Why Did Long Voting Lines in Dem. Ohio Precincts Mean Low Voter Turnout?

[Time for change]

On Election Day 2004, when I first heard numerous reports of huge voting lines across the country, especially in the heavily Democratic cities of Ohio, I thought that that was great news for the Kerry/Edwards ticket. Isn’t it logical to think that long voting lines in Democratic areas would equate with high voter turnout in those areas? Even if thousands of voters get tired of waiting and leave, you still have the long lines as evidence of high voter turnout, right?

Not quite. For various known and unknown reasons, long voting lines in Ohio on Election Day 2004 not only failed to equate with high voter turnout – it actually equated with very LOW voter turnout.


Reports of Long Voting Lines in Ohio, Election Day, 2004

The national Electronic Incidence Reporting System (EIRS) is a system for receiving and documenting election related complaints. There were four Ohio counties on Election Day that received the great majority of EIRS reports relating to long lines. These were Franklin (268 reports, 317 per million registered voters), Cuyahoga (150 reports, 149 per million registered voters), Summit (49 reports, 133 per million registered voters) and Mahoning (18 reports, 97 reports per million registered voters). For those reports where the county was specified, only 54 of these reports were received from the remainder of the state, a rate of only 10 per million registered voters. Furthermore, the vast majority of these reports from each of the four above specified counties came from the largest city in the county – Columbus, Cleveland, Youngstown, and Akron, respectively.


Turnout and voting tendency in counties and cities with numerous reports of long lines

Voter turnout in the other 84 Ohio counties combined averaged 72.7%. This compares with a voter turnout average of 66.1% in the four counties where numerous long lines were reported and only 56.2% from the four cities where the vast majority of the reports came from. More specifically:

Columbus – 53.9%
Cleveland – 53.4%
Youngstown – 52.3%
Akron – 73.2%
Rest of Ohio – 71.2%

The four cities with numerous reports of long lines went very heavily for Kerry. Overall, they averaged 71.4% for Kerry, 25.4% for Bush – a vote margin of 46%. The rest of the state voted only 46.7% for Kerry.


Why?

Only in Franklin County has the reason for the apparent contradiction of low voter turnout in the face of long voting lines been well studied. In that county we know that the lines were as long as 11 hours and that thousands of voters left the polls without voting because of the long lines. Furthermore, we know that Columbus had far too few voting machines to handle the massive voter turnout there, and it has been shown statistically by Elizabeth Liddle that this probably cost Kerry 17,000 votes in Franklin County. And, we also know that voting machines were purposely withheld from heavily Democratic areas of Columbus.

The explanation for Mahoning County has not been well studied. Mahoning County, like Franklin County, was one of the few Ohio counties to using electronic voting machines in 2004. Furthermore, we know that in Mahoning County there were numerous complaints by voters who tried to vote for Kerry, but saw the machine register a vote for Bush, and who sometimes had to make several attempts before they successfully got the machine to register a vote for Kerry.

We don’t know the explanation for Cleveland at all. Cleveland used punch card machines, and unlike the counties that used electronic machines, the punch card counties did not demonstrate an inverse relationship between number of voting machines and voter turnout. The long lines in Cleveland were generally considerably shorter than those reported in Columbus, so probably Cleveland didn’t lose as many voters (per population) as Columbus to the long lines. Perhaps Cleveland votes were electronically deleted by the county’s central tabulator. There has to be some explanation for why a city with so many long voting lines nevertheless demonstrated such a low “official” voter turnout.

Akron was the only one of the four cities with numerous long line reports where turnout was pretty good. Maybe whatever plagued the other three cities was absent in Akron. But even so, turnout in Akron was five points lower than in the rest of the county.


What were the consequences?

