Jordan: Election Officials Concerned about Candidates’ Vote-Buying Attempts | Fars News Agency

Election officials in Jordan voiced concern about the attempts made by a number of candidates to buy people’s votes to win the parliamentary elections on January 23. The London-based al-Hayat daily quoted a Jordanian official as saying that his department has received reports about the illegal activities made by certain candidates who have embarked on buying people’s votes. The official underlined that the move is an instance of fraud and runs counter to the government promises about campaign against corruption and implementing reforms in the country, cautioning that the move threatens arrangement of healthy parliamentary elections in Jordan.

Kuwait: 40 candidates disqualified – Liberals reaffirm boycott – Tweeters remanded | Kuwait Times

The newly-established National Election Commission yesterday disqualified 40 candidates including several former MPs over a variety of reasons – mainly over not keeping good conduct – but many of them said they will challenge the decision in court and were confident they will nullify the decisions. The commission, established by an Amiri decree last month, comprises nine top judges and is independent. Its decisions cannot be appealed but can be challenged in the administrative court. Prominent among those disqualified are former MPs Youssef Al- Zalzalah, Saleh Ashour, Khalaf Dumaitheer, Askar Al-Enezi, Khaled Al- Adwah, Saadoun Hammad and Mubarak Al-Khrainej, all of whom were incidentally questioned over allegations that they received millions of dinars in illegal deposits into their bank accounts.

National: Why It May Be Illegal to Instagram Your Ballot | ProPublica

Proud voters are already posting photos of their ballots on Instagram—sometimes with the names of their chosen candidates filled in. But before you snap a shot of your vote, you might want to check your state laws. As the Citizen Media Law Project points out as part of their guide to documenting the 2012 election, showing your marked ballot to other people is actually illegal in many states. Laws against displaying your ballot are motivated by concerns about vote buying, since voters being bribed might need to be prove they voted a certain way. While laws vary from state to state, the penalties for showing your ballot can be stiff.

Palau: Election Commission Bans Cell Phones to Prevent Vote Buying | Oceania Television Network

When voters went to the polls for the 2012 primary election in Palau they were greeted by a barrage of signs banning cell phones and cameras.  For the first time, cell phones were collected before voters were allowed to enter the voting booths.  This new rule was prompted by complaints to the Palau Election Commission of alleged vote-buying for walk-in voters that produced a photo of their vote.  Multiple sources have contacted OTV to advise that local radio and television host Alfonso Diaz was offering money to walk-in voters who took a picture of their ballot in the voting booth with presidential candidate Johnson Toribing marked.  Vote buying is a criminal offense in Palau subject to a fine and up to 1 year in prison for each individual offense.  The Palau Election Commission responded quickly after these complaints with the “No Cell Phones or Cameras” rule.

Massachusetts: Voter Fraud in East Longmeadow | I-Team/WWLP

A voter fraud scandal continues to play out in East Longmeadow.  Enrico “Jack” Villamaino, who is running for State Representative, resigned his position as an East Longmeadow selectman Wednesday night.  Villamaino sent an email to the Town Clerk. The 22News I-Team tracked down Villamaino in Connecticut. Villamaino hasn’t said anything publicly since this investigation into voter fraud began. So the 22News I-Team went searching for answers. Trying to get some answers, the 22News I-Team went to an address we had listed for him in East Longmeadow.  No one answered the door, but a note pointed us to Enfield, Connecticut. That’s where we found him. Not coming to the door, but speaking through an open window, Villamaino didn’t want to talk about why he resigned and gave a “no comment” when asked if he was staying in the State Representative race.

National: New database of US voter fraud finds no evidence that photo ID laws are needed | News21

A new nationwide analysis of 2,068 alleged election-fraud cases since 2000 shows that while fraud has occurred, the rate is infinitesimal, and in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tough voter ID laws, is virtually non-existent. In an exhaustive public records search, reporters from the investigative reporting projecdt News21 sent thousands of requests to elections officers in all 50 states, asking for every case of fraudulent activity including registration fraud, absentee ballot fraud, vote buying, false election counts, campaign fraud, casting an ineligible vote, voting twice, voter impersonation fraud and intimidation.

Click to search the national database of voter fraud cases compiled by News21.

