Colorado: Legislators hear concerns of county clerks | Colorado Statesman

Colorado’s county clerks have gotten off to an early start lobbying the legislature for election reforms after the previous session in which several proposals were killed during a divisive election year. The County Clerks Association met with lawmakers on Monday for an informational session to outline several proposals ranging from an all-mail ballot delivery system to shortening voter registration deadlines and eliminating contention surrounding mailing ballots to inactive voters. “Our goal today is to start a conversation on providing convenient, transparent and legal elections,” Donetta Davidson, former secretary of state and current executive director of the Colorado County Clerks Association, told the small group of lawmakers. Several of the legislators represented members of the House and Senate State, Veterans and Military Affairs committees, which will likely be the first committees to see the bills. “Obviously accessibility and integrity is one of the issues; balancing those and making sure we meet those,” continued Davidson.

Colorado: Scott Gessler, Colorado’s ‘honey badger,’ may be most closely watched election official | The Washington Post

Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler has a deeply partisan past, a dedicated cadre of supporters, a long list of enemies, a colorful nickname bestowed by liberal detractors and a Web site dedicated to “watching” him. The scrutiny will only get more intense between now and November as the “honey badger of Colorado politics” — a reference to the ferocious, fearless animal — presides over voting in a battleground state that could help decide the presidency. Gessler may be the most closely watched election official in the country, heightened by Colorado’s prominence, his ready-to-rumble personality and a series of loud disputes with what he has termed the “angry left.”

Colorado: Denver clerk sues Gessler over mailing ballots to inactive voters | The Denver Post

Denver Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson on Wednesday sued Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler, challenging a rule from his office to block ballots from being mailed to inactive voters in city and school board elections. “The election rules adopted in August by the Colorado secretary of state prohibiting the mailing of ballots to inactive-failed-to-vote voters in nonpartisan and coordinated elections infringes on Denver’s status as a home rule city and county,” Johnson said in a statement. “We believe that the secretary of state is overstepping his authority by trying to control who gets ballots in local municipal elections.

Louisiana: Secretary of State defends inactive-voter list | NOLA.com

Louisiana Secretary of State Tom Schedler is disputing Democratic allegations that state residents are being stripped from voting rolls without adequate notice. He said the state, as required by state and federal law, checks voting rolls against other databases and puts people who have moved outside their parishes on an inactive list. The state sends two separate postcards to the address listed on the voting rolls, allowing a voter who was incorrectly made inactive to correct the record and return to active voting status, Schedler said. Voters can also correct the record by filling out an online form. Even if inactive voters don’t respond to the postcards and show up to vote on Election Day, they can still cast ballots by certifying they still live at their original addresses.

New Mexico: Voter purge postcards sent to active voters | New Mexico Telegram

The postcards by the Secretary of State’s office that Dianna Duran said are designed to clean the voter rolls of inactive voters and those who have moved are reaching at least some who do not fit either definition. And those who have received them say they are confusing. The mailers say in bold letters, “Confirmation of Voter Registration” and, “Please detach complete and return this postcard no later than Oct 9, 2012.” In smaller letters below, the postcard says: If this card is not returned and you do not vote in any election from the date of this notice through the November, 2014 general election, your name will be removed from the voter registration list. And the postcards are causing confusion over whether or not the recipients have to reply to the postcards to be eligible to vote.

Colorado: Gessler’s proposed changes to election rules draw heated objections | The Colorado Independent

Over the course of a five-hour rulemaking hearing Monday, Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler probably got the message that a lot of people are unhappy with proposed rules that would stop county clerks from mailing ballots to inactive voters in some elections, change the way canvass boards are selected and give county clerks more power to determine how much access election watchers have. About 40 people signed up to testify at this week’s hearing; nearly all of them spoke in opposition to one or more of Gessler’s proposed rule changes, which covered three general areas. “It was pretty much all opposition,” commented Luis Toro, executive director of Colorado Ethics Watch, who did not speak.  “I don’t think it (the opposition) will change anything, though,” he said. The rules, (pdf) either as presented by Gessler or as revised by his office as a result of the hearing and written testimony, could go into effect as early as Monday, at Gessler’s discretion.

Virginia: State Board of Elections debunks re-registration rumor | Augusta Free Press

Information circulating via mass emails stating that voters who have not voted since the 2008 General Election must re-register to vote 25 days prior to Election Day Nov. 6, 2012 in order to be eligible to vote is false. The State Board of Elections addressed the rumors in a news release Monday. According to the SBE, there is “absolutely no requirement to re-register in Virginia.” Voters are not removed from the rolls solely for the reason of not voting. Because of the questions raised in the mass emails, it is recommended that voters check their registration status to ensure it is current.

