Stop, Drop, and Poll - What to Do if You Have Problems Voting
Anecdotal evidence is coming in fast and furious of early-voting incidences including voting machine malfunctions in Ohio, Putnam, and Jackson Counties in West Virginia and Davidson and Decatur Counties in Tennessee, as well as hidden problems with “straight ticket” voting (confirmed by Snopes) in Texas and West Virginia. A more complete list of the problems so far can be found at VotersUnite.org.
It CAN happen to you. If it does, here are a few suggestions on what to do:
1) Video Your Vote
If possible, plan ahead for any problems by bringing a video camera with you to Video the Vote. Then, spread it around (send it to us and we’ll help). Remember, the focus should be on gathering evidence and not telling stories. So, use video, audio, photographs to document what happened. Also, get names and phone numbers of witnesses, voting machine serial numbers, names of poll workers, and document the time of day.
2) At the First Sign of a Problem, Stop*
At the first sign of a problem with your machine (or if you experience any of the other problems listed below), stop what you are doing and ask to speak to the supervisor/officer of elections (skip the poll worker) at your polling location. Explain your problem. If they try and waive you off, call your main election commission number and ask to speak to the election commissioner who will satisfactorily address your problem. Keep in mind that many poll workers/supervisors will try and blame the voter aka “operator error.” Do not leave your polling place until your problem is well-documented and addressed to your complete satisfaction and, if the problem is with a machine, that machine is quarantined. Oh, and you get to vote. Never leave the polling place without voting.
3) File a Report. File Several Reports.
Your local polling place will have incident reports available to you. If they do not, call the main election commission for your county and ask for someone to bring one to you. Make sure that both you and the supervisor sign it. An example of a report is here (Hat tip: Wake Up and Save Your Country Voters Guide). The U.S. Election Assistance Commission also lists on their website where you can find out how to file a report in your state. Again, the Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights Election Protection Hotline at 1-866-Our-Vote can also help with any questions in this area.
4) Call the Election Protection Hotline
Report you incident to the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Election Protection Hotline at 1-866-Our-Vote, especially if you feel you are being bullied or your incident is not being taken seriously. The ACLU has a hotline as well at 1-877-523-2792. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and Greg Palast offer suggestions as well in their comic StealYourVoteBack.org.
5) Pledge to Stand Up to Stolen Elections
Go to NoMoreStolenElections.org and pledge to not concede until every vote is counted - and counted as cast.
*Problems can include: machine problems, polling place problems (machines not set up on time), switching or closing of polling place, voters forced to vote on a provisional ballot, long lines/waits, intimidation, unusual ID demands, poll workers asking inappropriate questions, etc.
UPDATE: One of TrueVote.Us’s members has a great suggestion to add to this list: “Voters who see their vote being flipped by the machines on election day, if they can’t get the machine taken out of service, they should immediately begin telling all the voters still waiting in line exactly which machine flipped their votes. (Third machine from the left, or whatever.) Try to get people…to refuse that machine. This could cause trouble, backups, and increase the pressure on the local officials to mothball that machine. No doubt people are already complaining both to the officials and to election activists and lawyers waiting outside - but the other voters waiting in line also need to know. [I took out a bit of this that was very partisan because we believe that fair and honest elections are no-partisan and non-ideological. - Ed.]
Over 1.6 million Voters Purged in New York State
Bo Lipari, Executive Director, New Yorkers for Verified Voting, writes on his blog today that over 1.5 million voters were purged in New York State:
But a question has remained, how many voter records have been purged from New York State’s voter rolls? Now we have an answer. I submitted a Freedom of Information Law request for all records in New York’s NYSVOTER voter registration database. Early in October, I received a copy of NYSVOTER records from September 23, 2008. I wrote a program to analyze the 12,010,045 voter records and can now report the number of voters who have had their status set to “Purged” or “Inactive” in the Empire state, and the reasons given for the change.