Is it reasonable to believe that voter turnout in the four places in the whole state that were characterized by numerous reports of long voting lines really experienced a voter turnout of 15 percentage points LESS than the rest of the state? Let’s suppose that the real voter turnout (as opposed to the “official” voter turnout) in those four cities was comparable to the rest of the state of Ohio. With a Kerry vote margin of 46% in those cities, and 1,059,819 registered voters, that would mean 1,059,819 X 46% X 15% = 73,107 more net votes for John Kerry.


Conclusion

Huge voting lines in combination with low voter turnout just don’t make sense, and they certainly do not suggest a legitimate election. When this occurs in four of the most heavily Democratic areas of the state, in an election run by a sleazy Republican Secretary of State, one has to be very suspicious. This needs to be investigated further, and we can’t allow this to continue to happen.

[Boredtodeath]

1. we can’t allow this to continue to happen

And how would you suggest we stop it?

Officials and voters BEGGED for more machines to be delivered to these precincts where the lines were disenfranchising voters.

The people in charge said NO.

So, tell me, how is it we should stop it?

Perhaps we should buy up our own voting machines on EBay and deliver them to precincts when the officials refuse?

[MarsThe Cat]

5. i don't think they let people provide their own voting machines...

so i hope you were kidding.

what has to happen is that the MSM has to run stories with banner headlines, that explain in detail the fraud that went on in florida in 2000 and ohio in 2004, and that Gore would have won ANY legitimate recount of Florida, despite the shenanigans.

but that AIN'T gonna happen.

maybe history will reveal the truth, but i doubt it.

[Boredtodeath]

15. I was being sarcastic

But, if someone tried it, I bet the officials would deliver REAL machines in a big hurry, don't you?

Walk in the door with your own machines and the TV cameras.

[NicRic]

59. pass law ,no police I.D. checks for warrants @polling lines !

This was one of the tatics used in Florida I belive to keep some minorities from showing up at locations to vote. Not because the had warrants ,even though some may have ,just the idea of being harrased by police for going to vote, goes against the foundation of our right to vote and there needs to be some kind of legislation in the area ,that when it comes to voter lines hands off by police ,unless some kind of disturbence is taking place ,so far they are the disruption , its unbelieveable to me that this took place five years ago in our country ! Then this guy "wins" re-election ! Someone wake me up from this long nightmare !

[Time for change]

65. The tactics they used in 2004 in Ohio were every bit as bad or worse

They had groups calling Democratic voters and telling them that Democrats were supposed to vote on November 3rd. And, they had some groups calling people to tell them (falsely) that they were inelligible to vote, and if they tried to vote they would be sent to jail.

[Time for change]

9. I wish I knew how to stop it

All I know how to do is study the issues and try to publicize them, like I'm doing here. I think that understanding what happened is always a good first step.

How would you stop it?

[mod mom]

11. I recently suggested to an Ohio Election Reform list serv to send info to

Jim Petro (OH Republican Attorney Gen who placed sanctions on the attorneys who contested the Ohio vote). My reasoning was that since he is running against Blackwell for the Repub slot in the governorship, it would behoove him to want to have fair, trusted elections w/o Blackwell's influence. My idea was shot down. I was told he couldn't be trusted and it was a waste of time. comments.

[Time for change]

14. Wow. Well, if he placed sanctions on attorneys who contested the Ohio

vote. And if contesting the vote was the only reason that he had for placing sanctions on them, then I would certainly tend to agree that he couldn't be trusted. But then, I don't know much about Ohio politics.

[mod mom]

19. reason was "frivoulous suit-can you believe it? I am not siding with the

guy, only thinking our enemy (Blackwell) is his enemy. He has the power and the necessity to facilitate change (assuming he wants to possibly win the race).

[Time for change]

22. Well, why not?

It would be good to have those guys fighting against each other.

[Boredtodeath]

13. Legal requirements.

Change the election laws to require a 1 hour resolution of anyone standing in line to vote longer than 1 hour.

In other words, mandate additional machines if a precinct suffers waiting periods of 1 hour or more. Immediate resolution, bring in more machines.

