Virginia: Richmond judge finds ‘out-and-out fraud’ in effort by Rep. Scott Taylor staff to get independent on ballot | Richmond Times Dispatch

In a ruling with potentially serious ramifications for the re-election campaign of Rep. Scott Taylor, R-2nd, a judge on Wednesday found “out-and-out fraud” in signatures Taylor’s campaign staff gathered to help get an independent spoiler candidate on the ballot. Richmond Circuit Judge Gregory L. Rupe ruled that independent Shaun Brown should be removed from the 2nd Congressional District ballot. Campaign staffers for Taylor helped gather signatures required to get Brown on the ballot. Investigations by news media and the Democratic Party showed forged signatures, including from voters who had died or no longer lived in the congressional district. The judge’s ruling followed testimony in a civil lawsuit the Democratic Party of Virginia brought against state elections officials. Four Taylor staffers and a former campaign consultant signed affidavits invoking their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in response to a series of questions about what happened.

Virginia: GOP House speaker appeals redistricting ruling to high court | Associated Press

The Republican speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates has filed a formal appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking to overturn a court ruling that found 11 House districts were unconstitutionally gerrymandered. A federal court ruled in June that lawmakers illegally packed black voters into the 11 districts and ordered lawmakers to redraw them by Oct. 30. Republicans say the districts are constitutional, and they filed noticed in July that they would appeal. House Speaker Kirk Cox’s appeal was filed Tuesday.

Virginia: Hopewell electoral board stands by new registrar’s decision to approve ballots with some names in capital letters | Richmond Post Dispatch

After raised voices and pounding on the table, the Hopewell Electoral Board voted 2-1 on Tuesday to stand by its newly appointed registrar’s decision to create ballots that feature some candidates’ names in capital letters. In a heated debate in the back of the Hopewell registrar’s office, the board’s two Democrats stood by Registrar Yolanda Stokes after she submitted a draft ballot for November’s election that showed three Hopewell City Council candidates’ names entirely in uppercase. Stokes is overseeing her first general election after being appointed registrar in May. She previously served on Hopewell’s public housing board, but the City Council voted to remove her in 2013 after she clashed with other city officials who accused her of overstepping her role.

Virginia: Governor calls special session for legislature to redraw districts | The Washington Post

Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D) is calling the General Assembly into special session on Aug. 30 to redraw legislative districts that a federal court deemed had been racially gerrymandered. A three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled on June 26 that the lines for 11 House of Delegates districts had been drawn with the purpose of concentrating black voters. The 2-to-1 ruling was a victory for Democrats, who hope that new district boundaries will help them retake control of the House for the first time in nearly two decades. Last year’s elections wiped out a 2-to-1 GOP advantage in the 100-seat House, leaving Republicans with a narrow 51-to-49 majority.

Verified Voting in the News: First new election results audit held in Fairfax city | WTOP

In a first for Virginia, elections officials gathered Thursday and Friday at the Fairfax County Courthouse to prove that election results from June’s primary were correct. The risk-limiting audit was for the Republican U.S. Senate primary results in the city of Fairfax. It was a demonstration of what could be done statewide in future elections as a statistical check to provide more evidence that the final results based on counts from ballot scanners are correct. The audits, when done for an entire election, are meant to show statistical confidence that the winner really won and the loser or losers really lost. Results of the first audit completed Friday showed the results of 69 randomly selected ballots scanned by a machine Thursday matched the hand count of those same ballots done Friday morning. (One ballot was selected twice by the random process).

Virginia: Voter Roll Purges Attract Scrutiny | WVTF

In the last presidential election cycle, almost half a million more people in Virginia were purged from the voter rolls than the previous election cycle. That change comes even as election officials used a faulty database to delete voters who allegedly moved. Jonathan Brater at the Brennan Center for Justice says Virginia is one of four states that has conducted illegal purges. “In recent years, we have seen Virginia attempting to remove higher numbers of suspected non-citizens from the voter rolls. But it turns out that many of those people actually are citizens.”

