Michigan: Detroit mayoral ballot recount meets challenges right off the bat | Detroit Free Press

Moments after the recount of Detroit’s mayoral race ballots began Tuesday, the first hand went up from a challenger citing an issue. Other hands were soon to follow. So went the first day of recounting ballots after former mayoral candidate Tom Barrow and others alleged fraud in the elections process in several city races. “This is an investigation,” Barrow said Tuesday at Cobo Center, where the recount was being conducted. “We’re seeing thousands of ballots in the same handwriting. All for the write-in. All for (mayoral candidate) Mike Duggan. These are clearly fraudulent ballots — and we’re just getting started.” Tuesday morning, Wayne County Director of Elections Delphine Oden told observers and poll workers that once ballots were taken from ballot boxes, county workers assembled for the recount would begin by holding some ballots faceup, giving challengers from the various campaigns time to examine them, before putting them facedown and moving through the votes.

Michigan: State To Recount Write-In Votes In Detroit Mayoral Primary | CBS

Members of the State Board of Canvassers voted 4-0 Tuesday to re-tally Detroit’s mayoral primary results, which means they’ll soon be rolling up their sleeves to recalculate what could become one of the most pivotal elections in Detroit history. The issue erupted after the Detroit city clerk’s office posted results that showed write-in candidate Mike Duggan handily defeating Benny Napoleon. But when the votes went to Wayne County for certification, the county board found Detroit workers had not used hashmarks to represent every five votes counted — so they tossed out 18,000 write-in ballots where hashmarks weren’t used in their tabulation. Without the 18,000 votes, Napoleon became the unofficial victor. Then the state stepped in and said those votes couldn’t be tossed out — so now Michigan is going to look at the ballots again. The recalculation is expected to last a few days.

Michigan: State takes up Detroit’s disputed election today, seeks to finalize mayor count | Detroit Free Press

State election officials will meet in Detroit this morning in an effort to finalize disputed results of the city’s Aug. 6 mayoral primary election. The state’s review of the election is ongoing and might not be finished by today’s public meeting of the Board of State Canvassers, said Fred Woodhams, spokesman for the secretary of state. The state board of two Democrats and two Republicans will meet at 10:30 a.m. at Cadillac Place, 3044 W. Grand Blvd. The state took over the job of verifying the Detroit primary results after the Wayne County Board of Canvassers last week refused to certify results prepared by the county clerk’s staff that differed greatly from unofficial results the city’s elections department compiled on election night.

Michigan: Election officials expected to ‘re-tabulate’ 18,000 votes in Detroit primary election | MLive.com

Michigan election officials are likely to review some 18,000 write-in votes from Detroit’s mayoral primary, and Gov. Rick Snyder is hoping for a swift resolution to the dispute. “There’s good people potentially involved in this process, so I hope it gets resolved,” Snyder said this morning during an interview on WJR-AM 760. “We don’t need more issues on things like this, but it’s important we do democracy the right way. Let’s get it looked at by the appropriate people, let’s get decisions made and let’s move forward.” The Wayne County Board of Canvassers on Tuesday considered throwing out 18,000 votes that would have swung the August 6 primary in favor of Sheriff Benny Napoleon weeks after unofficial results suggested that write-in candidate Mike Duggan had bested him by roughly 16,000 votes.

Michigan: Detroit mayor count in chaos as Wayne County refuses to certify primary results | Detroit Free Press

A state election panel will have to decide who really won the Detroit mayoral primary after Wayne County election officials on Tuesday refused to certify shocking new election results, which would have invalidated about 20,000 votes and handed the primary win to Benny Napoleon instead of Mike Duggan. The county board was debating whether to invalidate more than 20,000 write-in votes that were not recorded at polling locations using hash marks, which would cause the result of the Aug. 6 primary to be flipped — with Napoleon, the Wayne County sheriff, receiving more votes than write-in candidate Duggan. ■ PDF: Unofficial write-in summary for Detroit mayoral primary

Editorials: Lansing should act quickly to remedy Detroit election mess | Detroit Free Press

When the Wayne County Board of Canvassers refused to certify the results of Detroit’s Aug. 6 mayoral primary Tuesday, citing irregularities in the tabulation of write-in votes, many reflexively laid the blame at City Clerk Janice Winfrey’s doorstep. Only in Detroit, Winfrey’s critics clucked, could election officials mishandle enough votes to turn what had been declared a landslide victory for write-in candidate Mike Duggan into a lopsided victory for his rival, Benny Napoleon. But by Wednesday, just 24 hours after county canvassers asked the state to conduct a recount, the evidence suggested that they and County Clerk Cathy Garrett may have grossly overreacted to minor variations in the way some Elections Department workers recorded write-in votes for Duggan.