Tennessee: Shelby County elections facing changes in August | Action News 5

After the Shelby County Election Commission purged more than 30,000 inactive voter records, voters are concerned about whether their votes will count this August. “Why all of a sudden that thirty two thousand voters records are purged from Shelby County in the last five months,” asked concerned voter Kermit Moore. At the main library in Memphis Saturday, State Representative G.A. Hardaway hosted a voter’s right’s forum.   Richard Holden Administrator of Elections explained voters who haven’t been to the polls in 8 years were removed from their system.  “We want every vote to be counted and not to be lost,” said Holden, “even those that have been purged, if they’re still alive and still in Shelby County can re register by simply submitting an application by Tuesday.”

Colorado: Denver clerk Johnson, Secretary of State Gessler reignite ballot fight | The Denver Post

Denver officials and Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler are positioning for another fight over when the clerk’s office may mail ballots to inactive voters — a battle that could have ramifications for the November presidential election. Late last week, Gessler’s office proposed a new rule it says clarifies that clerks may not mail ballots to inactive voters in a “coordinated” election, or an election held simultaneously with another political entity. The issue took on new significance this week, when Denver Public Schools announced it could ask voters in November for a $500 million property tax increase. That would make Nov. 6 a coordinated election in Denver, reopening the debate over whether Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson may mail ballots to inactive voters — who are overwhelmingly Democrats and unaffiliated.

Tennessee: Special master sought in missing voter files case | Knoxville News Sentinel

State elections officials and lawyers for Democratic plaintiffs in a voter purge lawsuit have agreed to ask a federal judge to appoint a special master to look into missing voter files. The Chattanooga Times Free Press reports the request is being made as part of a lawsuit filed against the state by former Democratic U.S. Rep. Lincoln Davis, who says he was wrongfully kept from voting in the state’s presidential primary in March. Plaintiffs’ attorney George Barrett told the paper that the two sides have agreed to ask U.S. District Judge Kevin Sharp to appoint the special master to investigate claims that 11,000 voters’ records contain partial or completely blank voting histories. “We’ve asked the court to appoint a special master to investigate those facts and see what happened, if anything,” Barrett said.

Tennessee: Shelby County Election Commission reclassifies 180,000 voters | The Commercial Appeal

In the 2008 presidential election, when Shelby County counted a record 401,081 votes cast on the Nov. 4 ballot, the final turnout of 66.9 percent was considered strong but still meant some 33 percent of the nearly 600,000 people on the county’s voter rolls chose not to participate. Was it apathy? Or, as recent aggressive moves by the county Election Commission suggest, was it something more simple — absence. A spring cleaning of the county’s voter rolls, based on identifying names of people who had not cast ballots in any federal election since 2006, has resulted in voting rolls that as recently as March showed 611,937 voters now listing just 431,054 names. The commission says there is a simple explanation for how some 180,000 names vanished from the publicly available voting rolls. The most substantial change involved moving 151,826 people who have not voted in any of the two most recent federal election cycles to “inactive” status. Those voters remain eligible to vote, but since they have not voted in any federal election over a four-year stretch, they are no longer considered “active” voters, and the commission, under the control of county Republicans since 2010, has decided to include only the “active” voters on its registered voting statistics.

Colorado: Wisconsin’s Walker echoes Colorado’s Gessler on voter fraud | The Colorado Independent

In the last two years, Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler has made voter fraud prevention a top priority. His efforts have included working to stop county clerks from sending absentee ballots to inactive voters, lobbying for a controversial voter ID law and leading an unprecedented effort to determine whether non-citizens are voting in the state. Critics have questioned Gessler’s priorities, given that the number of documented incidents of voter fraud in Colorado is tiny. Yet Gessler argued his case at committee hearings in Washington and Denver by citing statistics. There were hundreds and maybethousands of non-citizens registered to vote in Colorado who may or may not be casting ballots, he said, as an example. Wisconsin governor Scott Walker has also sounded alarms on voter fraud. Taking a page from Gessler, he recently cited numbers to back up his claims.

Colorado: Lawmakers battle over inactive voters | Aurora Sentinel

Senate Democrats moved to take down what they say is a roadblock that makes it more difficult for more than 100,000 voters to participate in the November elections, resurrecting a proposal Monday that House Republicans previously rejected. The legislative action would send mail-in ballots to so-called inactive voters who otherwise would have to cast ballots in person. And the implications are huge. About 37 percent of the affected voters are Democrats. Around 23 percent are Republicans. The remaining 40 percent are unaffiliated — a bloc both parties think they can use to pick up support. Democrats say they are pressing the issue to make voting easier, adding that the issue is more urgent with important state issues and the White House on the line. “I would think that we would want every possible soul who’s eligible to vote, to be able to vote in that election,” said Sen. Rollie Heath, the chair of the committee that brought back the plan.