National: Voter fraud found to be rare, survey indicates | KansasCity.com

A new nationwide analysis of more than 2,000 cases of alleged election fraud over the past dozen years shows that in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which has prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tougher voter ID laws, was virtually nonexistent. The analysis of 2,068 reported fraud cases by News21, a Carnegie-Knight investigative reporting project, found 10 cases of alleged in-person voter impersonation since 2000. With 146 million registered voters in the United States, those represent about one for every 15 million prospective voters. The News21 report is based on a national public-records search in which reporters sent thousands of requests to elections officers in all 50 states, asking for every case of alleged fraudulent activity — including registration fraud; absentee-ballot fraud; vote buying; false election counts; campaign fraud; the casting of ballots by ineligible voters, such as felons and non-citizens; double voting; and voter impersonation.

National: Election Day impersonation, an impetus for voter ID laws, a rarity, data show | The Washington Post

A new nationwide analysis of more than 2,000 cases of alleged election fraud over the past dozen years shows that in-person voter impersonation on Election Day, which has prompted 37 state legislatures to enact or consider tougher voter ID laws, was virtually nonexistent. The analysis of 2,068 reported fraud cases by News21, a Carnegie-Knight investigative reporting project, found 10 cases of alleged in-person voter impersonation since 2000. With 146 million registered voters in the United States, those represent about one for every 15 million prospective voters. The News21 report is based on a national public-records search in which reporters sent thousands of requests to elections officers in all 50 states, asking for every case of alleged fraudulent activity — including registration fraud; absentee-ballot fraud; vote buying; false election counts; campaign fraud; the casting of ballots by ineligible voters, such as felons and non-citizens; double voting; and voter impersonation.

Ukraine: Parliamentary elections in 2012 to be more expensive than that in 2007 | Kyiv Post

The current election campaign will cost more than the parliamentary elections in 2007, Chairman of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine (CVU) Oleksandr Chernenko has said. “If we summarize the costs of parties and candidates for majority constituencies, of course, the sum will be bigger than in 2007,” Chernenko told a press conference on Friday. He noted that at the early parliamentary elections “the parties spent their budgets on themselves” as the elections were held according to the proportional voting system. “Compared to the previous elections in 2007, I think that the party costs were cheaper, as they did not nominate candidates for majority constituencies at that time, and the whole party budget was spent on the party, there were many parties, the election threshold was 3% and it was easier to overcome it, and the parties could spend more on themselves,” he said.

Kentucky: Drug money funds voter fraud in Kentucky | Fox News

Voter fraud has a shocking new meaning in eastern Kentucky. That is where in some cases, major cocaine and marijuana dealers admitted to buying votes to steal elections, and the result is the corruption of American democracy. The government continues to mete out justice in the scandal, as two people convicted in April in a vote-buying case face sentencing this week, and another public official pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiracy. “We believe that drug money did buy votes,” Kerry B. Harvey, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky, said of a separate vote-buying case. He described a stunning vote-buying scheme that includes “very extensive, organized criminal activity, involving hundreds of thousands of dollars, and in many cases that involves drug money.”

Mexico: PRI Party Says Runner-up Used Illegal Funds | Latinos Post

Mexico’s Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, winner of the July 1 presidential election, on Monday accused the leftist runner-up of exceeding spending limits and using illegal funds to finance his bid. The allegations were a tit-for-tat exchange after leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador challenged the 3.3 million-vote victory by the PRI’s Enrique Pena Nieto. Lopez Obrador alleges the PRI resorted to money laundering and vote-buying to win. PRI officials fired back on Monday, saying Lopez Obrador’s campaign spent 1.2 billion pesos ($88.65 million) more than was allowed in the presidential campaign.

Mexico: Parties join to demand campaign probe | AP

The conservative National Action Party joined Mexico’s main leftist party Thursday in accusing the winner of the country’s July 1 presidential election of campaign wrongdoing, saying it has “strong and conclusive” evidence of the use of illicit funds. National Action leader Gustavo Madero said his party is demanding that electoral authorities investigate the purported use of pre-paid debit cards by apparent winner Enrique Pena Nieto’s campaign to disburse an estimated 108 million pesos ($8.2 million) in funds. That alone would be about a third of all the money the candidate was legally allowed to use in the race. Pena Nieto of the old ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, won the election with about a 6.6 percentage-point lead over the second-place finisher, leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. National Action and the Lopez Obrador’s Democratic Revolution Party normally don’t agree on much, so Thursday’s joint news conference between Madero and Democratic Revolution leader Jesus Zambrano was a rare occurrence.

