The first Tuesday in November is notorious for long lines to tap a few buttons, cast a vote, and possibly change the future course of our state. Depending on where you live, you may not be waiting in line to cast your vote in November. Several counties across Utah are doing it: mail-in ballots- for everyone, not just the absentee voters. This isn't new, but several counties are trying it for the first time this year.
Would the ability to vote in your pajamas, on a smart phone, make you a better participant in the political process? Would it make you care more? Utah’s lieutenant governor has convened a committee to study the idea of making the state a pioneer in Internet voting. They might want to look to Norway, which tried such a thing — then, according to a headline writer at npr.org, did a “Ctrl+Alt+Delete” on the whole thing a few weeks ago. Utah Director of Elections Mark Thomas told the Deseret News last week that the biggest hurdle to overcome is security. Norwegian officials would agree. They couldn’t do it. NPR quotes Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory computer scientist David Jefferson as saying, "There is no way to guarantee that the security, privacy and transparency requirements for elections can all be met with any practical technology in the foreseeable future."
Utahns file their taxes, bank and shop online all the time, says state Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, so why shouldn't they also be able to vote on their laptops? "It seems reasonable that we have a discussion — a serious discussion — about how you would set up a secure, auditable system to vote online," Bramble said. "Personally, I'm going to be pushing the envelope." But Bramble, appointed to a new committee put together by Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox to study online voting, said he'll wait to see what members come up with by the end of the year before deciding whether to introduce legislation next session. … Another member of the new committee, Salt Lake County Clerk Sherrie Swensen, also questions whether Utahns will be voting online anytime soon. "I hope that sometime in the future it will be something that happens," Swensen said. "I admire the lieutenant governor's office for wanting to explore this and be progressive, but I think there's a lot to overcome before we get to that point."
A new committee created by Utah's lieutenant governor will look at what it will take to move the state to the point where it can hold elections online. Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox's office announced the formation of the committee Tuesday. The group, which is officially named the iVote Advisory Committee, is made up of state legislators, election officials in the state and individuals who have a strong background in Internet security. "This is the beginning of just trying to understand electronic voting," said Mark Thomas, director of elections for the state of Utah. … Cox and Thomas both explained there are a number of hurdles that need to be crossed before Utah could host an online election. First would be how to create a process that allows for a ballot to be cast and kept confidential but provide a way for the election to be audited. Another hurdle would be how to protect the integrity of the vote count from hackers.
Voters in about a dozen Utah counties have more flexibility in this year's election primaries. In seven of those counties, residents may choose their preferred candidate by mail. Such ballots aren't exactly new technology, said Brian McKenzie, election manager for Davis County, but officials for the first time are relying on them to collect the bulk of county ballots. After Weber and Duchesne counties logged higher turnout with mail-in ballots during recent elections, "a few more counties said, 'Let's give this a try,' " Justin Lee, deputy state elections director, told the Salt Lake Tribune (http://bit.ly/UoA6HX.) Voters wishing to cast votes in person, who have lost their ballots, or who simply want to drop them off may use one of seven centers that will be open on primary day, McKenzie said. The six other counties include Beaver, Duchesne, Garfield, Grand, San Juan and Sevier, Lee said.
An all-mail voting system currently in use by seven counties across Utah for their upcoming primaries could be a model for future voting throughout the state. The Utah Legislature relaxed the vote-by-mail laws in 2012, allowing a handful of counties to try the new system. Davis County is the largest county trying out by-mail voting. The election office sent out ballots last month to all registered voters for the June 24 primary. Voters can then mail them back or drop them off at several locations. Davis County Election Manager Brian McKenzie is already excited about the turnout. "We've mailed out about 90,000 ballots, and as of this morning, we've had just over 13,000 that have been returned," McKenzie said. "So far, we're more than half way to meeting the turnout we had in 2010. When we compare it to 2012, we're a little over third of the way there."