The data reveals that New York State has moved 1,661,244, or almost 14% of the voter records, from “Active” status to “Purged” or “Inactive”, meaning they will not be in the poll books on Election Day. Whether or not these changes are valid is anybody’s guess, and there’s no way to know for sure how many of these have been incorrectly removed from “Active” status. But I’ll wager that a significant number of these records are actually legally registered voters who should be allowed to vote on Election Day, but won’t be.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: If you live in New York State, you can check your registration online at https://voterlookup.elections.state.ny.us/votersearch.aspx. If you’d rather call, you can find the number of your county election commission here or call information and ask for the number of your county’s election commission.
You know, as I am writing this I am realizing that the word to check your registration will spread fairly easily among people who have access to the internet, but what about the people who don’t? Does anyone in New York have any ideas on how to get the word out to people without computers and internet access?
Steal Back Your Vote
In June 2006, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., wrote “Was the 2004 Election Stolen?” for Rolling Stone, and followed it up in September 2006 with, “Will The Next Election Be Hacked?.” He’s back, this time with investigative journalist Greg Palast (author of The Best Democracy Money Can Buy), with another chapter in his bid to save our democracy, “Block the Vote (Will the GOP’s campaign to deter new voters and discard Democratic ballots determine the next president?). Here are the highlights:
“On Super Tuesday [2008], one in nine Democrats who tried to cast ballots in New Mexico found their names missing from the registration lists…[In] Las Vegas…nearly 20 percent of the county’s voters were absent from the rolls…In state after state, Republican operatives…are wielding new federal legislation to systematically disenfranchise Democrats….”All these new rules and games are turning voting into an obstacle course that could flip the vote to the GOP in half a dozen states.”…Paul Weyrich: “I don’t want everybody to vote. . . . As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down.”…Republican election officials at the local and state level have used the rules to give GOP candidates an edge on Election Day by creating new barriers to registration, purging legitimate names from voter rolls, challenging voters at the polls and discarding valid ballots….To justify this battery of new voting impediments, Republicans cite an alleged upsurge in voting fraud….federal courts found only 24 voters guilty of fraud from 2002 to 2005, out of hundreds of millions of votes cast…The recently enacted barriers thrown up to deter voters include: 1. Obstructing Voter-Registration Drives… 2. Demanding “Perfect Matches”…3. Purging Legitimate Voters From the Rolls…4. Requiring Unnecessary Voter ID’s…5. Rejecting “Spoiled” Ballots…6. Challenging “Provisional” Ballots…Add up all the modern-day barriers to voting erected since the 2004 election…and what you have is millions of voters, more than enough to swing the presidential election, quietly being detached from the electorate by subterfuge….If Democrats are to win the 2008 election, they must not simply beat John McCain at the polls — they must beat him by a margin that exceeds the level of GOP vote tampering.”
For those of you who think this an unfair attack on one political party, I ask you to read the article and think of the news you’ve been hearing the last couple of weeks. News about ACORN (1. Obstructing Voter-Registration Drives?), the use of contested voter registration lists (2. Demanding “Perfect Matches), and voter roll purges (3. Purging Legitimate Voters From the Rolls). What makes you believe that stories about 4. Requiring Unnecessary Voter ID’s, 5. Rejecting “Spoiled” Ballots, and 6. Challenging “Provisional” Ballots aren’t just around the corner? As Kennedy and Palast remind us (and as you can see by watching Uncounted), we’ve already seen instances of these in 2004, 2006 and this year’s primaries.
It’s simple really - one of the few things that’s black and white in this very nuanced world. Voter registration and encouraging participation in the our country’s greatest tradition is good. Fighting hard to suppress this participation is very, very bad. If you’re still not buying it, then replace “Republican” with “Democrat” and vice versa, and reevaluate.
Kennedy and Palast also add seven ways to steal back the election in another collaboration - a full color downloadable comic called, “Steal Back Your Vote.” This one’s a how-to guide:
STEP 1: DON’T DON’T DON’T mail in your ballot!! Absentee ballots are often not counted for the weakest of reasons. Furthermore, there are new rules in many states that you must photocopy your ID and send it with the ballot. However, they often don’t even tell you that. So hundreds of thousands of absentee votes will not be counted for this reason.