Colorado: Fighting over voters who don’t always vote | 9news.com

Some people don’t vote in every election, preferring to cast a ballot only in presidential election years. In Colorado, those voters are purged when they miss a midterm election, with their status changed to “inactive voters.” Inactive voters are still eligible to vote, but they won’t receive a mail-in ballot even if they signed up to be permanent mail-in voters. Democrats are fighting especially hard to change that just in time for the 2012 presidential election. Republicans have a much smaller share of Colorado’s inactive voters, and political watchers say the Democrats don’t want to lose any votes from President Obama’s 2008 supporters. Democrats say they’re not only concerned with “bandwagon” voters. “There are all kinds of reasons that people don’t vote once, and we’re going to basically take them off the rolls because they failed to vote once? That doesn’t make any sense to me at all,” Sen. Rollie Heath (D-Boulder) said. Health is concerned about people who miss an election due to military service or illness.

Colorado: Democrats resurrect bill that would allow counties to mail ballots to inactive voters | The Denver Post

In a move likely to inflame partisan tensions, Colorado Democrats plan to graft dead legislation allowing counties to mail ballots to 439,560 “inactive voters” onto a resurrected Republican bill. House Republicans said Senate Democrats were “hijacking” the House bill. But Democrats said the issue of allowing registered voters who didn’t vote in the last election to receive mail ballots was too important to give up. “If it’s going to be a fight, this is worth fighting over,” Sen. Rollie Heath, D-Boulder, an organizer of the Democratic effort, said. House Speaker Frank McNulty, R-Highlands Ranch, said he was surprised by the Democratic move. “I know that from time to time bills are hijacked for other purposes,” McNulty said. “It’s pretty extraordinary that Senate Democrats would resurrect a (Republican) bill like this. It is extraordinary that they would go to these efforts.”

Colorado: Republicans kill Colorado voter-registration measure | The Durango Herald

House Republicans on Wednesday killed a bill on voter registration from one of their own members, Rep. Don Coram, R-Montrose. The bill was a reaction to Republican Secretary of State Scott Gessler’s effort to prevent county clerks from mailing ballots to people unless they voted in the last major election. After the vote, Democratic leaders were so angry they called for Gessler’s removal as the state’s top elections official. The House Local Government Committee killed Coram’s bill on a party-line, 6-5 vote. It had passed the Senate 24-10.

Missouri: Voter ID at center of Missouri Secretary of State election | seMissourian.com

On Nov. 7, 2000, hundreds of St. Louis voters were unable to practice that most cherished of constitutional sacraments. They were turned away from the ballot box, told their names had been placed on the city’s list of inactive voters.
House Speaker Pro Tem Shane Schoeller, R-Willard, calls that incident pivotal in two of his recent decisions — his introduction of legislation to require voter identification and to run for Missouri Secretary of State. “I think that’s when I began to understand the importance of having a secretary of state who truly wants to make sure your elections are fair and honest,” Schoeller said Friday during a stop in Cape Girardeau.

Colorado: Should military members who did not vote in 2010 receive a ballot? | State of Elections

It may sound like a simple issue, but Colorado is currently in an uproar over this issue. The City of Denver had been planning to send mail ballots to all registered voters, including inactive military voters. In response, Republican Secretary of State Scott Gessler made the controversial move of filing suit against the city, arguing that Colorado law only allows localities to mail ballots to those on the active voting list. The full complaint can be found here. Because the election is mere weeks away, John Tomasic of The Colorado Independent notes that this new directive seems likely to effectively disenfranchise the effected soldiers.

Colorado law requires ballots to be sent out to all active registered voters, but it does not explicitly prohibit county clerks from being more proactive. According to The Daily Sentinel, Mesa County Clerk Sheila Reiner argued that counties should be able to do more if they wish. “I had made a decision early on not to include the inactive voters because it wasn’t required,” Reiner said. “But I have to agree with the Denver County clerk and recorder that the statute requirements are only a minimum, and in many areas clerks often go over and above depending on the needs of their counties.”

South Carolina: DMV reports flawed South Carolina voter ID list | Charlotte Observer

South Carolina election officials are using flawed data that include dead people as they deal with implementing a new state law requiring that people have photo identification when they cast ballots in person, according to an analysis by the Department of Motor Vehicles. The South Carolina State Election Commission and the DMV had matched data on licenses, ID cards and voter records as part of the new law, now under review by the U.S. Justice Department.