The long-standing American tradition of going to the polls to cast your vote is going away in Grand County, and voters will have to send their ballots in by mail for the upcoming primary election. “I don't like it,” said long-time resident and business owner Andy Nettell. “There is something about going to the polls, seeing your neighbors, and dropping your ballot in the box that makes you feel like you are participating in democracy.” Other residents were surprised when the notice showed up in their mailbox. “This was the first I had heard of it. I was taken completely by surprise,” local teacher and resident, Joanne Savoie said. “Was there any discussion on this? Who made this decision?” The decision was made by Grand County clerk/auditor Diana Carroll, under Utah State Code 20A-3-302, which allows the election officer (clerk/auditor) to conduct the election by mail. Carroll made the decision, she said, “to reduce election costs, to clean up voter rolls, and to increase voter turnout."
Local voters who show up at the polls on June 24 will be in for a surprise. Both Grand and San Juan counties are switching to a vote-by-mail process this year, so primary and general election voters will no longer be able to cast their ballots in person. Anyone who is currently registered to vote should keep an eye out for official-looking letters from the counties, since those notifications will include important information about the vote-by-mail process. Grand County will be asking active voters to return signature verification cards. At the same time, it will also be mailing out separate notices to inactive voters who have not participated in the last two elections, according to Grand County Clerk Diana Carroll. Those who have not voted in the past two elections will be required to renew their voter registrations, according to information from the clerk’s office. Local residents can verify their voter information online at www.vote.utah.gov or by calling the Grand County Clerk’s Office.
Sure, someone in the Philippines is probably working on a virus that will make Imelda Marcos our president. But Internet voting will be here some day, and probably sooner than we expect.Are we finally ready to begin choosing our political leaders on the Internet? Is it time to do our civic duty in our pajamas? Will we at last be able to message our friends, watch a Youtube video and cast a ballot at the same time, trying hard not to accidentally “like” a presidential candidate and “vote” for “Charlie bit my finger,” instead of the other way around? It’s been nearly 14 years since I first wrote about this. That was in the context of the 2000 presidential election, in which rooms full of Florida election judges tried to decide the fate of the presidency by examining punch cards that hadn’t been punched very well. At the time, I interviewed Scott Howell, a Democratic state senator who worked for IBM. He predicted Internet voting would be a reality within two years.
There's still a push for Utah to play a bigger role in the 2016 presidential primary race, even though a bill to make the state's election the first in the nation stalled in the Legislature. "By going first, I believe that Utah could finally show what all of us already know, that the emperors — Iowa and New Hampshire — have no clothes," said Rep. Jon Cox, R-Ephraim, the sponsor of HB410. The bill, which passed the House but failed to get a vote in the Senate before the session ended, would have put an online Utah election ahead of Iowa's caucuses and New Hampshire's primary, traditionally the initial contests for White House contenders. Cox said no state should always be first in line, but until the national parties put an end to the practice, it will take a state like Utah going rogue to "finally allow us to discuss meaningful reform in the presidential nominating process." Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox, who oversees state elections, said he backed the proposal.
Four years ago, the fledgling tea party claimed one of its first and greatest victories in Utah, ousting the state's veteran Republican senator in a thunderclap of anti-incumbent anger. Now the establishment has struck back, with a new law giving more voters a say in nominating the candidates for public office. The measure, signed this month, amounts to a compromise in a fight to limit the influence of grass-roots activists and others bent on purging the GOP of all but the most ideologically pure. Under the agreement, primary candidates can still be chosen, as they long have been, at party conventions, attended by just a few thousand delegates chosen at neighborhood meetings. But others can bypass delegates and appeal directly to voters if they collect enough signatures to make the ballot. Those unaffiliated with a party, a big chunk of Utah's electorate, will also be allowed to vote in Republican primaries.