[mod mom]

20. BTD, surely you are aware of the controversy surrounding the recent

defeat of the 4 election reform initiatives. Changing laws assumes politicians in office wanting change (not nationally right now as well as in Ohio) or voter initiatives with FAIR votes.

[Time for change]

23. That sounds good to me

We need a lot more than that, but I think that even that one law, if enforced, would make a lot of difference.

[warrens]

2. People get tired of the line and go home

Or the line is cut off when the deadline comes. It's not necessarily fraud. The fraud is not delivering enough machines in Dem districts.

[Time for change]

6. In Franklin County people leaving the voting lines explain most

or all of the decreased turnout.

In the other counties it's hard to say. Cleveland and Akron use punchcards, and according to the data, failure to provide enough machines did not lead to depressed "official" turnout in those counties.

Blackwell has not been cooperative at all with those who want to investigate what happened in Ohio on election day. I think that there very well may have been kinds of fraud other than simply misallocation of voting machines. It doesn't seem that lack of voting machines can explain the problem in Cleveland or Akron.

[philb]

31. In Cuyahoga there was lots of manipulation of vote counts in multiple

precinct polling places; lots of people who voted didn't get their vote counted or counted for the person they intended to vote for

likewise much fraud was found in other smaller Ohio counties
http://www.flcv.com/greenrc.html

[philb]

32. Lots of touch screen switching in Mahoning, Franklin, etc.

http://www.flcv.com/mahonts.html
http://www.flcv.com/franklin.html

But Florida had a lot more touch screen switching than any of the other states; and also the most systematic dirty tricks and minority voter purges
http://www.flcv.com/fraudpat.html

[philb]

37. Lots of long lines and dirty tricks in the big S. Florida counties

http://www.flcv.com/browardo.html
http://www.flcv.com/palmbeao.html
http://www.flcv.com/dadeo.html
http://www.flcv.com/duvalo.html


in addition to lots of touch screen switching and other manipulation

[Time for change]

76. I know what you mean about the switching in Mahoning County

Here's a report I wrote on it:

http://ohioelection2004.com/WordHost/VoteSwitchComb.doc

I didn't notice any touch screen switching in Franklin County though

[Time for change]

44. I think that one of the biggest issues in Cuyahoga County was

voter registration fraud:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2237782&mesg_id=2237782

This thread is still active in GP-D

[Time for change]

45. There is some very good information here - thank you

I'm particularly interested in the part about the poll books not matching with the actual count. It's disgusting that they found this problem, and not much further was done about it.

Here is the quote:
From what they were able to get through, witnesses found that signature counts were very much different from the official recorded number of ballots.

If signature counts didn't match the number of ballots, that suggests manipulation of the official counts, and could very well explain the very low turnout in Cleveland (and elsewhere as well)

[unpossibles]

87. I voted first thing in the morning

and waited over 2 hours - when it usually takes about 30 minutes. I saw only one person leave the line at that time, and there were what seemed the normal number of booths, more or less. When I left, the line was almost twice as long, and most people were chatting and being friendly while waiting. I saw some people bring coffee and umbrellas to people, and everyone was anxious to vote.

I was so excited to see that many people voting, and knew that people had turned out in record numbers, especially after hearing similar stories from friends all over Columbus. I first started to get suspicious when that night the poll numbers jumped for no reason. Then, when I saw how the voter turnout was only about 10-15% higher than normal, I called BS. There is no way it is possible. Especially when you look at the turnout all over the rest of the state - it doesn't match. A lot of the people in that city were excited by the possibility of change. My biggest fear: that we lost a lot of voters who may now think it doesn't matter.

[Time for change]

90. You're exactly right

People did turn out in record numbers. And that doesn't match at all with the "official" voter turnout figures that we have.

[azmouse]

3. The right to vote

needs to be made a Federal right and it should not be left to the states. It wouldn't hurt to keep the partisan hacks (like Blackman in Ohio) from controlling the elections either.

