Weakness in an election system is exposed is when there’s a close race. I think a lot of people believe that all election officials are partisan and captured, but in my experience (admittedly anecdotal and local) that’s not true. For “career” people here, “landslide!” is their favorite result no matter which side wins, because that result won’t be contested. It has built-in credibility. It’s easier.
In Ohio, the weakest link in our process is provisional balloting. We found that out here when we had a very tight judicial race in 2010 and there were state and federal lawsuits, actual fact-finding rather than opinion or speculation, and a federal judge applied careful, diligent, serious thought to sworn testimony from poll workers and voters. She listened to them. She took it apart. She found out what happened. She discovered that many people didn’t know the rules, and thus the rules were applied differently from precinct to precinct. That’s a failure. Voters shouldn’t have to rely on a lucky draw or a clever advocate to get their provisional ballot handled properly, but that’s what happened.
This is a huge failure on the part of the Florida Governor and his appointees. Maybe it won’t matter, they won’t get caught out, but if it does matter, people should know what happened and what led to chaos and litigation and yet another hit to the credibility of our election system. It wasn’t unavoidable. It wasn’t a perfect storm or bad luck. They knew it going in:
Most Florida voters don’t know it, but come the Aug. 14 primary election, the majority of them won’t have the same opportunities to cast a ballot as Floridians in five counties because the state is enforcing two different sets of rules. That’s the basis of the latest lawsuit seeking to halt Gov. Rick Scott’s assault on voting rights. And it shows how determined the governor is to ignore law and precedent in order to manipulate the election process.
On June 29, the American Civil liberties Union of Florida, the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights organization, and state Sen. Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa, filed an administrative petition challenging the state’s policy that has created an illegal, dual system of elections.
Five Florida counties (Hendry, Hardee, Collier, Monroe and Hillsborough) operate under rules that were the law before 2011. These counties are “covered jurisdictions” under the Voting Rights Act. Consequently, any change in voting law or procedure must be approved (“precleared”) by the U.S. Justice Department or the federal court in Washington before it can be implemented. The remaining 62 Florida counties are operating under rules approved by the 2011 Legislature and immediately implemented by the Scott administration.
There are now different election laws and procedures on either end of the bridges across Tampa Bay; different rules for Naples and neighboring Bonita Springs; different rules for Miami and the Florida Keys. Joyner’s district spans three counties that operate under two different voting laws. This is a recipe for chaos and confusion. Has Scott forgotten Florida’s embarrassing performance in the 2000 election?
Conducting an election with rules that vary from county to county also violates Florida law requiring the secretary of state as chief election officer to “maintain uniformity in the interpretation and implementation of the election laws.”
The secretary, an appointee of the governor, is ignoring established interpretations of election law that governed the administration of elections under both Democratic and Republican administrations.
In 1998, facing an almost identical situation of a new election law and a required Voting Rights Act review, the secretary of state followed a Division of Elections advisory opinion that election law changes not be implemented anywhere until the law received approval.
The division determined that all 67 Florida counties must enforce the existing election code and not implement changes that had yet to be federally approved: “To do otherwise … has the potential to cause widespread voter confusion, affect the integrity of the election process, impair uniform application of the election laws and could violate federal and state law.”
The governor of Florida and his political appointees have designed this thing to fail when it’s tested with a close race. If it does fail and we see the lower-level career people or poll workers or voters on television remember: they’re not the bosses. There will be an effort to cover for the top people, because somewhere along the way we’ve decided that top executives and managers get all of the rewards but none of the responsibility.
Florida leaders have abandoned a Florida advisory opinion, the state’s own tragic history and experience with election administration, and common sense. They have a rock-bottom duty of basic competence in administering an election and they’ve already failed at that if a court has to order them to apply rules consistently. They should know that. They DO know that. They’re going forward despite knowing that.
the Conster
It’s hard to care about Floridians at this point. They elected a known criminal – what did they expect? If everyone who was meh about him at the time he got elected isn’t outraged and chomping at the bit by the millions to vote him out after everything they know about him now, then too bad so sad. Now with TB.
Poopyman
You say “failure”, but I’m guessing the good governor sees it as a “feature”.
Kay
@the Conster:
My problem with that is, it isn’t just Floridians. We’re all stuck with the weaker or weakest link in national elections.
