Bridgeport Ballot Shortage

[dawp]

http://www.salon.com/wires/allwires/11/03/D9J8Q5B80_us_not_enough_ballots/index.html

This is a 'Doh' situation if there ever was one. No matter how may show up, Have as many as there are registered voters. That should be common sense.

 

[Vette73]

I thought it was law, at least in the states I grew up in, that you HAVE to print as many ballots as there are reg. voters.

And how much does a ballot REALLY cost? Its a peice of paper that can be scanned. We used them in school all the time so i doubt they cost that much. Or someone is overpaying.

 

[dfuze]

From what they were saying on the local CT news was that they were told to photocopy ballots and use those, but then in another newscast I heard them say something like that is not legal to do so.

 

[Thump553]

I thought it was law, at least in the states I grew up in, that you HAVE to print as many ballots as there are reg. voters.

And how much does a ballot REALLY cost? Its a peice of paper that can be scanned. We used them in school all the time so i doubt they cost that much. Or someone is overpaying.

In CT it's up to the local officials (Registrar of Voters) to order the ballots. The Secretary of States, which oversees all elections in the state, reccommends ordering 110%, in order to account for spoilage, but has no authority to compel ordering. Bridgeport, the largest city in CT and heavily Democratic, has just under 70,000 registered voters. The Bridgeport Registrar of Voters, an elected official and Republican, ordered 21,000, has taken responsibility for the screwup, saying he did it to save costs. There were a number of high profile political appearances recently in Bridgeport, including Obama, Bill Clinton and the WWE holding a fan appreciation day/pseudo-rally (thier CEO was running for Senate).

According to the Hartford Courant ballots cost between fifty cents and a dollar each, depending on the number of questions, etc. (Aside-those prices absolutely astonish me).

When Bridgeport ran out of ballots early in the day and began turning voters away, the Democratic Party went to state court and got an order, among other things, requiring polls in roughly 12 Bridgeport districts to remain open an additional two hours beyond the state law closing time.

Turns out this incident/dirty trick is having a huge impact on the governor's race. If the after hours Bridgeport votes are counted it looks like the Dem candidate wins, if not, probably the GOP one. The GOP candidate has indicated he is going to litigate this, seeking to exclude the "illegal" Bridgeport votes cast after 8 PM.

Another fine example of American democracy by litigation. We also had a similar GOP lawsuit brought late last week by the GOP Attorney General candidate, claiming her Democratic opponent was not qualified to hold the office. A judge dismissed that frivilious lawsuit on its merits yesterday, the day after the GOP lost that race. The GOP candidate is considering appealling.

PS: Bridgeport did use some photocopied ballots, which apparently is also going to be part of the GOP's litigation to exclude counting votes actually cast.

 

[trenchfoot]

Republicans are well-known for their honesty and integrity. This was definetely an honest mistake by the registrar. As he explained, his intentions were good and fiscally sound. No matter the cost, I'm sure he will ask for a re-vote and pay for it out of his own pocket to clear up any misconception or suspicion that might sully his spotless reputation and standing in the community...........bwaahahaha

 

[dawp]

Just 21k? For almost 70k voters? that's not eve 1/3 of the voters. How the hell is he going to justify that? There should be a recall vote for this shit for brains.

 

[spacejamz]

Serious WTF....68K voters and past elections average 65% turnout which is about 44K voters and yet they only order 21K ballots?

Did math or common sense go AWOL in CT or something??

 

[Exterous]

Serious WTF....68K voters and past elections average 65% turnout which is about 44K voters and yet they only order 21K ballots?

Did math or common sense go AWOL in CT or something??

Do we know that the average turnout is 65%? If he were in my area - where average turn out is ~28% then I would cut him some slack for only ordering 30% of the ~70,000 registered voters. If it does average 65% then he needs to lose his job*

Edit: It says ordering the past 65% of ballots resulted in unused ballots so I would need to know the average turn out to know how much I fault him for this

Regardless the GOP litigation needs to be thrown out -NOW. Trying to refuse or call the votes 'illegal' because of a government screwup pisses me off

 

[Thump553]

CT law doesn't provide for recalls. OTOH our crooked politicians do get actualy jail time upon conviction and a relatively recent law allows for forfeiture of their pensions, etc.

The GOP lawsuit hasn't been filed yet, that I know of. They are almost certainly waiting for the Secretary of the State to officially certify the election results, which should happen today according to news reports. Then, depending on the margin of victory there may or may not be a recanvass (ie, recount) which must be completed by next Tuesday. Then the GOP will file their lawsuit.

Frankly, I long for the days of the mechanical voting machines. This so-called election reform mandated after the 2000 Florida debacle is an absolute fraud and a huge expense to the taxpayers.

 

[Thump553]

Bumping this to let people know how it came out. Foley (R) ended up losing by about 5600 votes statewide. Even if all the photocopied* ballots were disallowed, and all the voters who voted in Bridgeport after 8 PM were disallowed, Foley would still lose. He conceded yesterday and said no lawsuit would be filed. To his credit Foley eventually took the admirable position that he was never going to contest the photocopied ballots, regardless of what his legal team reccommended.

So we ducked a Florida situation here-this time around.

(*photocopied ballots-Bridgeport ran out of official ballots and had to use photocopied ones which had to be counted by hand).

 

[Throckmorton]

Small government taken to its logical end. Voting is expensive socialism. Stop living off the government teat and buy your own ballots.