[Time for change]

18. It certainly does

We need a constitutional ammendment. And it's absolutely ridiculous to allow partisan hacks like Kenneth Blackwell and Katherine Harris to run elections. They both should be seriously investigated for election fraud.

[Pachamama]

4. I was in the Akron/Canton precincts on Election Day - All the voters who

stood there in the long lines, said that they never had seen anything like that and when many of them got into the polling place, often many of them were either being "challenged" or told that they weren't on the registery so they had to be considered for a provisional ballot and not allowed to vote. There were also reports of far fewer "voting booths" than usual. People who had been living in those precincts, voting for decades at the same church or school were saying that they had never had a problem, never been told they weren't on the registry of voters, or that there were always far more voting booths. In fact, many of the older voters would be coming over to us (the election protection volunteers) and say that they had voted in the primaries that year and that there were now only half as many voting booths as had been in the primaries. I believe this was a big factor in the creation of the long lines. Then, in addition to the pouring "ice" rain, and the fact that many of the folks waiting a long time, had to go back to work. My feeling has been that this was a deliberate attempt to turn people away and to make the votes cast (in this case for Kerry since these were predominantly Democratic areas) be lower. If I had seen this on that day in only one location, I would have said that it might have been just that polling place. But I was rotated to 4 places that day. I saw it at all 4 polling places in the Akron/Canton area.

I have all along believed that this was one of the very clever ways they disenfranchised voters and I have no idea if its ever been investigated. The problem is that unless one can show it was deliberate, how does one prove that there was criminal intent. I just know what I saw and heard from the citizens of Akron/Canton. It was and I will believe it to the day I die, the dirtiest election that ever was and I do not, do not for a minute, believe that George W. Bush won Ohio. No effing way.

[Time for change]

21. This is great information - thank you

Some people aren't very impressed with the fact that 40 some reports of long lines in Akron were sent in to the EIRS system. So your eye-witness account of 4 different polling places lends an air of reality to this, and suggests that the EIRS system does provide an indication of what is going on, though it is only the tip of the iceberg.

And yes, it was indeed a very dirty election.

[flordehinojos]

7. bush's fuzzy math applied to the voting process!

[mod mom]

8. We need to push elected officials to stand behind the GAO Report and

demand no further elections until safeguards are in place. In Ohio, this means prior to the '06 primary election when Blackwell is running for governor, as well as counting the votes.

I've posted this before, but for those of you who missed it, here is a promising DNC response:

"BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends touch screen (DRE) machines not
be used until a reliable voter verifiable audit feature can be uniformly incorporated into these
systems and that in the event of a recount, the paper or other auditable record should be
considered the official record; and"

from:

DNC Resolution in Support of Election Reform
November 19th, 2005
The following resolution will be considered by the DNC Resolutions Committee at its meeting on December 1, 2005, in conjunction with the meetings of the Democratic National Committee, December 1-3, 2005.
Submitted by: Donna L. Brazile, At Large/District of Columbia
Hartina Flournoy, At-Large/District of Columbia
Ben Johnson, At Large/District of Columbia
Resolution in Support of Election Reform
WHEREAS, in June, 2005, the Democratic National Committee completed its exhaustive
review of the presidential campaign in Ohio; and
WHEREAS, the resulting report, “Democracy at Risk: The 2004 Election in Ohio” documents
that more than one quarter of Ohio voters reported problems with their voting experience, and
African Americans were more than two times as likely as white voters to claim they encountered
problems with their voting experience; and
WHEREAS, this report confirms evidence of widespread voter confusion; voter suppression;
negligence and incompetence on the part of election officials; long lines at the polls; improper
requests for voter identification, particularly among young voters and African American voters;
the failure to properly process absentee ballots and the improper use of provisional ballots in
Ohio on Election Day 2004; and
WHEREAS, evaluations of the administrative processes and technology used by election
officials in Ohio revealed that inadequate and insecure voting systems were pervasive
throughout Ohio—unreliable punch card systems and insecure, unverifiable direct record
electronic (DRE) machines; and
WHEREAS, 71 percent of white voters in Ohio were very confident their vote was counted but
only 19 percent of African American voters were confident their votes were counted; and
WHEREAS, the right to vote and to have that vote accurately counted is the bedrock on which
our democracy stands and nothing is more fundamental to our freedom than our confidence in
the integrity of our democratic institutions; and
WHEREAS, “Democracy at Risk: The 2004 Election in Ohio” makes recommendations for
future action by parties, legislators and local election officials to improve future elections;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) will
continue to work with Members of Congress, lawmakers in all 50 United States, the District of
Columbia, and all U.S. Territories, local election officials, and community leaders to update and
reform our election laws to ensure that voter confidence in our election system is restored and
maintained;
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC “Democracy at Risk: The 2004 Election in
Ohio” recommends several actions; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends states, the District of Columbia
and all U. S. Territories codify into law all required election practices, including requirements for
the adequate training of official poll workers; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommend lawmakers adopt uniform and clear
published standards for the distribution of voting equipment and the assignment of official poll
workers among precincts, to ensure adequate and nondiscriminatory access, and that these
procedures be based on set ratios of numbers of machines and poll workers per number of voters
expected to turn out, and should be made available for pub lic comment before being adopted;
and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers adopt legislation to
make clear and uniform the rules on voter registration; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers and local election
officials adopt clear and uniform rules on the use of, and the counting of, provisional ballots, and
distribute them for public comment well in advance of each Election Day, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends touch screen (DRE) machines not
be used until a reliable voter verifiable audit feature can be uniformly incorporated into these
systems and that in the event of a recount, the paper or other auditable record should be
considered the official record; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends remaining punch card systems
should be discontinued; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers make it easier for
college students to vote in the jurisdiction in which their school is located; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers develop procedures to
ensure that voting is facilitated, without compromising security or privacy, for all eligible voters
living overseas; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers make voter suppression
a criminal offense in all states, the District of Columbia and all U.S. Territories; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the DNC recommends lawmakers and election officials
should improve the training of poll workers.


http://blog.pdamerica.org/?p=426

[Time for change]

27. Thank you mod mom - that's a very nice list

I just received an e-mail from Michael Vu, in response to an e-mail that I sent him a few days ago. I am very suspicious, as I indicate in my OP, that there was something more than the long lines that was keeping down the "official" turnout.

So, I sent him an e-mail asking if there had been an audit of the poll books, to see if the signatures matched the official vote count. Here is the response that I just received from him, shortly after I posted this thread:

"In response to your email, the Board of Elections is responsible to conduct an audit of the election. This begins 11 days after the election. We are responsbile for accounting for any discrepancy that occurred at the polls. This entails going through the poll book, audit book to determine how many ballots were issued and how many were counted on election night. Also, we are responsbile for crediting those that voted by going through the poll book. We then match what was counted for each precinct against how many voters received credit for that precinct."

It sounds to me like he's completely avoiding the question. What do you think of this? -- I'm sure you know a lot more about him than I do.

[mod mom]

47. My first encounter with Michael Vu was at an EAC Hearing on Provisional

Ballots held at OSU Moritz School of Law last winter. At the time, I was impressed with his knowledge of the subject and his appearance of lambasting Blackwell. I believed at the time that he was someone who was upset at the system. Then in March at the House Administration Hearing held in Columbus, he spoke about pressure the SOS placed on BOE directors, to conform with the SOS directives. He was invited to participate in an election reform teach-in we held, but declined.

Since this time, election reformers from Cuyahoga County who participate in list servs I am on, have been highly critical of Mr Vu. I have always wondered, based on the above encounters, if in fact there was some issue of job security involved in his actions. In Ohio, the directors serve at the discretion of the SOS. No one, either from within Ohio, or at the national level (as in John Conyers and the House Judiciary Dems) have been able to question or make an impact on the power structure that surrounds Blackwell. Perhaps the suits from Lucas County will facilitate this.