Utah Republican Party leaders tell UtahPolicy that they are considering suing the state over SB54, the Count My Vote citizen initiative petition compromise that provides a dual-track process to candidate nominations. It’s not the dual-track that state party chair James Evans finds illegal. Rather, it is the requirement in SB54 that political parties have an open primary. The state GOP has a closed primary today. Several court cases, including one in Idaho, rule that the government can’t force a political party to open its primaries, says Evans. Thus, there are legal problems with SB54 from the get-go, Evans believes. That may be the case if the compromise law, sponsored by Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, forced all political parties to have open primaries.
The Democratic National Party is excited about Utah’s new pilot project on same-day voter registration — even if it does help the opposition party sign up new voters in the GOP-dominated state. The Legislature passed a measure this session to allow counties and municipalities to have same-day registration in the next three years, a move that dovetails with Democratic efforts nationwide to increase access to the polls for Americans. Pratt Wiley, the Democrats’ national director of voter expansion, acknowledges that in deep-red Utah, the program could "absolutely" help Republicans. "Our job is to make sure we’re working so that everyone votes," Wiley said this week, "not to make sure that Obama voters vote, not to make sure that Democrats vote; it’s to make sure that everyone votes. And so we recognize that this can help Republicans — especially in a state like Utah, it can help Republicans probably in a way that it doesn’t in some swing states."
Utah lawmakers were unsuccessful in their effort to push their state to the front of the presidential selection process. Iowa holds the spotlight every four years as presidential hopefuls pour into the state to audition for the White House, trailed by the national press. No other state votes before the Iowa caucuses. A proposal that would have required Utah to hold the first presidential voting contest in the country, and for voting would take place online, didn’t make the cut last night. Earlier this week, the Utah House overwhelmingly approved HB410 and sent it to the state Senate for further consideration. But records show it never came up for a Senate vote. It got stuck in a logjam of bills that were defeated when the legislature adjourned at midnight, as required by the state constitution.
It is the nightmare scenario for those who worry that the modern campaign finance system has opened up new frontiers of political corruption: A candidate colludes with wealthy corporate backers and promises to defend their interests if elected. The companies spend heavily to elect the candidate, but hide the money by funneling it through a nonprofit group. And the main purpose of the nonprofit appears to be getting the candidate elected. But according to investigators, exactly such a plan is unfolding in an extraordinary case in Utah, a state with a cozy political establishment, where business holds great sway and there are no limits on campaign donations.
For perhaps one last time, political party caucuses this week will figure into a long-running debate about whether small extremist groups can use them to control Utah’s ballot, or if big attendance there instead can ensure mainstream choices. Examples of when small groups ruled — such as the tea party dumping former GOP Sen. Bob Bennett four years ago, even though polls showed he likely easily would have won a primary — led to a change in the system that takes effect Jan. 1. Gov. Gary Herbert this month signed into law SB54 as a compromise between parties and the Count My Vote drive. It will allow Utah’s current caucus-and-convention system to continue with reforms, but also allows candidates to bypass it and gain direct access to a primary election if they gather enough signatures. But for one last time under the old system — unless courts overturn SB54 — Democrats hold their caucuses on Tuesday at 7 p.m. Republicans hold theirs on Thursday at 7 p.m. Locations may be found online at utdem.org and utgop.org.
Utah could jump to the front of the U.S. presidential primary lineup in 2016 and hold its own online election a week before any other state, under a proposal advanced by state lawmakers this week to win more sway for the conservative state. For decades, the Iowa caucus has been the first event in which presidential hopefuls can secure convention delegates, followed closely by a vote in New Hampshire, which has held the nation's first full primary election since 1920. "Utah is roughly the same size as Iowa and roughly twice the size of New Hampshire, and yet our influence in the presidential primaries process is minimal if it all," bill sponsor Representative Jon Cox, a Republican, said during a House debate of the bill on Monday. "It's time to change that. We've created a system that is blatantly discriminatory, that creates second-class states," he said.
Utah could offer the nation’s first presidential primary in 2016. The House voted 58-14 Monday to pass HB410, sending it to the Senate. The bill would allow Utah to hold a presidential primary a week before any other state — conducted solely by online voting. However, the early date could bring punishment from national political parties, which have rules to protect New Hampshire as the country’s first primary and Iowa as the first caucus.