Virginia: Campaign’s Election Data Exposed in Virginia | Infosecurity Magazine

A Virginia-based political campaign and robocalling company Robocent left hundreds of thousands of voter records on a public, exposed and unprotected Amazon S3 bucket. This year has already seen a lineup of attempted attacks on local elections and campaigns, but this news comes less than a week after the indictment of 12 Russian officials for meddling in the 2016 US presidential election. According to an 18 July blog post by Bob Diachenko, head of communications at Kromtech Security, Robocent’s self-titled bucket was reportedly “indexed by GrayhatWarfare, a searchable database where a current list of 48,623 open S3 buckets can be found. Repository contained both audio files, with pre-recorded political messages for robocalls dials (*.mp3, *.wav), and voter data (*.csv, *.xls files).”

Virginia: House GOP asks U.S. Supreme Court to delay court-ordered redistricting in racial gerrymandering case | Richmond Times-Dispatch

Lawyers for Republican leaders in Virginia’s House of Delegates have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to halt a court-ordered redistricting process as they appeal a recent ruling on racial gerrymandering. Attorneys working with House Speaker Kirk Cox, R-Colonial Heights, filed a notice of appeal with the high court on Friday, indicating they intend to fight an Oct. 30 deadline to redraw the House electoral map to correct racial imbalances in 11 legislative districts. Late last month, a federal panel made up of district and appellate judges ruled that the House violated the U.S. Constitution by packing African-American voters into certain districts already drawn to favor the election of African-American Democrats.

Virginia: Federal court rules Virginia state House districts unconstitutional | The Hill

A federal court on Tuesday ruled that Virginia’s legislative districts were gerrymandered along racial lines and ordered the state to come up with a redistricting plan by the end of October. In a 2-1 ruling, the judges for the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia ruled that state lawmakers must redraw lines for state House districts by Oct. 30. “Overwhelming evidence in this case shows that, contrary to this constitutional mandate, the state has sorted voters into districts based on the color of their skin,” Judge Barbara Milano Keenan wrote in the majority opinion.

Virginia: More misassigned voters found in Virginia, Board of Elections separately to correct November results | WTOP

Virginia’s Department of Elections has found even more voters likely assigned to the wrong districts across the state following tight House of Delegates races last fall, including one tie determined by a random drawing, where the problem could have determined control of the chamber. The department has helped several local registrars and electoral boards identify misassigned voters since the significant issues were revealed following November’s election, according to a presentation set to be given Tuesday to the State Board of Elections. Northern Virginia registrars had already confirmed hundreds misassigned to the wrong state, federal or local districts just in this area. The House of Delegates ended up split 51-49 in favor of Republicans.

Virginia: On primary day in Virginia, officials say they’re preparing for more cyberthreats against elections | StateScoop

As five more states hold primary elections Tuesday, one of the biggest concerns in this year’s voting cycle continues to be how secure ballot systems are. But the lead elections official in Arlington County, Virginia, is confident votes there will be counted without issue. “We have a practical, low-key approach,” said Linda Lindberg, Arlington’s director of elections. Arlington is a bit of a model citizen for how jurisdictions conduct elections. Lindberg’s “practical” hews closely to what many ballot-security advocates call for: recording votes on paper ballots, which are then counted by optical scanners. Lindberg said her office also conducts routine tests of its equipment and scans its voter-registration system for vulnerabilities.

Virginia: Fairfax County registrar fired days before midterm primary | WTOP

Less than two weeks before Virginia’s midterm primaries, the electoral board in the state’s most populous jurisdiction has fired its general registrar. The Fairfax County Electoral Board formally fired Cameron Sasnett Friday evening. He had been appointed in October 2015 and had 13 months remaining in his statutory four-year term. “Enough things came to our attention and kind of came to a head to the point where we felt we needed to let him go, and you can imagine, especially less than two weeks from an election, this is not a good time to do something like this. But we felt like we needed to do this,” Electoral Board Chairman Steve Hunt said.

Virginia: Election officials assigned 26 voters to the wrong district. It might’ve cost Democrats a pivotal race. | The Washington Post

Last year’s race for state delegate in Newport News went down in Virginia history for its razor-thin margin. Republican David E. Yancey won on Election Day by 10 votes; Democrat Shelly Simonds beat him by a single vote in a recount. Then, a judicial panel declared a tie, so officials picked a name out of a bowl to determine a winner, and it was Yancey. Now, a review of voter registration records and district maps by The Washington Post has found more than two dozen voters — enough to swing the outcome of that race — cast ballots in the wrong district, because of errors by local elections officials. The misassigned voters lived in a predominantly African American precinct that heavily favored Democrats in the fall, raising the possibility that they would have delivered the district to Simonds had they voted in the proper race. The impact of a Simonds win would have been felt far beyond Newport News.