Regarding your question (sorry for the deep background ;) ), Michael Vu is merely quoting from the procedure book. Yes, he has avoided your question by stating what is supposed to be completed. Could this be a way of sending a message to you? Possibly, only subpoena power could say for sure. Michael Vu is one person I would love to see questioned under oath.

[mod mom]

10. Precinct Reduction was another way used to ensure low turnout:

<snip>

"But Republican governor Bob Taft and Blackwell did prepare: they reduced the number of polling places, ensuring long lines.

As noted above, the state had been anticipating the purchase of DRE machines, which are both more expensive and — at least in theory — quicker. That meant, according to Blackwell, that counties could make do with fewer machines without affecting the lines, and fewer faster machines meant that counties could merge small precincts together to share them. The Republican-led legislature helped encourage precinct consolidation by raising the maximum allowable number of registered voters per precinct. So, some counties merged their polling places, cutting as many as 48 percent in some cases.

When the state suddenly nixed the new machines, those counties were left with fewer polling places for more voters, with the old slow machines, and about the same number of poll workers. Erie County consolidated 101 precincts in 2000 into just 62 this year. As a result, the average number of voters per precinct in Erie nearly doubled, from 355 to 640.

<http://www.providencephoenix.com/features/other_stories/multi_1/documents/04259694.asp>

Here is an example of how this worked:

-The number of precincts in Lucas County for the November 2003 election was 530 precincts, at the time of the November 2, 2004 election there were 495 precincts.

This would allow for confusion, long lines and in cases where the voter went to the wrong precinct and waited in line, they would received a provisional ballot. Blackwell determined that only provisional ballots cast at the correct precinct would count. This means if a voter was correctly registered, but went to the wrong poll place (WHICH MIGHT MEAN THE WRONG TABLE IN THE CORRECT CROWDED FACILITY) the vote would not count. There were 90,000 provisional ballots cast in Ohio in 2004 that were not counted.

[yngliberal]

12. One way of stopping this...

This is probably a stupid idea but electing a Democratic Governor and Secretary of State in 2006 might prevent more problems from happening in 2008. I have a feeling they would truly investigate what went wrong and I believe they would do everything they can to make sure it doesn't happen again.

[mod mom]

16. Welcome to DU yngliberal, but the problem in Ohio is that Blackwell

Republican SOS controls the vote. Since you are new, you might not be aware of the mountain of work that indicates that Kerry won Ohio. I would like to suggest you visit the "Election Reform" forum under topic forums here at DU for more background.

We are not alone in thinking the Ohio vote is tainted. I also suggest John Conyers and the House Judiciary Dem Staff's excellent report "What Went Wrong in Ohio" and of course:

The GAO recently released a 107 page scathing report on Electronic Voting Machines in our country. The report states that Electronic Voting Machines in the U.S. are NOT SECURE, NOT ACCOUNTABLE, NOT TRANSPARENT, NOT ACCURATE, AND ARE UNCERTIFIABLE. A bipartisan panel which included both Republican Congressman James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) and Democratic Congressman John Conyers (D-MI) released a joint news release (a true rarity in these days of divisive politics) regarding his report, yet the main stream media has ignored it's important findings. Here is a link to the GAO Report:

http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d05956high.pdf

[yngliberal]

17. Thanks...

I'll check out the links you sent me but that's what I'm worried about, Blackwell screwing up the machines in 2006 so he can become Governor.

[Time for change]

61. Here's a summary that I put together of reasons to believe that

the election was stolen:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2052179

Hope you find it useful.

And welcome to DU.