The election agency reported in October that nearly 240,000 active and inactive voters lacked South Carolina driver’s licenses or ID cards. The DMV’s analysis shows that more than 207,000 of those voters live in other states, allowed their ID cards to expire, probably have licenses with names that didn’t match voter records or were dead.

Colorado: Inactive voters playing major role in Pueblo County election | The Colorado Independent

Pueblo County Clerk Gilbert “Bo” Ortiz defended his right to send ballots to “inactive voters” this year over the objections of Secretary of State Scott Gessler. Ortiz told the Colorado Independent he believes his main objective as clerk is to facilitate participation in elections and, on that score, he has succeeded. As of Monday night, 16 percent of the county’s roughly 17,000 inactive voters had cast ballots. That’s 2,700 votes, nearly 9 percent of all votes cast in the county, which is a lot of votes.

“This means that Pueblo[‘s] [inactive] voters responded and will have a significant impact on this year’s election,” Ortiz said. “The bottom line is that all registered voters had the opportunity to cast a vote. And the more people who participate, the stronger our community.”

Colorado: All-mail election turnout could exceed past off-year contests | Aspen Daily News Online

A total of 1,813 Pitkin County voters have cast ballots in this fall’s all mail-in election and turnout is on track to exceed prior off-year elections. The county issued a total of 10,720 ballots for this year’s election. That included a late addition of about 2,500 “inactive” voters, earlier this month, who were to be excluded, said elections manager Dwight Shellman.

The clerk’s office began receiving high volumes of ballots in the mail on Oct. 17. Wednesday was the most ballots the county had received yet in a single day so far, with 296, Shellman reported. Turnout is typically low in odd-numbered election years, like 2011, in which there are no state or national candidates on the ballot. Over the last decade, those contests have averaged about 3,200 ballots. Before ballots began coming in this year, Shellman said he was expecting between 3,500 and 4,500. “We would be over the moon if we hit the high end of that,” he said.

Colorado: Vets press Gessler to drop voter ballot case | The Colorado Independent

Richard Allen Smith, Afghan war veteran and vice chairman of national soldier and veteran advocacy organization VoteVets, on Thursday hand delivered a petition with more than 9,000 signatures asking Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler to drop the lawsuit he filed seeking to prevent counties in the state from mailing ballots to inactive voters, including to soldiers serving away from home. The organization is asking Gessler to accept a decision handed down in district court last week finding insupportable Gessler’s interpretation of election law in the matter.

“I didn’t meet Gessler,” Smith told the Colorado Independent on his way back from the office. “I met two people from the Elections Division. They were polite and professional but they didn’t let on about Gessler’s plans. Actually, one of them seemed more interested in sharpshooting our petition.”

Smith said that, of the 9,000 signatures he delivered, 3,400 were signatures from veterans. He said the petition contained the full names, addresses and, where appropriate, veteran status. The Elections Division staffer, however, suggested that wasn’t enough.

Colorado: Fairness questioned as 9 mostly Democratic Colorado counties to mail inactive voters ballots | The Denver Post

Officials in at least nine counties plan to mail ballots to inactive voters for the Nov. 1 election — a decision some believe could give a boost to a statewide ballot measure to raise taxes for education. The counties — all but two of which lean or are heavily Democratic — are home to about 107,000 voters considered “inactive/failed to vote.”

Victor Mitchell, a former state representative from Douglas County who is leading the opposition to Proposition 103, said Tuesday the fact that some counties are mailing to inactive voters while others are not is “a form of gerrymandering and voter manipulation” that creates an unlevel playing field.

“It will clearly have an effect,” Mitchell said. “Will it be enough to put (Proposition 103) over the top? I certainly hope not.” Proposition 103, the only statewide measure on next month’s ballot, would raise taxes for five years to generate $3 billion for education.

Colorado: More counties sending ballots to inactive voters | The Pueblo Chieftain

Boulder and Pitkin counties have reversed course and will send election ballots to inactive voters this month, the Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler’s office confirmed Monday. That turnaround comes only two days after a Denver district judge refused to block Denver and Pueblo counties from doing so.

Boulder will send ballots to about 24,000 inactive voters, while Pitkin will send out about 2,500 ballots. Mesa County officials also notified Gessler on Monday that they will send ballots to their inactive military and overseas voters only, but not to inactive voters within their county. El Paso County, which has a heavy registration of overseas military voters, was the target of protests Friday from one veterans group objecting to Clerk Wayne Williams’ decision not to send ballots to about 800 inactive military voters. Williams reaffirmed after the court ruling that his county does not intend to send ballots to any of its 63,000 inactive voters, regardless of Friday’s court ruling.