Arizona: Bill makes qualifying harder for minor-party candidates | AZ Central

Libertarians and Green Party candidates would be virtually cut off from running for office under new nominating-petition requirements in a bill now on Gov. Jan Brewer’s desk. Meanwhile, the legislation eases the number of signatures needed for Republican and Democratic candidates. On Tuesday, critics of the law said it’s a valentine for Republican candidates, who see third-party candidates, particularly Libertarians, as spoilers in races. The provision was tacked onto a wide-ranging election bill, House Bill 2305, one week before the Legislature adjourned. It passed on largely partyline votes in the closing hours of the session with the support of most Republicans and solid opposition from Democrats. On Tuesday, the minor-party officials said the bill, if signed, would cement the two parties’ hold on Arizona elections.

Alaska: Counting Anchorage election ballots could yield bubble trouble | Alaska Dispatch

Voters in a West Anchorage assembly race might be facing some bubble trouble. Starting Saturday, city officials will begin hand counting more than 7,000 votes cast in last Tuesday’s municipal election after concerns that some ovals marked correctly, according to municipal code, might not have been counted. At least that’s what the campaign of Nick Moe, the 26-year-old write-in candidate, is saying. Moe challenged incumbent Anchorage Assembly chairman Ernie Hall after Hall cut off testimony on a controversial ordinance designed to limit the power labor unions that do work for the city. On Monday, Moe’s campaign requested that Anchorage conduct a hand count of ballots in Assembly District 3, Seat D. That came after the city released a statement saying it would not perform a hand count unless the total number of write-in votes cast were equal to or more than the amount of votes for the leading candidate. The same release noted that there may be “other circumstances” where the votes would be hand-counted.

Editorials: Proposed Amendment Would Limit Voter Choice in California | Richard Winger/IVN

California State Senator Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) and Assemblyman Jeff Gorell (R-Ventura County) have introduced identical proposed state constitutional amendments that would change the top-two open primary section of the California Constitution. Lara’s bill is SCA 12 and Gorell’s is ACA 9. Article II, section 5 of the California Constitution includes the new primary rules, which say that the two candidates who get the most votes in the primary, for Congress or partisan state office, go on the November ballot. The Lara-Gorell amendment would change the language of this section to say that if the person who came in second in a primary is a write-in candidate, he or she could not be on the November ballot unless he or she received approximately 120,000 write-ins for a statewide office, 3,200 write-ins for State Senate, 1,600 write-ins for Assembly, or 2,500 write-ins for a congressional race. The specific formula is one percent of the last general election vote total for that office.

Voting Blogs: Unlikely Challenge: North Carolina Election Challenge Procedures and Write-In Candidates | State of Elections

“You can’t beat somebody with nobody”. On Election Day 2012, President Obama was re-elected, and North Carolina elected a Republican Governor for the first time in two decades. But there were thousands of other races further down the ballot, ones that are barely noticed by the public. In one of the most competitive counties in a swing state, on the last race on the ballot, a very odd thing happened. There was an election for an office that no one ran for. This election, for Watauga County Soil and Water Supervisor, had only write-in candidates since no one officially filed to run. Of the 27,764 ballots cast in Watauga County, only 1,839 votedin the race, all write in votes.  The election was won by Chris Stevens, a college student who registered to vote in September in Watauga County. The ineligible candidate discussed by this post, Alan Teitleman,finished fifth.

Arizona: Fake write-in votes cost the county | Arizona Republic

If some voters had their way, Mickey Mouse would be an Arizona senator. And U.S. president. And a mayor. And on every local school board. Donald Duck, a close runner-up for all those races, likely would concede. Mickey has always been the front-runner among fake write-in candidates. Superheroes from Marvel comics are popular, too, along with other characters from box-office favorites around election time. Some voters write in their names, or names of friends or family members. Others go on rants about politics on the write-in line. While some may find it funny, Maricopa County elections officials aren’t laughing. Every write-in entry must be verified with the list of legitimate write-in candidates for that election, by a three-member review team. In the August primary election, Maricopa County elections officials saw the biggest ratio of fake-to-legitimate write-in candidates in recent memory: Among 90,433 entries in write-in slots, 1,738 were votes for legitimate write-in candidates. Each fake entry cost Arizona counties money and manpower and slowed down the tabulation process, said Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell, who oversees elections.