:toast:

[eridani]

39. The new machines would NOT have been faster, not at all

Voting is inherently slow, and tabulation fast. Making the two part of the same process makes everything happen at the pace of the slowest step. This is why one opscan can handle ballots from 5 to 10 precincts. Mr. LumpLump with his Voters' Pamphlet and all his campaign material checking and rechecking and agian rechecking his vote can prevent dozens of people from voting on a DRE in a crowded polling place. In a polling place with opscans, the voters just look for any available flat surface to fill out their ballots, and Mr. LumpLump can take as long as he likes.

[Time for change]

66. Maybe that's why we didn't have any problems like this in any of the

op-scan counties.

[baldguy]

24. "I can't wait in line for four hours to vote, I've got to get to work."

It's no more complex than that.

[Time for change]

30. I think that it is more complex than that

Probably not in Franklin County, and perhaps not in Mahoning County, where they use the electronic machines that have all those problems.

But Cuyahoga County and Summit County used punch card machines, and there was no evidence that lack of sufficient punch card machines slowed down the process, since there was no correlation in the state between the number of punch card machines per registered voter at a precinct and the official turnout.

Therefore, it would appear that in Cleveland and Akron the long lines were more a sign of high turnout than they were a sign of insufficient machines. If that is true, then even after hundreds or thousands of voters leave the lines (and don't come back), there are still long lines, and in the absence of foul play, that should result in a high turnout, not a low turnout.

Doesn't it sound reasonable that long lines are a sign of high turnout?

[philb]

25. EIRS: long lines,etc. in Franklin County, Cuyahoga C, Mahoning Co.,etc.

Long lines and lots of other problems in franklin county/Columbus
http://www.flcv.com/franklin.html

Cuyahoga County(Polling place problems, long line, machine problems, Voter Suppression, widespread dirty tricks & malfeasance to reduce minority vote, cause votes in wrong precinct) Cleveland
http://www.flcv.com/cuyahovs.html
http://www.flcv.com/cuyahoga.html
http://www.flcv.com/cuyahodt.html
http://www.flcv.com/cuyahopb.html

Mahoning County Youngstown http://www.flcv.com/mahonts.html
Some Touch Screen machines switch vote from Kerry to Bush
Some Touch Screen machines switch vote from Kerry to blank
Some Touch Screen machine freeze/many switching or freezing/Long lines
(long lines, dirty tricks, registration, absentee, and provisional irregularities)
http://www.flcv.com/mahonot.html

******************************************
other areas also had problems in minority precincts

Montgomery County Election Problems Dayton http://www.flcv.com/montgomo.html
(Long lines and polling place irregularities in minority precincts, dirty tricks, registration problems, absentee ballot and provisional ballot problems, suppression of minorities, possible fraud)


Hamilton County http://www.flcv.com/hamilton.html
(A machine problem prevents vote for Kerry, dirty tricks and apparent misinformation/malfeasance to reduce minority vote through registrations, absentees, provisionals) Cincinati


similar in Lucas County/Toleldo
http://www.flcv.com/lucasoh.html

[Time for change]

35. Yes, I certainly didn't mean to imply that this turnout issue was the only

problem.

For example, in this thread I talk about several lines of evidence for a stolen election.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2052179

But in this thread I wanted to concentrate on the discrepancy between the long lines and the low "official" turnout, because I think that that's been a somewhat neglected issue.

[lonestarnot]

26. Oh yeah baby K & R

[understandinglife]

28. Well done, Tfc. Thank you.

Recommended.


Peace.

[Time for change]

33. Thank you ul

Maybe if we had a real government in this country, as well as in Ohio, there would be a real investigation of all this.

[Tom Joad]

29. This is where I believe there is the best evidence that the election...

was stolen.

They simply made it very difficult for urban people to vote. No funny stuff with the machines, just keep them waiting.

Remember, this was not a matter of waiting 30 minutes rather than 10 minutes, it was sometimes a matter of hours. so no matter one's dedication to casting the vote, sometimes the need to pick up the child, take medicine, eat, or any number of things meant you had to leave the line.

