There is something unacceptable here. Can you find it? Almost 1,000 votes were provisional and of that they are overwhelmingly for Obama. I think this number has to be examined. How did it get so high? Provisional ballots are what they give you at the polls to shut you up when they won't allow you to vote. Why were so many given out to valid voters? Also, how many did they actually have that they didn't count in the election?
3 comments:
They tried forcing a provisional ballot on me because next to my name on the voting rolls it says that I was mailed an absentee ballot. I told them I didn't use my absentee ballot and they called the HQ who verified that they hadn't received one from me, so I was allowed to vote regularly.
I suspect I wasn't the only one with this issue.
They were probably students who moved to Miami-Dade for school. The new law says that Florida voters must vote provisional when they move to new county and have not updated their registration with their new address. Students overwhelmingly support ODumbo.
The very poor also change districts a lot, which can yield this kind of result. I canvassed in such a neighborhood this year, and found only about 25% of the names I had matched the residents that the campaign had on file. The result is often confusion about where to vote (esp. among election-year only voters in the first Pres. election following a redistricting), which can sometimes lead to a provisional ballot. In working class and middle-income neighborhoods, my names and addresses were between 75% and 95% matching, fwiw.
This is definitely another area that is ripe for improvement. There will always be some provisional ballots, but you're right that the number could be lowered by more effective election law and administration.
Post a Comment