STEP 2: VOTE EARLY …VERY EARLY! Many states are already allowing you to vote. Do it NOW. That way if you’re not listed on the voter roles, you have plenty of time to get your complaint heard.
STEP 3: REGISTER AND THEN REGISTER AND THEN REGISTER! There is a TON of purging of voter rolls going on. It’s not enough to think you’re registered. Double check twelve times. You can check online at www.votersunite.org. Once you’re done with that, go register. …Then go register. [For most states. the registration deadlines have passed. So CHECK YOUR VOTER REGISTRATION! at VotersUnite.org. Some states have a way to check online, others you will have to call. If you find you are no long on the rolls, go down to your election commission and sort it out in person.]
STEP 4: DO NOT FILL OUT A PROVISIONAL BALLOT if your vote is challenged!! In 2004 the Republicans challenged a ridiculous number of voters. The voters were then told by a sweet little lady at a table that their “provisional ballot” would be counted, BUT IT WON’T. Don’t listen to the little old lady!! DEMAND that poll judges make the judgment ON THE SPOT. Demand a call to the supervisor of elections. If you have to, go home and come back with a better form of ID. If you need help, call ELECTION PROTECTION at 1-866-OUR-VOTE. And help those around you when you’re at the polling place. Look for people having trouble. Call the number for them. Tell them not to fill out a provisional ballot!
STEP 5: STEP AWAY FROM YOUR COMPUTER! Walk out your front door and get active!! Volunteer to help with the campaign. Or ignore the campaign and do something on your own. It’s as simple as printing out these ELECTION PROTECTION steps and leaving them at people’s doors. Hell, you could hand them out outside the polling places. Don’t sit still or this election will be stolen. And go to a swing state if at all possible.
STEP 6: FRIENDS DON’T LET FRIENDS VOTE WITHOUT FRIENDS! Don’t go to vote alone. Bring friends!! Lots of them or only one of them. Make it a date. Arrange to have lunch with everyone after you vote. Whatever it takes. And have your election protection phone number WITH YOU (1-866-OUR-VOTE).
STEP 7: IT AIN’T OVER ‘TILL IT’S OVER! If the election is indeed stolen, don’t throw in the towel! The day after is CRUCIAL! Three words need to be chanted over and over again: COUNT EVERY VOTE. For example, in 2000 Al Gore lost because of a Supreme Court decision that was 5-4 against him. Imagine if he had won that court decision. But if half of America had not chanted COUNT EVERY VOTE after election day, we would never have gotten to the Supreme Court. Half of America could’ve thrown in the towel on election night, but thanks to people in the streets, it was fought to the end.
Vote Flipping in Davidson County, Tennessee
This political season, more than any other in recent memory, is irony-filled. So why this incident involving my friend and the wife of UNCOUNTED filmmaker, David Earnhardt, surprises me, I can’t tell you.
My wife, Patricia Earnhardt, had an early voting experience here in Nashville, Tennessee, where she saw her vote momentarily flip from Barack Obama to Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney. She voted on a touch-screen paperless machine. Here is her story:
“A poll worker directed me to a touch screen voting machine & instructed me how to use it. I touched “Obama” for president & nothing lit up. I touched 2 or 3 more times & still nothing lit up. I called the poll worker back over to tell him I was having a problem. He said I just needed to touch it more lightly. I tried it 2 or 3 more times more lightly with the poll worker watching & still nothing lit up. The poll worker then touched it for me twice — nothing lit up. The third time he touched the Obama button, the Cynthia McKinney space lit up! The McKinney button was located five rows below the Obama button. The poll worker just kind of laughed and cancelled the vote. He hit the Obama button again & it finally lit up. I continued on to cast the rest of my votes. After completing the process & reviewing my votes, I went to the VOTE page, hit the VOTE button & nothing happened. Again after several tries, I called the poll worker over & he finally got the machine to register my votes.” Patricia Earnhardt - Friday, Oct. 17 - Howard School Building - Nashville, Tennessee
I also had similar problems with the machine I was voting on that same day, although no vote flipping. I would touch the screen numerous times before I could get my various candidate choices to light up. It was strange and very frustrating. When I finally got through my slate of candidate choices, I could not get the VOTE button to light up when I touched it. I finally called over a poll worker and he told me that I needed to touch lightly. I touched the VOTE button more lightly, but was only able to get it to work after several more failed attempts.