Mexico: Election challenge process starts in Mexico | Boston.com

Mexico’s highest electoral court has formally received the legal challenges filed by the second-place leftist candidate seeking to annul the July 1 presidential elections. The challenges filed by leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador appear to face an uphill struggle given the 6.6.-percent margin of victory for the winner of the race, Enrique Pena Nieto. Lopez Obrador claims Pena Nieto’s campaign engaged in overspending and vote buying. The court says he submitted 58 boxes of evidence as part of the challenge.

Voting Blogs: Revisiting Fraud and the 2012 Mexican Presidential Election | The Monkey Cage

In view of the large amount of attention yesterday’s post on the potential for vote buying in the 2012 Mexican presidential election has received, we are very pleased to have a second follow up post-election report on this election from  Marco A. Morales, a Ph.D candidate in the Department of Politics at New York University, that addresses more directly the question of the potential for and consequences of electoral fraud in this election. In addition to his graduate work in political science, Morales has also served as a public official under both PRI and PAN administrations, most recently – under the current PAN administration – as Press Counsellor and Spokesman for the Mission of Mexico to the United Nations, and Director General for Political Analysis at the Office of the Mexican Presidency. The official tally for the Mexican presidential election has now been released. After all votes have been counted (and recounted whenever there were discrepancies in the tallies) the results advanced by the PREP and the expedite count remain virtually unchanged: PRI’s Peña Nieto has38.21% of the vote, PRD’s López Obrador 31.59%, and Vázquez Mota 25.41% of the vote. This means that a difference of over 3.3 million votes between the front-runner and the second place remains virtually unchanged. (Or in other words, that there was human error on the vote counts, but no systematic error). Yet, for outside observers, this could seem like a convoluted process taking an exceptional amount of time. And that would be a correct observation. Nevertheless, that is what the electoral law dictates. So what exactly is going on, and why?

Mexico: Mexico Still Far From Fair Elections | Huffington Post

The media rewrites history every day, and in so doing it often impedes our understanding of the present. Mexico’s presidential election of a week ago is a case in point. Press reports tell us that Felipe Calderón, the outgoing president from the PAN (National Action Party) “won the 2006 election by a narrow margin.” But this is not quite true, and without knowing what actually happened in 2006, it is perhaps more difficult to understand the widespread skepticism of the Mexican people as to the results of the current election. The official results show Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) candidate Enrique Peña Neto winning 38.2 percent of the vote, to 31.6 percent for Andrés Manuel López Obrador, of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) and 25.4 percent for Josefina Vázquez Mota of the PAN. It does not help that the current election has been marred by widespread reports of vote-buying.

Mexico: Old guard wins Mexico election recount | Deutsche Welle

Mexico’s electoral commission has declared centrist candidate Enrique Pena Nieto the winner of the presidential election. The announcement comes after a recount of more than half the ballots. Enrique Pena Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) has decisively won Mexico’s presidential election, after allegations of vote buying forced a recount of more than half the ballots. The Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) reported on Friday that Nieto had won 38.21 percent of the vote, while leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) came in second with 31.59 percent. Josefina Vazquez Mota of outgoing President Felipe Calderon’s conservative National Action Party (PAN) garnered 25.41 percent of the vote.

Mexico: Vote buying alleged, recount demanded in Mexico | CBS News

Thousands of people rushed to stores Tuesday to redeem pre-paid gift cards they said were given to them previously by the party that won Mexico’s presidency, inflaming accusations that the weekend election was marred by widespread vote-buying. Meanwhile, the projected runner-up in the election, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, said he has asked Mexico’s Federal Election Institute for a recount of the ballots. The Election Institute says it expects the final count results Sunday, and that the law will already likely mandate recounts of about a third of the total ballots cast. At least a few gift cardholders were angry, complaining that they didn’t get as much as promised or that their cards weren’t working. Neighbors at one store in a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Mexico City said the unusually large crowds prevented them from doing their daily shopping. Some people shopping at the store said that they were told the cards would be valid only during the two days after Sunday’s election and that they had waited to cash them in until Tuesday because the store was packed Monday.

