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Here, I
use the definition of Swing States by the Swing State Project. Please
select your state of interest to proceed. (If there is no link, that
means there is no content for that state yet).
NEW
MEXICO 11/16/04
[Permalink]
Numerous (potentially
hundreds of) ballots rejected in New Mexico for trivial reasons such
as missing middle initials or other minor technicalities Via
reader LV, an article in the Albuquerque
Journal:
A Democratic attorney
and an election volunteer for the party said workers disqualified
hundreds of provisional ballots cast in Bernalillo County because of
names that had a missing middle initial or some other minor
discrepancy. They urged commissioners to reconsider the rejection of
those ballots, if they could.
The commissioners, however, said they didn't have
authority to question the qualification of provisional ballots. They
voted 3-0 in favor of certifying the Nov. 2 election results, which
were sent to the Secretary of State's Office.
Roughly half of those ballots were disqualified in the
canvassing process. The most common reason was that the person
wasn't registered to vote anywhere in the county.
But Democratic attorney Jim Noel said his party's
observers had seen at least 330 provisional ballots rejected due to
minor discrepancies. Those were cases where voters had to show
identification but the ID didn't exactly match the name on the voter
registration.
The ballots were tossed even if it was only a
middle initial that was missing, he said.
Herrera also told the Journal on Thursday that
ballots were rejected if the person's name on the registration rolls
didn't match the name they signed when voting.
Herrera and a county attorney said Friday that
they were following instructions from the state. "It doesn't
mean I agree with it," Herrera said.
But Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron said
Friday she did not instruct clerks to toss provisional ballots if
the signatures did not exactly match the person's name on voter
rolls.
She said voters' addresses and first and last
names must match, but officials should not have invalidated ballots
if middle initials or titles such as "Jr." or
"Sr." did not match.
"Common sense has got to be applied
here," Vigil-Giron said.
She said her office probably will return election
results to counties if officials rejected ballots because signatures
did not perfectly match voters' names on registration rolls.
11/11/04
[Permalink]
Several hundred
provisional ballots of registered Democrats disqualified in New Mexico
by Republican judge; ballots certified "good" turn out to be
all Republican; this news comes as reports indicate that provisional
ballots in New Mexico are being rejected at higher rates than expected Via reader
radtimes, here is a report in the Albuquerque
Tribune:
A Republican judge in
one voting precinct has some explaining to do, Bernalillo County
Clerk Mary Herrera said this morning.
As the weary clerk's
staff continued to examine provisional ballots, attention gathered
on one batch in which the disqualified ballots all were Democrat and
those that qualified were Republican, Herrera said.
Herrera's staff had
been combing through 2,000 "questionable" ballots, which
led to the certification of 1,400 of them.
Those that weren't
certified bothered her staff. The main reason for disqualifying
them, she said, was because an affidavit testifying to the voter's
identity, which is supposed to be signed by a presiding judge, was
not in the outer of two envelopes that are supposed to be turned in
to election workers. That rule was prescribed by New Mexico
Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron.
Today Herrera said a
Republican presiding judge in one particular precinct was in charge
of several hundred bad ballots. The problem, Herrera said, was that
the bad ballots, with affidavits inside, were largely Democrats. The
good ones were for Republican voters.
"It made us kind
of sick," Herrera said. "It was too obvious."
Herrera did not know
which precinct had the problems, but she planned to meet with the
presiding judge today.
"Right now I'm
giving them the benefit of the doubt," Herrera said. "I'm
hoping they wouldn't do that purposely. I will talk to that
presiding judge."
Reader radtimes also sent in this
report from the Albuquerque
Journal:
Provisional ballots in
Bernalillo County are being rejected at a rate higher than earlier
estimates.
And that makes it
even more unlikely that John Kerry can overtake President Bush in
New Mexico.
As of Tuesday
evening, Bernalillo County election officials working under the
watchful eye of Republican and Democrat observers had reviewed about
9,000 of the approximately 13,000 provisional and in-lieu-of ballots
cast in last week's election.
Here's an approximate
breakdown so far:
- 3,000 have been
accepted and will be counted;
- 4,000 have been
rejected and won't be counted;
- 2,000 are
undergoing further review;
- The rest have not
been reviewed.
The
"reject" category so far is bigger than election officials
had predicted.
"It's a lot
sadder than what I would expect because that's a lot of people who
thought that their vote counted and it didn't," said County
Clerk Mary Herrera. "That's because they didn't understand what
a provisional ballot really was. A lot of them thought that they
could go vote anywhere."
The primary reason
for rejecting the ballots was that the people who cast them were not
registered to vote, she said.
11/2/04_1
[Permalink]
Older News: Non-partisan
voter registration drive illegally blocked in New Mexico and decision
reversed after criticism mounted Via
PFAW/NAACP,
here is a report:
In
New Mexico, officials at
several Indian Health Service (IHS) hospitals and clinics stopped an
on-site, nonpartisan voter registration program saying that even
nonpartisan voter registration was prohibited on federal property.