Virginia: Russians targeted some Virginians with ads promoting ‘Southern pride’, others with messages denouncing police brutality | Richmond Times Dispatch

Russians attempting to sow racial and political division targeted some Virginians with Facebook and Instagram ads promoting Southern pride and rebel flags and others with messages highlighting young black men killed by police. Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee released more than 3,500 of the ads Thursday, offering the fullest picture yet of how a Russian internet agency attempted to influence Americans before and after the 2016 presidential election. Most of the ads are issue-based, pushing arguments for and against immigration, LGBT issues and gun rights, among other issues. A large number of them attempt to stoke racial divisions by mentioning police brutality or disparaging the Black Lives Matter movement. Some promote President Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders, who ran against Hillary Clinton in the Democratic presidential primary. Few, if any, support Clinton. Others were more narrowly targeted. About 10 specifically targeted Virginians, and only a few of those were widely distributed.

Virginia: Virginia works to improve voting process before midterm elections | WRIC

As Virginia prepares for the November midterm elections, the State Board of Elections approved a number of policy changes aimed at clarifying the voting process and making ballots easier to understand. On March 23, the board met for the first time since the Northam administration was sworn in. The panel unanimously voted to roll out new ballot standards for the Nov. 6 general election. The goal of the standards is clarification – including allowing candidates to use nicknames, more readable fonts and user-friendly instructions on the ballots. Each ballot will include instructions on how to vote. It will also state, “If you want to change a vote or if you have made a mistake, ask an election worker for another ballot. If you make marks on the ballot besides filling in the oval, your votes may not be counted.”

Virginia: A national non-profit has created confusion among Virginia voters by sending mailers that imply they are not registered to vote | The Washington Post

A Democratic-leaning group working to get more unmarried women, people of color and millennials to the polls in November has sewn confusion in Virginia through mailers to voters that imply they’re not registered, election officials said Thursday. The Washington-based Voter Participation Center, a nonprofit that operates in 23 states, mailed 140,000 voter registration forms in Virginia with a message telling recipients they “do not appear to be currently registered to vote.” The same group sent the same kind of confusing mailers in Virginia in the weeks before the 2016 presidential election.

Virginia: After irregular ballot helped decide a Virginia House election, state aims to make ballot more clear | The Virginian-Pilot

It was the ballot seen around the world. One voter’s flawed attempt to be counted in Newport News in December helped decide a pivotal Virginia House election and political control of the chamber. The bubbles for both candidates, David Yancey and Shelly Simonds, were filled in, but Simonds’ had a slash through it. A court had to decide the voter’s intent, which tied the race and setup the infamous name drawing out of the bowl. But had the voter simply asked for another ballot after his or her mistake, the whole thing could have been avoided.

Virginia: State to adopt new ballot guidelines after confusing 2017 elections | WTOP

Months after control of Virginia’s House of Delegates was decided by a disputed, mismarked ballot, the State Board of Elections will set new ballot requirements that include clearer instructions for voters. Proposed changes to be adopted March 23 address “a need for improved clarity and additional examples” and “a need for improved usability of ballots for voters based on best practices and research,” a memo to the three-member board said. Virginia would go from more general rules about what printed ballots should look like to two specific approved forms. One of the proposed forms would include voting instructions in the leftmost column on the front of a three-column ballot. The other secondary choice would place voting instructions across the top of a two-column ballot just beneath the header that lists the date and type of election.

Virginia: Redistricting Reformers Push for End to Gerrymandering | Public News Service

The borders of certain voting districts in Virginia could be changed more than state lawmakers may have expected. A group known as OneVirginia2021 is spearheading the charge for redistricting, convinced that 11 of the 100 districts in the House of Delegates are unconstitutionally drawn in favor of one political party. This process, known as gerrymandering, ignores the size and shape requirements of the districts, and the group says both major parties are to blame. Brian Cannon, executive director of OneVirginia2021, said the current lines are a way for politicians to create an advantage rather than playing fair.