Mexico: Lopez Obrador asking for presidential recount | Reuters

Mexico’s presidential election runner-up, leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, said on Tuesday he would ask the country’s election authorities to recount the votes from Sunday’s contest, saying it was riddled with fraud. Lopez Obrador, who finished about 6.5 percentage points behind President-elect Enrique Pena Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), said the process had been corrupted by PRI vote buying and other abuses, and that his campaign would ask the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) to recount the votes.

Armenia: OSCE Reaffirms Armenian Election Verdict | ArmeniaNow.com

Western monitors representing the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) reaffirmed on Tuesday their cautious assessment of Armenia’s recent parliamentary elections, praising the election campaign but criticizing voting in a “considerable” number of polling stations. In its final report, the largest international vote-monitoring mission deployed in the country by the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) again avoided concluding whether the May 6 elections were democratic. “The voting process was orderly and well organized in the large majority of polling stations observed,” says the report. “However, international observers assessed voting negatively in nine per cent of polling stations, which is considerable. This assessment was mainly due to organizational problems, undue interference in the process, generally by proxies, and cases of serious violations, including intimidation of voters.”

Mexico: Electoral Campaign in Final Sprint | Prensa Latina

With less than a month remaining before the Mexican elections on July 1, just as the gap between the candidates is beginning to show signs of narrowing, the tone of the race is sharpening. The leftist candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, warned that the war against him has already begun, just as in 2006, although he believes that this time, the attacks against him will fail. From Michoacan, Lopez Obrador denounced the increased attacks by his opponents, who are trying to counteract his gains in the race, seen in the results of the most recent polls.

Cambodia: Prime Minister Hun Sen’s party expected to win Cambodia elections | The Brunei Times

Prime Minister Hun Sen’s ruling party was expected to win Cambodia’s local elections yesterday in a vote that monitors say is tainted by vote buying and other irregularities. The elections for local governing councils across the country are viewed as the key indicator of public opinion ahead of general elections in 2013. Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party has ruled Cambodia for nearly three decades. It has strong rural support and overwhelmingly won both previous local elections in 2002 and 2007. Preliminary results from Sunday’s vote were expected by Monday.

Iran: MP accuses Revolutionary Guards of interfering in election | Al-Arabiya

Iranian veteran conservative MP Ali Motahari accused the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) of interfering in the results of the latest parliamentary elections amid retaliation threats by IRGC senior officials. IRGC General Ramadan Sharif, was quoted in a statement posted on the IRGC-affiliated Fars News Agency as saying the military body is, and will always be, committed to the teachings of the leader of the 1979 Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Khomeini and will therefore never interfere in legislative elections. The IRGC, the statement added, did not influence in any way the results of the March 2 elections, which witnessed a major victory for the supporters of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, some of whom are IRGC members. IRGC members were infuriated by the accusations Motahari, one of Iran’s most daring and independent MPs, hurled at them in the parliament session held Sunday and threatened to take the MP to court if he does not withdraw his “allegations.”

Dominican Republic: Election in dispute after apparent win | Boston.com

A governing party official appeared to have scored a first-round win in the Dominican Republic’s presidential election but supporters of his main opponent complained of vote-buying and other forms of fraud and said they would challenge the results. Danilo Medina of the current president’s Dominican Liberation Party received just over 51 percent of Sunday’s vote with 83 percent of the ballots counted, according to the Caribbean country’s Electoral Commission. His main rival, former President Hipolito Mejia of the Dominican Revolutionary Party, had nearly 47 percent. The winner needed more than 50 percent to avoid a runoff. Medina said he was confident he would win, but that the Electoral Commission would keep scrutinizing ballots through the night. He thanked a crowd of supporters and sent them home. “We will celebrate in a big way tomorrow,” he said.

Armenia: Top election official calls Armenia’s polls “essential progress” | ArmeniaNow.com

Tigran Mukuchyan, the head of the Central Election Commission (CEC), described the May 6 parliamentary elections in Armenia as “essential progress” as he gave a press conference in Yerevan on Wednesday. In the view of the head of the body administering the process, the elections giving the ruling Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) a landslide victory amounted to the “most transparent, public and controlled” elections in Armenia ever. Mukuchyan’s comments were in harmony with what the political leadership in Armenia has said before and after the elections. President Serzh Sargsyan and other senior members of the government had pledged to hold the best elections in the history of independent Armenia – a circumstance also attached a great deal of importance to by Armenia’s international partners, notably the European Union and the United States.