Kay
@Poopyman:
I honestly don’t know. Running a Medicare-scam business may have very little in common with running a state. I think we should re-examine that whole idea.
c u n d gulag
I know that if I could vote, and had some of the bullsh*t happen to me, I’d get an attorney and personally sue the Governor, the SoS, and then, the entire state of Florida, for denying me of my legitimate right to vote, which is a Civil Rights violation.
Can people do that?
And if they can, why aren’t we telling to do just that?
It’s probably NOT legal to personally sue them – which is the only real way to stop these feckers:
Have them personally sued by ALL of the individuals – or, a Class Action Suit.
I can’t believe after the 1960’s, these evil assholes haven’t been stopped from monkeying with elections.
And remember, if “Voter Suppression” doesn’t win it for them – they still have a lot of electronic voting machines just willing to flip votes the way Mitt flips his convictions.
Nemesis
Great plan in FL. They leave the voting rolls cluttered with bad data, then use that bad data as reason for culling thousands of voters from the rolls. A created scandal.
With Portman (from OH) as VP, mittbot is expecting to be handed FL by Bat Boy and win OH outright with his VP candidate.
If we lose fair and square, I can deal with it. But things are shaping up to be quite contentious in November.
Nemesis
@the Conster: Well, yes, he was elected governor by the people. It was a time of much disgust with government which is still with us today. I doubt most who voted for this creature really understood what he would do once in office. His approval rating are in the tank. I doubt he cares. His job, not unlike like Kasick and Walker and the rest is to do maximum damage in minimum time. Voters have notoriously short memories.
Kay
@Nemesis:
FWIW, I think this is complete and utter DC nonsense. I canvassed for Sherrod Brown recently. He’s been an Ohio Senator since 2006, and he’s up for re-election. Conservatives have spent 10 million dollars on tv ads since April making up outlandish lies about him. More than a few voters I spoke with had no idea who he is. I would bet 5 dollars that Portman, who is perhaps the least-memorable person on the planet, will have little or no effect on Mitt Romney’s chances in Ohio. It’s punditry. Nothing to do with reality.
Davis X. Machina
@the Conster:
Good feelings deep down inside. Their team is winning! Providing competent governance to for the state of Florida is nice, if you can get it, but it’s not essential. Just win, bay-bay!
Gaming the system, right up to the level of outright electoral fraud, never hurts a politician if it works, just as steroid use, alleged or proven, never hurt an athlete with his home team fans.
I had numerous conservatives tell me in 2000 that Bush did steal the election, but that’s the very reason why he should be president in the first place. Because he wanted it bad enough to cheat. And that’s the kind of toughness the office requires.
Redshift
@Kay: Definitely. The VP “carrying his state” is below even “no president has ever won with…” in the list of political myths. It’s hard to justify even if you ignore the fact that the data set is too small to make any real conclusions.
I recall Nate Silver writing that governors are possibly the only endorsement that actually matters, because they have actual resources they can deploy in support of a candidate. But the idea that having your governor chosen as VP would excite people enough change the outcome in a state is pretty silly, just based on how many people care about their governor or the VP.
Elizabelle
We need to federalize presidential elections.
Is that possible, legally?
Because the whole country pays the price if Florida or Ohio doesn’t get its shit together (or throws too much into the works).
Kay
@Redshift:
I would take it one step further. Mayors matter, a lot, for Democrats in states like mine because we are so reliant on turnout in populated areas (cities). We need mayors who LOVE the national Democrat. Mayors who will bust ass to drive up turnout.
Mayors don’t matter for Republicans because they run up 70/30 vote totals in counties with very few people in them :)
kindness
The Brooks Brothers revolution of 2000 ain’t seen nothing yet if the modern criminal organization known as the Republican Party has it’s way. And Florida isn’t the only ground zero here.
Mino
Too bad voters have no standing if they want to go into federal court to sue their state for this kind of shit on federal elections.
Dcrefugee
To Florida’s elected officials, this is a feature, not a bug…
DCr
Xenos
@Elizabelle:
No. Unfortunately, that would take a constitutional amendment. Not a bad idea, but not a short-term or even medium-term possibility.
Zifnab
@c u n d gulag:
Republicans remember the 60s well, specifically because that era delivered a major blow to their power base. They lost control of the electoral system, and had to spend much of the following two decades with Democrats in the driver’s seat in both Houses and numerous governor’s mansions.