David Earnhardt
Producer/director/writer, “Uncounted”
www.UncountedTheMovie.com
Need more sad irony? The machines David and Patricia voted on in Davidson County, TN - ES&S iVotronic - are the same machines used in the West Virginia counties (Putnam & Jackson) where vote flipping is also being reported. Go to the election info page on the state of Tennessee and click on Davidson County. Or download this PDF.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Please, if you experience anything unusual, stay at your polling place, ask to speak with the supervisor, call the election commission (they will have the number), and insist that the machine be quarantined until it can be examined.
Uncounted Clip of the Week: It Ain’t Heavy, It’s My Election
In response to the 2004 electronic voting machine debacle, hundreds of locally-based Election Integrity groups were formed in cities across the country by brave patriots who knew they could no longer trust our electoral system. The formation of these groups – and accompanying journalists, bloggers, activists, filmmakers, and writers - was grass roots citizen vigilance at its finest. And even though by 2006, as this clip from UNCOUNTED shows, the mainstream media (including MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann and Joe Scarborough, and CNN’s Lou Dobbs) had caught on to the electronic voting machine problems, the heavy lifting of protecting our vote was left up to the men and women who started the Election Integrity movement.
It’s no different now as the manufactured false narrative of “voter fraud” by community-based organizations like ACORN spreads like wild fire through the 24-hour news cycle. What is different, though, is that after four years of these amazing grass roots activists spreading their knowledge through web sites, articles, emails, books, movies, and comics, the power is back in the hands of the people who are sharing the heavy load of protecting our democracy. Every day, in response to stories of systematic attempts of voter suppression in precincts all over the country - voter roll purging, intimidation, etc., - additional stories are reported of these attempts being thwarted.
It’s three weeks before an historic election – an election that could once again have Keith Olbermann reporting that the “final outcome could rest on compromised vote counts.” But knowledge is power, so use the power your knowledge of our compromised election system gives you to question, to challenge, and to never, ever let anyone tell you that you can’t vote.
Send Lawyers, Phones, and Money
The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and its Election Protection coalition partners are recruiting legal volunteers to staff Election Protection Hotlines across the country and work on the ground as mobile legal volunteers.
Through their phone hotlines: 1-866-OUR-VOTE (administered by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law) and 1-888-Ve-Y-Vota (administered by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials Education Fund), their website, and field programs across the country, they provide Americans all across the country with comprehensive voter information and advice on how they can make sure their vote is counted.
If you are an attorney, law student, or paralegal, we need your help to protect the right to vote. We’re recruiting legal volunteers to staff Election Protection Hotlines across the country and work on the ground as mobile legal volunteers.
Volunteers must attend in-person a 2 hour training session and are asked to sign up for a 4 - 5 hour shift. Materials will be provided. Individuals will volunteer for both a hotline and/or Mobile Legal Volunteer shift and training directly online.
Go to nationalcampaignforfairelections.org to sign up.
For those non-lawyer types, you can help too by sponsoring the Election Protection Hotline (1-866-OUR-VOTE), which connects trained volunteers with voters in need to troubleshoot problems at the polls in real time.
(H/T Mark Crispin Miller)
Everybody Loves ACORN
Over the weekend Senator McCain said that there were “serious allegations of ‘voter fraud’ in the battleground states across America,” and that ACORN was to blame.
These allegations, unfortunately, are nothing new. But there is something funny about them - they tend to pop up every two years like clockwork and the organization that is targeted - ACORN - never gets charged or prosecuted. ACORN faced accusations in 2004 as well as in 2006, THE YEAR JOHN MCCAIN WAS THE KEYNOTE SPEAKER at an Immigration Rally sponsored by the group in Miami, Florida.
