Election Debacle of 2012 is already being described in monumental terms. In news stories, The State has called it “perhaps the mother of all bungled county elections in modern S.C. history.” State Democratic Party Chairman Dick Harpootlian summed it up in fewer words. “It’s f#!ked up,” he said. Richland County Democratic Rep. Mia Butler characterized it even more succinctly. “Inexcusable,” she called the county’s election process in an open letter to media and her constituents.

South Carolina: Lawmaker apologizes for Richland County election mess | TheState.com

A state lawmaker from Richland County has issued a public apology for the bungled Richland County elections Nov. 6, calling them a “colossal failure” that caused hundreds if not thousands of people “to drop out of long voting lines.” The statement by Rep. Mia Butler Garrick, D-Richland, made last week in a blast email to friends and supporters, was the first apology by an elected state official to date about the election missteps marked by severe shortages and multiple breakdowns of voting machines. Never in memory have Richland County elections been so trouble-plagued, local politicians have said.

South Carolina: Counting of Paper Ballots Complete in Richland County | wltx.com

The Richland County Election Commission has completed their counting of remaining absentee ballots in Richland County. The group finished the hand count of all paper ballots around 7 p.m. Thursday. The final tabulation came around 8:30 p.m. The result? No change in the outcomes of races, although the final numbers did change by a few votes. For example, in House District 75, numbers Wednesday showed Kirkman Finlay with 7,207 votes and Joe McCulloch with 6,891. On Thursday, those statistics were Finlay 7,218 and McCulloch 6,906.

South Carolina: Richland County election certified | TheState.com

The Richland County Election Commission formally signed and certified the results of the 2012 election Friday afternoon. The commission finished the polling process just after 4 p.m. Friday. The county was supposed to have certified its results at 12 p.m., but requested two two-hour extensions. The Supreme Court granted those requests Friday afternoon, giving the county until noon Monday to certify results, but county officials said they wouldn’t need the entire extension. “I want to get this done, the state election commission wants to get this done and the public is ready for this chapter to be ended,” county election commission attorney Steve Hamm said.

South Carolina: Richland County to resume vote count | SFGate

Richland County Council will resume counting votes after the South Carolina Supreme Court cleared the way. The Richland County Election Commission planned to resume the count of last week’s results Wednesday afternoon. The justices gave county officials until noon Friday to certify the results to the State Election Commission. The justices said any disputes must be filed by Nov. 21.

South Carolina: Richland County vote: Finlay, Dixon, Penny Tax appear winners in count | TheState.com

In a count delayed a week, Kirkman Finlay appeared to prevail over Joe McCulloch, 7,207 to 6,891 in House District 75, in one of tightest and most closely watched races in Richland County’s botched Nov. 6 election, according to preliminary results from Wednesday’s tally. Finlay, a Republican, had 6,771 votes, and McCulloch, a Democrat, had 6,506 in the original count. Totals came just after 11 p.m. Wednesday – eight days after the election marked by huge outcries from voters and candidates alike and a tumultuous legal back-and-forth that led courts to interrupt Richland County’s vote before the count was complete last week.

South Carolina: High court orders Richland County ballots returned | AP

South Carolina’s Supreme Court has ordered state police to return ballots and voting machines to Richland County officials so that they can be tallied, ruling on Tuesday that a lower court didn’t have jurisdiction to order a recount. The justices also gave county officials until noon Friday to canvass the votes and give the results to state authorities, who will certify them later that day. Any disputes with election results must be filed by Nov. 21.

South Carolina: Richland County vote count resumes today | TheState.com

Richland County voters could learn as early as this afternoon what the county’s official results are in the Nov. 6 county elections. Votes will be tallied beginning at 1 p.m. on the fourth floor of the county administration building on Harden Street, Election Commission chairwoman Liz Crum said Tuesday evening. “We will get this done, and we will get it done right,” Crum said. Election observers and news media can observe county officials do the count. “Everybody on hand can watch the canvassing,” she said. “We never finished counting the vote – this is not a recount.”

South Carolina: Losing candidate calls for new election over voting machine shortage | The Augusta Chronicle

A Republican who lost a bid to unseat a Richland County councilman called for a new election Monday, accusing county elections officials of intentionally not putting out enough voting machines on Election Day. Michael Letts said at a news conference Monday that thousands of voters abandoned hourslong lines because there were not enough machines. Letts lost to County Councilman Jim Man­ning, 37 percent to 63 percent, but said he was also worried about a county sales tax vote. By a margin of more than 9,000 votes, Richland County voted to increase sales tax by a penny, a decision that supporters have said will mean a $1 billion windfall for the area. Letts, who opposed the increase, said fewer voting machines were sent to areas that had voted against the measure when it was first put to voters in 2010. “A law was broken, deliberately, before the polls were ever opened,” Letts said.

South Carolina: Republicans, Democrats agree: South Carolina elections a mess | SFGate

Republicans and Democrats don’t agree on much in South Carolina, but the leaders of both parties said this year’s elections were a mess. More than 200 candidates were kicked off the June primary ballot because of paperwork problems. Voters waited four hours or more to vote Tuesday in one of the state’s largest counties, and there was an unprecedented seizure of votes. The way people are elected was in the news more than the politicians themselves. “Both parties have spent more money, more time and more effort in court than we have on the political side. It’s been exasperating,” said South Carolina Democratic Party Chairman Dick Harpootlian.