Since Election Day 2020, the integrity and accuracy of the vote has been the subject of speculation across the country, with local boards of elections often caught in the crosshairs.
Here in Ohio, election officials seem to have avoided much of the controversy. With far-right groups and supporters of former President Donald Trump still questioning the 2020 results, several red states have moved to give legislatures more power over elections instead of secretaries of state, and penalize election workers for technical mistakes.
Aaron Sellers, public information officer for the Franklin County Board of Elections, said while politics are political, elections administration in Ohio is not.
“Everything we do here is done in bipartisan teams,” Sellers emphasized. “For example, when the voting-location person brings back the supplies on election night, if that person is a Republican, there’s a Democrat ride-along person that comes along with them, or vice versa.”
More than half of voters in a recent Quinnipiac poll said they do not believe there was widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election. Ohio’s postelection audits revealed an accuracy rate of 99.98% in 2020 and 99.99% in 2021, based on data from counties utilizing a percentage-based audit.
While other states scrambled to develop a plan for voting in 2020 due to COVID, Sellers pointed out Ohio was ahead of the curve. Critics argued mail-in voting is more susceptible to fraud, but he explained there are multiple verification processes before the ballot is even mailed out.
“And when it is returned, there’s additional measures that we go through before we put that in the pile to count,” Sellers added. “It’s verification signatures, the last four digits of their ‘soc,’ (Social Security number) their driver’s license number, whatever they’re providing, those things are checked on the front end and the back end before those ballots are counted.”
With Ohio’s legislative and congressional district maps still not set in stone, Sellers noted boards of election are in a holding pattern when it comes to preparations for the May 3 primary.
“We’re just as anxious as I’m sure our elected officials are to get this resolved,” Sellers emphasized. “Elections officials, we take an oath to do this, and when it’s scheduled we’ll do what we need to do like we did in 2020 because of COVID.”
Wednesday, Republican Senate President Matt Huffman suggested keeping the May 3 primary for statewide and local elections, and holding a second for statehouse and congressional seats. There are concerns about the cost for two primaries, as well as the possibility of lower turnout.
Support for this reporting was provided by The Carnegie Corporation of New York.
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Florida Republicans are proposing yet another sweeping change to state election laws.
The new bill would establish an Office of Election Crimes and Security – a slimmed-down version of Gov. Ron DeSantis’s “elections police” proposal.
Sponsor, state Sen. Travis Hutson – R-Palm Coast – says it’s meant to safeguard elections.
But Mark Earley, the supervisor of elections for Leon County, said it also adds further restrictions to voting by mail that could cause more confusion and problems.
“We’re very concerned, as supervisors of elections,” said Earley, “that the requirement for these identification numbers from the vote-by-mail certificates is going to disenfranchise voters, complicate the process and make it much more difficult for us to get our vote-by-mail ballots tabulated by election night.”
The bill also would require voters to write identification numbers on mail-in ballots and create a new envelope, which Democrats say raises new barriers.
Elections supervisors say they were not consulted on the proposed changes, but Earley said they’re now vigorously trying to provide input.
Election supervisors would have to update their voter lists more frequently under the bill, which also would increase the penalty for so-called “ballot harvesting” to a felony.
But there was unified consensus that Florida’s last elections went smoothly, even in public statements by Gov. DeSantis and Florida’s elections chief, Laura Lee.
Earley said in his 36 years working on elections, Florida’s was already operating at its best prior to the changes in 2021.
“[They] were more than accurate and very, very good and well designed to ensure the security and the trust of elections,” said Earley. “Some of these other laws that have been coming forth since then, frankly are playing with people’s fears, and it’s regrettable in many ways.”
Groups, including the League of Women Voters, are already waiting on a federal judge to determine whether the last elections overhaul, Senate Bill 90, unfairly discriminates against minorities, older voters and people with disabilities – in part through long lines at the polls, as alleged in the lawsuit.
Support for this reporting was provided by The Carnegie Corporation of New York.
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A big deadline is coming up this week for North Carolina legislators, who have yet to spell out the process for redrawing new electoral maps.
This month, the state’s highest court ruled the first round of redrawn voting districts would give a disproportionate advantage to one party and violates the state Constitution.
Bob Phillips, executive director of Common Cause North Carolina, said lawmakers have until February 18 to submit new maps to the court.
“They must include some statistical rationale and evaluation,” said Phillips. “It must be written, that shows the districts are not partisan gerrymanders and complies with the high courts’ order. That’s something new; we’ve never seen anything like that, that I know of.”
He added the court has final approval of the new maps and notes any legal appeal of the second round of redrawn districts must be filed by February 23.
Executive Director of the North Carolina Business Council Vicki Lee Parker-High said the state’s economy depends on fair representation – and businesses rely on elected officials to advocate for the issues that affect them.
“Employment laws and zoning laws, and trade laws and any others, any of the laws relating to commerce,” said Parker-High. “Businesses are starting to understand that this is an important issue, and one that they have to weigh in on.”
Parker-High also pointed to billions of dollars in federal and state funding designated for small businesses. She noted business owners need to have a fair voice in how those funds are spent as the state looks to bounce back from the pandemic.
“We want to make certain that the people that we vote in to represent us as those funds are distributed,” said Parker-High, “so that they are distributed throughout the state.”
A survey this month of more than 1,500 people found that, although half of participants don’t know how their voting districts are drawn, 48% said they oppose partisan gerrymandering.
And three-quarters said they favor a “transparent process” for drawing district maps.
Disclosure: North Carolina Business Council contributes to our fund for reporting on Budget Policy & Priorities, Civic Engagement, Environmental Justice, Health Issues. If you would like to help support news in the public interest, click here.
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The Texas 2022 primary is approaching and nearly 12,000 possible voters have been flagged as potential non-citizens, prompting a lawsuit by the ACLU of Texas, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and other groups.
Latinos and Asian Americans comprise the largest number of naturalized citizens in Texas, and letters from county election administrators ask them for proof of citizenship.
Ashley Harris, attorney for the ACLU of Texas, said if there’s no response within a certain time frame, they are purged from the rolls and will not be allowed to vote.
“It’s not right that naturalized citizens should have to jump through extra hoops,” Harris contended. “It’s just an extra hurdle and an extra burden on them which other folks don’t have to do.”
The Texas secretary of state initiated a process last August to identify alleged non-U.S. citizens on the voter rolls. Harris emphasized the lawsuit was filed because despite federal laws requiring Texas to make information about the process publicly available, the secretary has failed to do so. Texas holds its first-in-the-nation primary elections March 1.
This is not the first time voter-protection groups have fought battles in Texas. In 2019, the state was sued over an attempted voter purge of more than 90,000 people, many of whom had been recently naturalized.
Harris noted the lawsuit will prevent a purge until at least June, after next month’s primary election.
“Federal law actually requires that there be a pause on removing folks from voter rolls in this fashion, this close to an election,” Harris pointed out. “But we’re hoping that it can be resolved for future elections.”
Numerous lawsuits, including one by the U.S. Department of Justice, have been filed over the new Texas GOP-drawn congressional map, alleging it dilutes the voting power of minorities. But after five conservatives on the Supreme Court this week let stand a congressional map for Alabama critics say was racially gerrymandered, a successful challenge to the Texas map seems in doubt.
Support for this reporting was provided by The Carnegie Corporation of New York.
Disclosure: Carnegie Corporation of New York contributes to our fund for reporting on Civic Engagement. If you would like to help support news in the public interest, click here.
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https://www.publicnewsservice.org/2022-02-10/civic-engagement/ohio-election-official-politics-are-political-election-administration-is-not/a77815-1