Populism brought it all back for them in the 80s and 90s, but now they want to retain their gains. That means rigging the votes even when their popularity is on the decline. I can’t blame them. If I was working with 30% of the electorate that actually supported me and 50%+ that hated my guts, I’d be figuring out how to keep those 50%ers the hell away from the polls, too. What continues to stun me is the apathy shown by the Democratic Party. So many party officials seem to be either too scared or too unconcerned to really crack down on the real American voter fraud.
ericblair
@Xenos:
Of course, the Supreme Court was helpful enough to federalize the presidential election in 2000 by curb-stomping the Florida Supreme Court. Then they helpfully told everybody that this was a one-off that can’t be used as precedent, because, really, Al Gore sighed a lot and we don’t like him so there.
Also having a presidential candidate win the presidency by a disputed result in a state run by his brother gives that nice, tropical, banana republic feel to the whole thing.
PeakVT
Has Scott forgotten Florida’s embarrassing performance in the 2000 election?
Republicans view the outcome in Florida as a success.
cmorenc
@Kay:
No, in fact Scott’s goal is to put as many mechanisms in place as possible to manipulate any close election toward a GOP victory, just like Kathleen Harris was able to do in 2000, except only with even more tools at his disposal.
Pyro Joe
Thanks for this Kay.
I’m working to help register voter’s in Hillsborough county with the YDA, OFA, and College Dems right now and believe me, this crap has annoyed the hell out of all of us. Sure, we’ve technically got a leg up due to the VRA, but in practice it’s a different story. At least when it comes to registration and turning in forms, we try to act within these new restrictions in case the new restrictions are somehow OK’d and we wind up in the same boat as the rest of the state.
At the very least, Hillsborough is an important swing district with a major urban area (Tampa Bay), so if nothing else we can try and encourage a high turnout here.
Villago Delenda Est
Kay, this is all by design.
The comparison between Scott and Lex Luthor is apt precisely because Scott is doing all this deliberately.
This is all part of the plan to insure, no matter what, Rethug rule in Florida.
If Floridians do not rise up in revolt and give Scott the Ceausescu treatment he has earned through his actions, then they are sheeple. Period.
gene108
Our election system can only fail of Barack Hussein Obama is re-elected.
It worked in 2000 because Bush, Jr. won and not that liar (I invented the internets), Gore, Jr.
I’m sorry to inform you the above is the view of most people because if it doesn’t effect them directly it doesn’t matter and if a Republican wins the media will just politely take the dictation of the right-wingers as they celebrate or if Republicans lose, they’ll repeat the vitriol as fact from right-wingers.
gene108
@Zifnab:
It’s not the Democrats. It’s the voting public in general.
If 10% of PA voters, for example or 20% of Philadelphia voters (or whatever the actual numbers are), will be disenfranchised because of the voter ID laws, that means 90% of the voters in PA and 80% of the voters in Philly will be unaffected.
We aren’t wired, as a species, to give a lot of thought to things that don’t directly affect us and if you still allow 80% of registered voters to vote without any major inconvenience, you haven’t upset the apple cart too much for most people to care.
Matt McIrvin
@Xenos: Also, federalizing elections could just lead to the same corruption on the federal level, though admittedly there are fewer points of failure.
Federal or not, I do think it’s a serious problem that the people at the top of the election system tend to be explicitly partisan, elected officials (state secretaries of state). It’s the last thing you want.
Kay
@gene108:
I have probably said this before, but I think that provisional ballots as a safety valve for voter ID disenfranchisement were a mistake. In a bad provisional ballot process (they’re not all bad, some are designed to work) provisional ballots are a false assurance, a placebo, a sop, a patronizing pat on the head.
If we were refusing 10% of voters, turning them away, there would be more outrage. Instead we’re handing them….something.
BruinKid
Like Jon Stewart said a few weeks ago about the election process, Iowa starts it off, and then Florida goes and shits all over it.
Supernumerary Charioteer
Wasn’t ‘you’re using two sets of standards’ the Supreme Court’s rationale behind denying Gore the recount in 2000? Is that a usable fact at all?
TenguPhule
Summary Televised executions after quick trial and conviction would solve this problem, just saying.
GxB
@Davis X. Machina:
Doesn’t surprise me in the least. This same mentality justifies paying the very smallest amount in taxes (ie. cheating) and tut-tutting anyone caught blatantly ripping off the system. America is all about “winning”, no matter the short sightedness of the “win” – the ends justify the means.
rikyrah
now THIS I didn’t know.
thank you Kay for this.