Brad Friedman over at BradBlog gives us an update from Sharona of Voice of Americans 2008 a “musical tribute to McCain’s change of heart about ACORN, followed by a local news report from his appearance at the ACORN immigration reform rally in Florida (note all of the folks with the red ACORN shirts on in the crowd shots)…”:
Hey, can we get back to talking about the economy now?
“Voter Fraud”: Zero to 60 in 3.5 Seconds
Election Reform Needs Media Reform
Thank you, Mark Crispin Miller, for succinctly writing what I have been fuming about all day. In an introduction to an incredible piece in OpEdNews called, “The False Narrative of ‘Voter Fraud,’” by Kenneth Anderson, Mark writes: “Amen, amen. And what it makes entirely clear is that we need not just election reform (and campaign finance reform), but also sweeping media reform.”.
This whole thing about McCain grabbing the moral high-ground on the Election Integrity issue by hopping on the “voter fraud” bandwagon is really getting my goat. Those of you who ask those of us in the reality-based community to put on our tin-foil hats when we talk about a vast right-wing media conspiracy, need only look at what is happening right now for the truth…Election Integrity activist and independent journalists have been trying to get the media and the punditocracy to talk about this issue for FOUR YEARS and yet it only takes 3.5 seconds for “ACORN” and “voter fraud” to be on everyone’s lips? Really?!? At this point you have to ask yourself, “Why IS that?” and “HOW is that?”
The False Narrative of ‘Voter Fraud has some answers. Here are excerpts:
A false election narrative of “voter fraud” is currently under construction in various swing states and being built by the Republican party and their media organ, Fox News. The narrative, that the Democratic party and, more specifically, Barack Obama, will steal the election through fraudulent voter registration, is being fleshed out by various state Republican party organisations, Republican Attorneys General and the McCain campaign. A false equivalence is being made between fraudulent voter registration and voter fraud.
GOP-led vilification of the grass roots community organization, ACORN, is now in full swing, after state police in Nevada raided the office of ACORN in Las Vegas in a desperate attempt to paint the organisation as rife with voter fraud intent. The only evidence that voter registrations gathered by ACORN were problematic were actually provided by ACORN itself, which flags potentially invalid voter registrations and submits those registrations to state election authorities. The raid has been describe as a “stunt,” a stunt designed to do bolster the voter fraud narrative. More raids in other critical swing states are expected. And let’s be clear about one thing: ACORN actively canvases low income — usually inner city — neighborhoods throughout the country in an effort to get more low income citizens involved in the electoral process. This is exactly not the demographic Republicans want to see enfranchised in elections.
These GOP driven state-level efforts have attracted the attention of Fox News, which is now in full propaganda mode, breathlessly pronouncing the phrase “voter fraud” and “ACORN” at every possible opportunity. During one broadcast, a Fox News host pondered recent events:
“Barack Obama is ahead right now in many of the battleground states — the same states where investigations are under way for voter fraud. Is this a coincidence?”
Clearly, this is not a coincidence. These “investigations” are being triggered by local Republican agents. They represent a direct response to the looming electoral defeat of John McCain and are occurring in conjunction with GOP-orchestrated challenges to new voter registration. But the Fox News implication is exactly reversed from reality, ridiculously claiming that pre-election polls of an Obama surge in swing states must be somehow be the result of fraudulent voter registrations.
Fox News, in the middle of their Brit Hume panel discussion (Brit wasn’t there), didn’t “bat a TV eye,” nor mentioned a word about the news conference, but-after a commercial break-continued with an “ACORN” report (and alleged ties to Obama) throughout the entire time that Paulson was speaking to the nation, and to the world, about one of the worst financial crises we have ever faced.
