Posts Tagged ‘news’

A Cincinnati-area pollworker writes of her experience on Election Day, which featured technology problems and substantial voter inconvenience. It was a bad day, but hopefully it will help make next year’s election better.

Yale’s Eitan Hersh has a new blog post in which he suggests that Democrats’ general support for off-year elections can be viewed through the same “voter suppression” lens they aim at GOP support for voter ID.

We’re not likely to have a lot of Election Day news today, but I’ll be trying to keep up with it here.

This morning, the EAC announced that two familiar names will join the agency in high-profile roles: Johnson County, KS’ Brian Newby as executive director and Washington DC’s Cliff Tatum as general counsel.

electionlineWeekly has a curtain-raiser on next week’s election, with vote by mail concerns in numerous states and localities, new machines, interesting initiatives in different communities – and a chance for one lucky Philadelphia voter to win $10,000.

The tiny city of Martindale, TX (pop. ~1,200) is facing a re-run of its recent mayoral election after a series of errors in administering the vote led a court to invalidate the results. This story highlights the challenges facing elections in the country’s smallest communities, which often involve complicated cost- and management-sharing arrangements that cross county lines.

Colorado SoS Wayne Williams is urging voters to forgo the mail and drop off their completed ballots in person, citing data suggesting that delivery of outgoing ballots had been delayed. It’s a story that is likely to become more commonplace as more and more ballots travel by mail at the same time there are concerns about USPS service.

Next Tuesday, Duluth, MN will vote on whether to adopt ranked choice voting for its city elections. It’s a question that has divided voters on questions of whether it will affect turnout, campaign tone, usability and outcomes – and is informed in part by the experience of previous elections in Minneapolis and St. Paul.

A recent column on ballot observer operations in Washington State is not only an insightful look at the process of managing ballots but also serves as a model for similar stories because it goes beyond the immediate story to highlight the issues and challenges facing state and local election administration.

New Mexico SoS Dianna Duran has resigned, leaving the state with the task of replacing her – first by appointment and then by special election – at the same time it is working to prepare for the 2016 election.