In 2013, Rep. Rebecca Chavez-Houck came close to passing a bill that would require county and city clerks to allow voters to register and vote on election day. The bill was killed over a concerns about costs and possible fraud issues, but now Chavez-Houck has resurrected the bill as a pilot program that cities and counties would voluntarily opt into. With a pilot program, municipal and county clerks would be able to accept registration and then offer a provisional ballot on election day to a voter that would be counted after the vote was verified. As a pilot program participating counties would closely monitor the same-day votes and report back their findings to the Legislature to see if there are any concerns or abuse of the process.
Despite grumbling and constitutional doubts, the Utah Legislature sent a deal to Gov. Gary Herbert that will overhaul the process for choosing candidates for office and bring to an end Count My Vote’s ballot initiative. "I don’t argue that this policy will be better than the caucus-convention process," said Rep. Dan McCay, R-Riverton. "The vote today is not whether you like one [nominating system] over the other. … Your vote today is ‘do I preserve a history at the same time I grab the future?’ That is this bill." While the bill, SB54s2, lets parties keep their existing caucus-and-convention system for nominating candidates, it also allows aspiring officeholders who collect enough petition signatures to go straight to the primary ballot. It also imposes certain requirements on state parties, and James Evans, chairman of the Utah Republican Party, has said the party has the right to nominate its candidates as it sees fit. Previously, he said an attorney the party hired recommended they not participate in the negotiations because it could weaken a potential lawsuit.
New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner is urging Utah lawmakers to reject a bill that would try to put the Beehive State ahead of Iowa or New Hampshire in the presidential primary race, arguing that New Hampshire’s 100-year-old contest is the best test of candidates. A House committee this week advanced HB410, providing that if Utah wanted to fund an early presidential primary, it must do so a week before any similar balloting. It’s a clear shot at New Hampshire and Iowa, both of which grab the attention of the national news media and major candidates for months. Rep. Jon Cox, R-Ephraim, says it’s unfair for those two states to always get the spotlight and Utah could actually play a role in electing the next president. But Gardner, who by law must place the New Hampshire primary a week before any similar contest, says his state’s contest allows all candidates to compete on the same level, working town markets and holding house parties instead of campaigning through major television ads and fly-in-fly-out stump speeches.
A House committee has given approval to legislation that would seek to put Utah first in line to hold a presidential primary election and also calls for it to be done online. The House Political Subdivisions Committee approved the bill, H.B. 410, on Tuesday night that would bump off Iowa and New Hampshire as the presidential wine tasters in the nation and move the Beehive state to the prominent spot of having a significant role in presidential primary politics, first. "I believe that our current presidential nominating process is blatantly discriminatory," said Rep. Jon Cox, R-Ephraim, the sponsor of the legislation. "I believe it creates second class states." Cox's bill would only create a mechanism for the primary to be held. Under the bill the Legislature would have the option to decide, at a later date, if it wants go first in the election season but does call for the elections to be held online, a move that cuts the cost of holding the election in half to an estimated $1.6 million.
The Utah House and Senate believe they have come up with a "win-win solution" to expand access to Utah's primary elections. Amendments to Senate Bill 54 were officially announced in a press conference Sunday at the Utah State Capitol, with members of the Utah Legislature and the leadership behind the Count My Vote ballot initiative attending. In what was called "historic legislation," by Count My Vote executive chairman Rick McKeown, the bill seeks to expand options to voters while retaining Utah's caucus-convention system. The bill creates a direct primary election, opening the door for candidates to use caucus-conventions or signature gathering as a means of getting on the ballot and allowing an estimated 665,000 unaffiliated voters to participate in primary elections.