After years of known electoral fraud, of Republican-linked corporations and their daft voting machines, after numerous, anomalous election results, suddenly and in a matter of days, the Republican machine has pressed the issue of “voter fraud” to the front and center of this election. It is a case that demonstrates the power centers of American politics, where GOP-connected corporations rig elections and are rewarded for their efforts, while humble, community organizations that encourage the poor and the dispossessed to vote are lambasted on the national political stage. This is a disgrace beyond measure, and it must be stopped.
WHAT YOU CAN DO: Spread the truth about ACORN far and wide. Refute “voter fraud” with real stories of “voter suppression” to everyone you know.
Democrats Demand Answers in Wake of Greene County Voter Suppression Controversy
In response to Sheriff Gene Fischer and Prosecutor Stephen Haller (a former law partner of McCain campaign chairman Mike DeWine) seeking “the un-redacted voting records of every Greene County voter who registered and cast a ballot between September 30th and October 6th - including driver’s license numbers and social security numbers,” the Ohio Democratic Party Chairman Chris Redfern “filed several Freedom of Information Act requests demanding records of contacts between the Greene County Republican officials and representatives of the Ohio Republican Party, the McCain campaign, and the Republican National Committee.”
“When a chilling act of voter suppression occurs in a county with five universities, including two historically African American colleges, on the eve of a historic election, voters have a right to know exactly who was involved and how it came about,” said Ohio Democratic Party Chairman Chris Redfern. “The Republican officials involved have deep ties to both the Ohio Republican Party and the McCain campaign. If Mr. Haller, a former law partner of the chairman of the McCain campaign, has nothing to hide about his role in this controversy, then why does he refuse to answer questions?”
Last week, “in the face of mounting public pressure,” Fischer and Haller’s request was withdrawn, with Haller stating in a press release that he “will have no further comment on this matter.”
WHAT YOU CAN DO: If you hear about a story like this where you live, become part of the “mounting public pressure” in your area. Pick up the phone. Send emails. Write a letter to the editor. Tell all your friends.
McCain and Company Co-opts Election Integrity
After 4+ years of activists and independent journalists trying - with little success - to get Democratic party leaders to take the issue of election fraud and voter suppression seriously enough to bring it out of the shadows, it’s officially too late. The issue, along with the righteous indignation and moral high ground that comes with trying to protect our precious right to vote, has been co-opted by the most recent perps: the Republicans. After four years the Democrats still haven’t started talking about election fraud and it’s taken Senator McCain, what, like 3 days?
Despite McCain and company’s maneuverings, Brad Friedman of BradBlog rightly calls out their actual intent as an “assault on democracy” and points out that are still completely ignoring the real problem, “Concerns of Actual Election Fraud, Voter Registration Purges in State After State…”:
The GOP’s October “Surprise” continues…Even as it’s no surprise at all that they are hoping to cause absolute bedlam at the polls. They are off to a good start, as the Democrats seem to be caught flat-footed, despite years of warnings about all of this.
The latest Republican assault on democracy began earlier this week with a ’stunt’ raid in (swing state) Nevada, then unsubstantiated allegations in (swing state) Missouri last night (raid coming soon, no doubt), and just hours ago as AP reports, it’s (swing state) Ohio…
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Law enforcement officials in southwest Ohio are seeking information on hundreds of voters who registered and voted during Ohio’s weeklong same-day voting window.
Greene County Sheriff Gene Fischer and representatives of County Prosecutor Stephen Haller have contacted the local Board of Elections asking for the voter registration cards of everyone who voted during the six-day window, which ended Monday.
Haller is the former law partner of Mike DeWine, the former Republican senator who is chairing presidential nominee John McCain’s Ohio campaign.
[Update: In an updated version of the AP report quoted above, it’s noted that Sheriff Fisher is “a Republican,” that Green County is “rich with Democrat-leaning college students,” and that Fisher requested the voter information after “he had been inundated with phone calls from people concerned about possible fraud.” In other words, no actual evidence of anything, just angry Republicans, fired up by chasing their own tails after Fox/RNC told them too. Smelling the rats here, yet?]
Whatever fear the Dems had of talking about this issue seems a tad bit silly right about now…