Canada: Elections Canada may roll out Internet voting in 2015 in spite of security concerns | CottageCountryNow

While Huntsville council tackles election topics such as ward boundaries, some residents believe the issue of electronic voting should be the primary concern. Grant Hallman, a retired resident who spent a career in software development, has said council’s decision to discuss in 2013 whether electronic voting or traditional paper ballots will be used in the 2014 municipal election will not give the municipality enough time for thorough debate. Hallman said it will likely not give the municipality enough time to switch back to paper ballots if council decides it does not want to use the telephone and Internet voting method used in the previous municipal election. There are several concerns Hallman and others have with the electronic voting method.

Russia: Presidential elections: How easy is it to commit electoral fraud? | Metro.co.uk

Two questions were asked after the recent Russian elections. Firstly, were Vladimir Putin’s tears real? And secondly, was the election rigged? According to the  experts, there are several ways of cheating to win an election. ‘It all depends on how you define electoral fraud,’ said Dr Sarah Birch, reader in politics at Essex University. ‘There are so many rules and regulations that to violate one of those is fairly easy, whether it’s a candidate in a local election overspending on their campaign by £5, or someone going to the polling station and saying they’re someone else. ‘It can also be the manipulation of voters – such as media campaigns that are overtly biased in favour of one contestant, as we found in Russia, where the media gave much more attention to Putin than to the other candidates. Alternatively, there’s manipulation of the vote, such as vote buying or intimidation.’

Russia: Voting Fraud Allegations Mar Putin’s Win | Huffington Post

A few days before Russia’s presidential election, Sergei Smirnov received a phone call from a man who called himself Mikhail and told him the terms of the deal: you will vote for Vladimir Putin four times and receive 2,000 roubles ($70) in return. The sum was promised to dozens of other young men and women who met on Sunday outside a popular fast food joint on the southwest fringe of Moscow, waiting to be taken to various polling stations in the province that rings the capital. Smirnov, a journalist, said he found the group a few weeks prior to the election through a friend. Mikhail, whom he met at Moscow’s Yugo-Zapadnaya (Southwest) metro station on Sunday morning, gave him final instructions. “He said we should vote for Vladimir Putin, photograph the ballot, and send him the photograph by phone,” Smirnov said.

Kuwait: Warning against election malpractices | Kuwait Times

His Highness Sheikh Jaber Al-Mubarak Al-Sabah, the Prime Minister, asserted here yesterday that “the government will not turn a blind eye on the phenomenon of vote buying during elections.” HH the Prime Minister thanked, after his tour of the Media Center for National Assembly elections 2012, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense and Interior Minister Sheikh Ahmad Al-Humoud Al-Sabah for involving the Kuwait Transparency Society in monitoring the elections for the first time, stressing that “the government cannot accept any sort of disturbance of the electoral process”.

Taiwan: Taiwan polls ‘partly unfair’ say observers | IOL.co.za

Taiwan’s elections were “mostly free but partly unfair,” according to a preliminary report released on Sunday by a group of international observers. Saturday’s election saw incumbent President Ma Ying-jeou defeat opposition candidate Tsai Ing-wen by six percentage points. In the report compiled by the International Committee for Free Elections in Taiwan, the observers cited several factors that could have helped Ma gain more votes than the opposition.

India: Election Commission declares stringent steps for free and fair polls in Uttarakhand | NewsTrackIndia

Chief Election Commissioner S Y Quraishi hereon Friday, issued strict guidelines to ensure free and fair assembly elections in Uttarakhand. Briefing the mediapersons about the preparations, the Chief Election Commissioner revealed that observer’s teams will keep a tab on all activities of the candidates to ascertain if they are indulging in resorting to money and muscle power including luring the voters with liquor.

“Our general observers and expenditure observers will keep an alert eye on money, muscle power and liquor during the state polls and they would check that any such things do not affect the elections,” said Qureshi. He mentioned that the Election Commission has specified all necessary guidelines and that it is monitoring the pre-polls process in the five states where polls are scheduled to take place.