Clinic staff involved in the registration complained, noting
that the federal government has encouraged registration on military
bases. As
criticism mounted, the Indian Health Service, a division of the
Department of Health and Human Services, clarified its position
saying that outside groups may register voters at IHS facilities but
that “no IHS employee will be registering voters as part of his or
her official duties.” When
asked for clarification, IHS officials would only say that employees
are expected to follow the Hatch Act, the law restricting partisan
activity by federal workers.[i]
[i]
Jo Becker, “Indian Health Agency Barred New-Voter Drive,” Washington Post, 10/6/04
10/30/04
[Permalink]
Flashback: Another
ACORN-related registration fraud incident. Again, it involved an
employee previously fired by ACORN. Via
Votersunite,
an incident
from August 2004 (bold text is my emphasis):
Bernalillo County
Clerk Mary Herrera plans to meet with the U.S. Attorney's Office as
early as this week to discuss suspicious voter registration forms.
"It's going to
be up to them," Herrera said. "I am not a
prosecutor."
Herrera has almost
3,000 voter registration forms with errors on them. Many could be
honest mistakes, such as a registrant who failed to sign their name
or who gave a faulty address.
But then there's the
case of Glen Stout's 13-year-old son, Kevin, who received a voter
registration card in the mail last week.
...
Rep. Joe
Thompson, an Albuquerque Republican and lawyer. The lawsuit was
filed Friday in state district court.
Thompson and others
added Stout to the lawsuit and are now blaming voter registration
groups for submitting many of the thousands of incorrect voter
registration forms turned in to the Bernalillo County Clerk's
office.
They have zeroed in
on the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, which
says it has turned in 25,000 voter registration forms. ACORN
employees are paid $8 an hour to register voters, and workers
receive a $50 bonus if they turn in more than 24 new voter
registration forms per day.
On Tuesday, Stout and
Thompson stood outside ACORN's door at 411 Bellamah Ave. N.W. and
blamed the group for faulty voter registration cards.
"We have
proof," Thompson declared.
Part of that
proof, they say, includes a copy, produced by Thompson, of young
Stout's voter registration form, turned in by Christina Gonzales, a
former ACORN employee.
But Matthew
Henderson, a spokesman for ACORN, disputed Thompson's claims, and
said his organization fired Gonzales in May for what he called
"dishonest practices" unrelated to voter registration
forms.
He took issue with
Thompson's assertions about voter fraud and said his organization
has three full-time staff members who work to identify fraudulent
cards.
Yet another case indicating that ACORN
was defrauded by a former employee. More
on ACORN here. 10/22/04
[Permalink]
E-voting machine
nightmare begins: votes for one candidate show up repeatedly as votes
for the opposing candidate in New Mexico
Via chicagoprogressive
at Dailykos, we have this report in the Albuquerqe
Journal:
Kim Griffith voted on
Thursday— over and over and over.
She's among the people in Bernalillo and Sandoval
counties who say they have had trouble with early voting equipment.
When they have tried to vote for a particular candidate, the
touch-screen system has said they voted for somebody else.
It's a problem that can be fixed by the voters
themselves— people can alter the selections on their ballots, up to
the point when they indicate they are finished and officially cast the
ballot.
For Griffith, it took a lot of altering.
She went to Valle Del Norte Community Center in
Albuquerque, planning to vote for John Kerry. "I pushed his name,
but a green check mark appeared before President Bush's name,"
she said.
Griffith erased the vote by touching the check mark
at Bush's name. That's how a voter can alter a touch-screen ballot.
She again tried to vote for Kerry, but the screen
again said she had voted for Bush. The third time, the screen agreed
that her vote should go to Kerry.
She faced the same problem repeatedly as she filled
out the rest of the ballot. On one item, "I had to vote five or
six times," she said.
Michael Cadigan, president of the Albuquerque City
Council, had a similar experience when he voted at City Hall.
"I cast my vote for president. I voted for
Kerry and a check mark for Bush appeared," he said.
He reported the problem immediately and was shown
how to alter the ballot.
Cadigan said he doesn't think he made a mistake the
first time. "I was extremely careful to accurately touch the
button for my choice for president," but the check mark appeared
by the wrong name, he said.
Bernalillo County Clerk Mary Herrera said she
doesn't believe the touch-screen system has been making mistakes. It's
the fault of voters, she said Thursday.
Cadigan, for example, could have "leaned his
palm on the touch screen and it hit the wrong button," she said.
In Sandoval County, three Rio Rancho residents said
they had a similar problem, with opposite results. They said a
touch-screen machine switched their presidential votes from Bush to
Kerry.
Bureau of Elections Manager Eddie Gutierrez also
said he doesn't believe there are problems with the machines.
But Gutierrez did replace one after someone
complained— even though he found nothing wrong with it.
"He (the voter) felt so strongly about it,
that I shut it down," Gutierrez said.
Herrera said she's heard stories from Democrats and
Republicans. In some cases, when people have tried to vote a straight
ticket, the screen has given their votes to every candidate in the
opposite political party, she said.
She believes it's a people problem. "I have
confidence in the machines," she said. "They are touch
screens. People are touching them with their palms, or leaning their
hand. ... They're hitting the wrong button."
It is outrageous to simply blame the
people for this. e-Voting machines have long shown problems and this
is a threat to democracy.
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