Virginia: State Supreme Court Weighs ‘Compactness’ of Election Districts | Courthouse News

Lawyers for the Commonwealth of Virginia appeared before the state Supreme Court Thursday arguing that legislators are legally allowed to create electoral district maps — even if the districts are not as compact as critics would hope. The case originated with a challenge to state House and Senate district maps that were drawn in 2011 and 2012. The focus in the underlying lawsuit was on 11 districts that One Virginia 2021, a bipartisan fair elections group, claims are unwieldy and fail to comport with the notion of compactness enshrined in the state constitution.

Virginia: Confusion reigned ahead of Virginia’s dramatic 2017 election | WTOP

Several officials at the Virginia Department of Elections and in the City of Fredericksburg were confused about how Virginia’s district lines were defined in the years leading up to the 2017 election, according to documents obtained by WTOP through the Freedom of Information Act. That confusion likely contributed to 147 people voting in the wrong House of Delegates races Nov. 7. One of those races, along with control of the House, was decided by just 73 votes. The process is complicated, and the lines are not defined on a map but are based on the voting precincts that were in place during the most recent census. Those precinct lines immediately become out of date after any General Assembly redistricting process, since local governments are similarly required to redraw lines based on the new population information.

Virginia: Voters quietly drop lawsuit requesting new 28th District election | Fredericksburg Free Lance Star

The legal fight over an error-tainted House of Delegates election in Fredericksburg came to an official end this week. Nearly a month after the General Assembly convened, a Democratic-aligned law firm dropped its federal appeal challenging the outcome of the 28th District race between Republican Del. Bob Thomas and Democrat Joshua Cole. At least 147 voters in Fredericksburg and Stafford County had been assigned to the wrong House district in a contest Thomas won by just 73 votes, according to state elections officials. Katie Baker, a spokeswoman for House Democrats, said in an email that they look forward to winning the 28th District seat in 2019, when Cole plans to challenge Thomas again. 

Virginia: Breaking logjam, Virginia House panel advances bill to establish redistricting criteria | Richmond Times-Dispatch

A bill to create a new rulebook for Virginia’s political redistricting process passed a Republican-controlled House of Delegates subcommittee early Tuesday, giving anti-gerrymandering activists an incremental win as other bills they supported were struck down. A House subcommittee on elections, usually the place where redistricting bills go to die, voted 6-0 to advance a bill to set new redistricting criteria in Virginia law as state lawmakers prepare to redraw the General Assembly and congressional maps in 2021. House Bill 1598, sponsored by Del. Chris Jones, R-Suffolk, declares that districts should respect existing political boundaries between cities, counties and towns, preserve “communities of interest” and avoid the types of odd, jagged lines lawmakers from both parties have long used to gain political advantage.

Virginia: House approves election changes in wake of 2017 drama | WTOP

Virginia’s House of Delegates on Thursday approved a series of election law changes, some of which are specifically tied to the drama and mistakes during the Nov. 7 elections. The House unanimously approved a bill that would clearly state only one recount is permitted in each election. While that appeared to be the intent of previous laws, questions were raised about unclear portions of the code after a recount led to a tie in Virginia’s 94th District. Those questions centered on whether the loser of the random drawing should be permitted to ask for a second recount. The bill would also specify that a random drawing is the proper way to resolve a tie after a recount, and allow the loser of a random drawing to contest the election.

Virginia: Senate passes voter ID bill linking poll books with DMV photos | WTOP

Virginia voters could see their own face when they check in at the polls under a bill approved along party lines by the Virginia Senate on Monday. Sen. Mark Obenshain’s proposal would have electronic poll books automatically display driver’s license photos of voters, which could eventually be used in place of Virginia’s existing voter identification requirement. “It’s not going to allow any election official to actually turn anybody away right now at all. It is simply porting those IDs over and is simply an additional deterrent to casting votes illegally,” said Obenshain, R-Harrisonburg, before the 21-19 vote.