Arizona: Fake write-in votes cost the county | Arizona Republic

If some voters had their way, Mickey Mouse would be an Arizona senator. And U.S. president. And a mayor. And on every local school board. Donald Duck, a close runner-up for all those races, likely would concede. Mickey has always been the front-runner among fake write-in candidates. Superheroes from Marvel comics are popular, too, along with other characters from box-office favorites around election time. Some voters write in their names, or names of friends or family members. Others go on rants about politics on the write-in line. While some may find it funny, Maricopa County elections officials aren’t laughing. Every write-in entry must be verified with the list of legitimate write-in candidates for that election, by a three-member review team. In the August primary election, Maricopa County elections officials saw the biggest ratio of fake-to-legitimate write-in candidates in recent memory: Among 90,433 entries in write-in slots, 1,738 were votes for legitimate write-in candidates. Each fake entry cost Arizona counties money and manpower and slowed down the tabulation process, said Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell, who oversees elections.

Maryland: Voter fraud allegations against Rosen prompt Maryland write-in campaigns | baltimoresun.com

The Maryland Democratic Party this week said it will back a write-in candidate challenging Republican U.S. Rep. Andy Harris in Maryland’s 1st Congressional District — which includes much of Carroll County — after voter fraud allegations ended the previous Democratic candidate’s bid. The party had scrambled for a replacement since its primary winner Wendy Rosen had to drop out of the race on Sept. 10, after confirming reports that she had voted in two different states in more than one election. The party this week threw its support behind John LaFerla, 63, a gynecologist from Chestertown, who had lost in the primary to Rosen by just 57 votes. But because LaFerla is late entering the campaign he will have to run as a write-in candidate, a distinct disadvantage.

Maryland: Democrats find new candidate for House race after voter-fraud claims knock out primary winner | Fox News

The Democratic Party has a new challenger to Rep. Andy Harris in Maryland’s 1st Congressional District, after voter fraud allegations ended the previous candidate’s bid, but the odds of his beating the incumbent are slim.  The party had scrambled for a replacement since its primary winner Wendy Rosen had to drop out of the race on Sept. 10, after confirming reports that she had voted in two different states in more than one election. Now, after a week-long search, the party has thrown its support behind John LaFerla, the 63-year-old gynecologist from Chestertown, who had lost in the primary to Rosen by just 57 votes.

Maryland: Democrats will run write-in candidate to replace Wendy Rosen | The Washington Post

Maryland Democrats plan to run a write-in candidate against Rep. Andy Harris (R), as Wendy Rosen — who quit the race Monday amid vote fraud allegations — will not be able to come off the November ballot. Rosen announced that she was leaving the race after the state Democratic Party uncovered voting records showing she had cast ballots in both Maryland and Florida in 2006 and 2008. Rosen issued a statement expressing “great regret, and much sorrow,” but did not directly address the allegations. Initially, Maryland Democrats said they would be able to pick a new candidate to replace Rosen on the ballot as long as they did so by Sept. 27, 40 days before Election Day. But while Maryland Election Law allows a ballot vacancy to be filled up to 40 days before the election, a candidate can only voluntarily withdraw up to 70 days before the election. That deadline was Aug. 28.

Michigan: Write-in votes in Republican primary could slow counting process | Detroit Free Press

It’s going to be a long night — and day — on Tuesday and Wednesday for candidates and voters in the 11th Congressional District in suburban Wayne and Oakland counties. The emergence of a vigorous write-in campaign by former state Sen. Nancy Cassis, R-Novi, means final results will be delayed until at least Wednesday afternoon. That may also slow vote tallies for issues on ballots in those communities. Local clerks will be able to determine how many votes Kerry Bentivolio, a Milford teacher, reindeer farmer, tea party activist and the only Republican who will appear on the ballot, gets on election night. But the results for Cassis — and the other two certified write-in candidates, Drexel Morton and former state Sen. Loren Bennett, both of Canton — will show up only as write-in votes after polls close. It might be possible to call a winner if Bentivolio has a significant majority of votes. But if write-ins are close to or exceed Bentivolio’s total, it gets complicated.

Florida: Seminole County commission write-in candidate keeps non-Republicans from voting in primary | Orlando Sentinel

Kevin Gross is running for Seminole County Commission, but you won’t see his name on a ballot. He doesn’t have a campaign website, and it’s unlikely he will knock on doors looking for votes. Gross, a registered Republican from Longwood, is a write-in candidate. Yet despite his low profile, he could have a significant influence on the District 3 commission race Aug. 14. Because of a loophole in state law, his candidacy means that only registered Republicans — about 41 percent of the county’s 260,000 registered voters — will be able to vote in the race. If not for Gross, all registered voters in Seminole could vote in the Republican primary. Across Florida, Republicans and Democrats alike have used the write-in tactic to keep voters from other parties out of their primaries.