Leaders in the Utah Legislature and of the Count My Vote Initiative held a press conference Sunday at the State Capitol to officially announce that a deal has been made that will change the way Utahns elect their leaders. Utah legislators from both sides of the aisle, as well as officials with the Count My Vote initiative, are calling this a great compromise, and that’s because the deal includes both the caucus convention system as well as a direct primary election. But of course, not everyone saw it that way. “We are confident that the results will be a win for voter turnout and citizen engagement,” said Wayne Niederhauser, a Republican who is President of the Utah Senate. In a press release issued Saturday by CMV officials and Utah legislators officials stated: “The new legislation will preserve Utah’s caucus-convention system and provide a direct primary alternative based on gathering a threshold of voter signatures.”
In the future, you may have the option to make certain your voter information is not accessible by the general public. Utah's House of Representatives approved legislation on Tuesday, on a vote of 71-2, that will allow the public to request that their voter information be kept private. The bill, H.B. 302, also calls for birth dates to be unavailable when someone purchases Utah's voter rolls, but the records would still list a voter's age. "I believe strongly an individual should not have to trade their constitutional right to vote in order to ensure their privacy," said Rep. Becky Edwards, R-North Salt Lake. Edwards explained that the legislation comes as a direct result to a website that surfaced earlier this year that contains the whole Utah voter roll on it.
Stung by the release of detailed voter information on 1.5 million Utahns online in January, Utah lawmakers are taking action to protect voter information. A bill making two changes in the voter information process passed the House by a 71-2 vote on Tuesday. The bill, HB 302, would keep voter birth date information classified and would also allow voters to opt into a program to protect all of their information, going forward. The bill now advances to the Senate for further consideration. Sponsored by Rep. Becky Edwards, the bill is one of two voter information related items being considered by the Legislature this session. It comes weeks after a New Hampshire man bought a voter registration list from the state and made that personal information available online for free. The information includes names, birth dates, phone numbers and the voting activity of everyone in specific households during recent elections.
State lawmakers are trying to figure out how to prevent Utah voters' information from being used for personal gain after a New Hampshire man bought it from the state and posted it online. The Senate last week unanimously passed SB36 to limit access to the state's voter registration rolls and prohibit putting it on the Internet. It includes exceptions for political, scholarly, journalistic and governmental purposes. But a House committee Monday expanded those exceptions to include banks, hospitals and insurance companies. It now goes the full House for consideration.
Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney is lending his support to an initiative that would change the way Utah political parties choose their candidates. In an e-mail to former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt (R), Romney said he supports Count My Vote, an initiative that would require party nominees to be chosen in primaries rather than through a convention system. “I want to tell you that Ann and I are supporters. Since the election, I’ve been pushing hard for states to move to direct primaries,” Romney wrote in an e-mail first reported by the Salt Lake Tribune. “Caucus/convention systems exclude so many people: they rarely produce a result that reflects how rank-and-file Republicans feel. I think that’s true for Democrats, too.” Romney said the Count My Vote initiative could “count on us to help financially.”
The Senate passed a bill Tuesday aiming to prevent the online posting of personal information from Utah’s voter-registration rolls, but it still would allow access by political parties, journalists and researchers. Meanwhile, a tougher bill — which could allow voters to check a box to entirely cut off public access to their data on the rolls such as birth date, address, phone number and party affiliation — has been advancing in the House. The Senate voted 26-0 on Tuesday to pass SB36, the less restrictive bill by Sen. Karen Mayne, D-West Valley City, and sent it to the House.
A proposed constitutional amendment prohibiting infringement on a political party's right to nominate candidates for public office could be on the November election ballot. Sen. Scott Jenkins, R-Plain City, is sponsoring the measure to counter the Count My Vote initiative to replace Utah's unique caucus and convention system with direct primaries, which might also be on the ballot this fall. Also, the Senate scheduled a floor debate on SB54 — legislation that would allow parties to avoid direct primaries — for 11 a.m. Thursday. Jenkins sees his resolution, SJR15, as complementary to the bill but also an attempt to thwart the Count My Vote effort. The group must gather more than 100,000 signatures to put its measure before voters in November.