Virginia: An Election Debacle That Didn’t Happen | Governing

For the election-obsessed among us, the two months of turbulence that followed last November’s elections for Virginia’s House of Delegates would be hard to top for its riveting back-and-forth legal drama and fingernail-biting suspense. Now, as the nation heads into midterm elections on which might hinge party control not only of several state legislatures but also of both houses of Congress, it’s not implausible to imagine similar dramas playing out across the country. Virginia’s experience holds some key lessons that policymakers and election administrators in other states should be moving quickly to follow. …  Not surprisingly, many journalists couldn’t resist the analogy to another close election that involved razor-thin margins and disputed ballots. As a New York Times headline put it in late December, “Virginia Voting Mess Was Never Supposed to Happen After Bush v. Gore.” But Virginia election officials are hardly deserving of Florida 2000-like scorn. Their administration of last November’s voting certainly wasn’t perfect; the mis-assignment of District 28 voters, for example, was a non-trivial mistake. Still, it’s important to understand some key things Virginia election officials did right that allowed them to dodge what might have been a far-worse catastrophe. The most important step Virginia took — and just in the nick of time — was to revert to paper ballots and ditch its high-tech, ATM-like voting machines.

Virginia: After race that ended in drawing, election bills advance | WTOP

Plans to prevent an infinite recount loop appear to be on track for passage in Richmond. On Friday, the House Privileges and Elections Committee unanimously supported a bill from Del. Marcus Simon of Falls Church that would clearly state only one recount is permitted. After a Newport News delegate race recount ended in a controversial tie, there were questions about whether state law would have allowed a second due to conflicting statutes. The full House could approve the bill next week and send it to the Senate. A bill sent to the full House — sponsored by the committee chairman, Del. Mark Cole of the Fredericksburg area — would address the issues in Cole’s district and the adjoining 28th District, where at least 147 voters cast ballots in the wrong races Nov. 7.

Virginia: After ‘chaos’ of 2017, General Assembly looks to overhaul election laws | Richmond Times-Dispatch

Recounts, ballot problems and a televised tiebreaker made Virginia’s 2017 election cycle a wilder ride than normal, but the General Assembly will take a slow and steady approach to figuring out legislative fixes. Republican leaders from the House of Delegates and state Senate announced Thursday that they will create a joint subcommittee to study the issues and craft a comprehensive response for the 2019 session. At a news conference, Senate Majority Leader Tommy Norment, R-James City, said legislators have heard plenty about “the chaos in some areas” of the 2017 elections. “Rather than doing this in a chaotic way, we have made a decision to undertake it in a deliberate and structured format,” Norment said.

Virginia: Lawmakers propose runoff elections, not bowls and film canisters, as new way to break ties | Richmond Times-Dispatch

When Dawnn Wallace learned that the election in her Newport News House of Delegates district would be decided by drawing a name from a bowl, she was “flabbergasted” to learn that was the state’s process for breaking ties. Wallace said she was among the 23,216 people who voted in the 94th House District race last year, only to see the outcome decided by pure luck when a recount showed Republican Del. David Yancey and Democrat Shelly Simonds both finishing with 11,608 votes. “I can tell you that nobody would want a football game decided by a coin flip. Or a basketball game decided by a jump ball. Or a hockey game decided by which team had the most teeth knocked out at the end of the game,” Wallace said. “If the game is tied at the end of regulation, it goes into overtime.” Wallace joined Del. Marcia S. Price, D-Newport News, Wednesday at the Capitol as Price announced she’ll push to change state law so that elections are decided via the political equivalent of overtime: runoff elections.

Virginia: Some are Calling for an End to Split Precincts Following Voting Errors in Fredericksburg | WVTF

Confusion over split precincts led to a meltdown in Fredericksburg last year, when dozens of voters were given the wrong ballot. Now some lawmakers are hoping for a fix. When most voters walk into their home precincts, they are handed a ballot that has candidates for one House seat. But some precincts are split in a way where some voters are supposed to receive one ballot while others receive another. That led to massive confusion last year in Fredericksburg, which is why Delegate Vivian Watts wants to outlaw split precincts. “Four of my 20 precincts are split. One of them is particularly impossible to figure out where that line is. How in the world are the people going to hold me accountable as an elected official if they don’t even know who represents them?”