Colorado: Judge’s ruling allows Nov. 1 election ballots to be sent to inactive voters | The Denver Post

Thousands of inactive voters in two Democratic strongholds will be mailed ballots for the Nov. 1 election following a judge’s ruling Friday. Denver District Judge Brian Whitney denied a motion for a preliminary injunction filed by Secretary of State Scott Gessler, who argued that state law prevents Denver Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson from mailing ballots to inactive voters.

Following the decision, Johnson and Pueblo County Clerk and Recorder Gilbert Ortiz said they will proceed with plans to mail ballots to those voters — about 54,000 in Denver and 17,000 in Pueblo.

Colorado: Judge: Denver may send ballots to inactive voters | The Denver Post

Denver Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson may send ballots to inactive voters, District Court Judge Brian Whitney ruled this afternoon. Secretary of State Scott Gessler asked Whitney last month to issue a preliminary injunction stopping Johnson’s office from sending mail ballots to voters classified as “inactive failed to vote.”

Those voters — about 54,357 in Denver county, or about 12 percent of all registered voters — are voters who didn’t vote in the 2010 general election or any subsequent election. They also failed to respond to postcards from their clerk and recorder asking whether they want a ballot for the Nov. 1 election.

Gessler, a Republican, said he wanted to ensure the statewide uniformity of the election. Although the judge refused to issue a preliminary injunction, Gessler’s suit may continue. The Secretary of State’s attorney also said Gessler may issue a rule on the issue.

Colorado: Crowd gathering for court battle over inactive voters | The Pueblo Chieftain

Like a fistfight in the street, the judicial showdown between Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler and two county clerks — Pueblo County’s Gilbert “Bo” Ortiz and Denver Clerk Debra Johnson — is starting to draw a crowd as both sides head for a court hearing today in Denver.

Denver District Judge Brian Whitney is scheduled to hear Gessler’s request for an injunction against Denver County at 1 p.m. today. Ortiz will be there, along with Pueblo County Attorney Dan Kogovsek, hoping Whitney will accept their filing to be included in the courtroom fight.

The dispute pits Gessler, a Republican, against Ortiz and Johnson, both Democrats, over the issue of whether the clerks can send mail ballots to inactive voters in those counties. Inactive voters are those who didn’t vote in the 2010 election or freshen their registration since then.

Colorado: Pueblo County clerk joins lawsuit over ballots for inactive voters | The Denver Post

Vowing to protect the right to vote for military personnel overseas, Pueblo County Clerk and Recorder Gilbert Ortiz announced Wednesday that he is joining the lawsuit between Secretary of State Scott Gessler and Denver Clerk and Recorder Debra Johnson.

Last week, Gessler, a Republican, sent a letter warning Ortiz that if he mailed ballots to inactive voters who are eligible to vote, he would be named in the lawsuit by Gessler’s office. Ortiz and Johnson are Democrats.

At the time, Ortiz said he would “reluctantly” comply with Gessler’s order not to mail ballots to 64 inactive military voters but indicated that the dispute of whether inactive voters should receive mail ballots was not over.

Colorado: Colorado SoS Gessler: web glitch not intentional | KDVR

Republican Secretary of State Scott Gessler and his staff dismissed speculation from Democratic groups that technical problems Monday on the state’s voter registration website were intentional. Monday was the deadline for voters to register to participate in the Nov. 1 election and the state’s site, www.govotecolorado.com, was slow and at times unavailable throughout the day, which Gessler’s office attributes to heavy traffic on the site.

“There were some intermittent issues, but we got to it as quickly as we could,” said Rich Coolidge, Gessler’s spokesman. “We monitor it really closesly, especially on a day ilke yesterday. It was the heavy volume on the site that caused any slowing issues.”

Voting Blogs: Colorado Absentee Ballot Fight: Data Can Help This! | Election Updates

In the ongoing battle over absentee ballots in Colorado, we’ve heard the claims about disenfranchised military voters and we’ve heard the charges about partisanship.

Unfortunately, what we haven’t heard is some hard factual information that compares ballot return rates among active and inactive voters. Andrew Cole, spokesperson for Secretary of State Scott Gessler is quoted as saying “there were thousands of ballots mailed out to inactive voters in 2010 that were unaccounted for.”

I’ve tried to answer this question at the Denver County elections office. Total registration, active and inactive, was 297,558 according to the spreadsheet available here: Of that total, 22,696 are “Inactive – Fail to vote”, or 7.63% of the total.