Posts by Doug Chapin

Mindy Moretti has a great piece in this week’s electionlineWeekly about two valuable new resources available to election officials looking to wrap their heads – and perhaps some federal funds? – around election cybersecurity.

Earlier this week, the Department of Defense’s Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) released their 2017 annual report to Congress. FVAP is a lot like the American men and women it serves around the world: doing important work for the nation but in a way that doesn’t always get a lot of notice.

One of my favorite things about elections is how intensely human they are; of course, they’re deeply important to our system of democracy – but they are also an endless source of insight into how people think and act, as illustrated by a story today about the kinds of complaints the Wisconsin Election Commission gets on Election Day.

I often say that election officials aren’t just people I work with, they’re also some of my favorite people – which is why I really enjoyed a recent profile and Q and A of my friend and colleague, Santa Cruz County, CA’s Gail Pellerin, in the Santa Cruz Sentinel. It’s a revealing (and fun) look at life as a local election official.

Local election officials in Maine are moving ahead with preparations for ranked choice voting (RCV) in June despite lingering uncertainty at the state level which has generated more litigation.

Yesterday, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission released more information on the election security grants included in the federal omnibus budget bill, along with some answers to key questions about the funds.

The Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) has a great story in its latest ElectionBuzz newsletter focusing on Cape Girardeau County, MO’s effort to create a student-designed “I Voted” sticker.

In Wisconsin – a state, it seems, that cannot go very long without another election-related controversy – the courts, the governor and the Legislature are involved in a dispute whether special elections must be held in districts that have been vacant for over a year.

The elections community was able to breathe a huge sigh of relief yesterday when it was announced that former EAC Chairman Matt Masterson would be joining the Department of Homeland Security as a senior cybersecurity advisor.

There was lots of news last week from Washington, DC – but Washington State had its own big story with the enactment of a series of new laws (including automatic registration, Election Day registration and pre-registration) aimed at improving voter participation in the Evergreen State.