[Time for change]

40. That's all very true, but

I see no reason to believe that all of the low turnout was due simply to the long lines. To a large extent I see the long lines as an indication of HIGH voter turnout, not just insufficient number of machines, particularly in Cleveland and Akron. See my above post #s 30 and 35.

Even though punch card machines were used in many of the individual precincts, central tabulators were used to compile the votes. Two Cuyahoga County election workers were indicted because they illegally prevented a complete recount of the county. Why did they do everything they could to prevent a recount in Cuyahoga County, and numerous other counties as well? Why did they lock the press out of the building while they counted the votes in Warren County? There are so many unanswered questions. Why assume that they didn't use electronic means to steal this election as well?

[upi402]

34. where's the special prosecutor?

why aren't our elected Dems chaining themselves to the doors?

why do they vote for trade deals that eliminate our jobs?

DAMMIT!!!!!!!!

[Time for change]

41. Unfortunately, I think that most of them are afraid to touch this subject

because they're afraid that they will be labelled as "sore losers" or "conspiracy theorists". It doesn't help at all when the MSM is on the other side, and you know that they will be eager to belittle any attempt to have this investigated the way it ought to be.

[mod mom]

48. without subpoena power, or the ability to hold a formal hearing, the Dems

are virtually powerless (hence the reason they are forced to hold what the Republicans called "stunts" to bring attention to an issue). I believe the majority of the American people do not understand this point.

My hope with the Nov 19th (a true birthday present for me) issuance by the DNC regarding election reform will trigger this sort of "stunt" in the near future. They have their plates full now, but if they are interested in gaining votes from disenfranchised voters and progressives like me, appalled with the system, then some major NOISE willhave to be made prior to the '06 elections.

[1932]

36. This is why it's important to vote absentee ballot.

You make sure there aren't lines for other people.

[Time for change]

42. Well, Blackwell had an answer for that one too

There were tons of registered voters in Ohio who requested absentee ballots and never received them.

[mod mom]

49. This is true. I have a story regarding this point. A friend (affavidit

has been filed) and his wife both elected to vote absentee in the Nov '04 election. His wife is registered as an independent, my friend , a dem. Low and behold his wife received an absentee ballot while my friend-the Dem did not.

Many in the election reform community would like to point out that their can be serious problems associated with absentee voting (and "early" voting) if the integrity of the election office is tainted. They can go by your party affiliation, or simply if you reside in a traditionally high-dem precinct, make an assumption of your vote.

[DeepModem Mom]

38. Remember the students at Kenyon College in Gambier?

There was no question that there would be very few Bush votes from that school. The school/town got two voting machines, one of which malfunctioned very quickly. Meanwhile, the Republican town of Mt. Vernon, five minutes away, had more machines than were needed. Dem lawyers asked for more machines, but Blackwell refused. Finally, paper ballots arrived, but many students did not want to use them; they didn't trust that they would be counted. The students, many of whom were first time voters, and faculty, and faculty widows and widowers, ended up on the national news on election night, as they cast, I think, the last ballots in the country. Determined to vote, and supported by the college administration (who cancelled classes, and supplied food, and even toilet paper), the Kenyon community voted until 4:OO a.m., after George W. Bush had already been declared the winner. It was a shameful episode, and a bitter lesson for the bright students at this excellent little liberal arts college.

Voters in poorer areas, working people, elderly, mothers with kids in school -- they couldn't have waited hours to vote. They might have been in line for a while, but they would have eventually had to leave, without voting.

[Time for change]

43. Yes indeed - very important points

I considered including this incident in myt OP, but in the interest of brevity I left it out. Knox County (where this occurred) was the only county in the state, other than the four that I mentioned in my OP, that had a comparable rate of EIRS reports (per registered voter) relating to long lines. But only a single precinct was involved, and there were only four reports (giving it about the same rate per registered voter as Mahoning County).

But this makes some important points. First is the fact that, although the EIRS reporting system gives us a lot of important information (IMO), it is only the tip of the iceburg. Certainly there were a hell of a lot more than four voters involved in that 11 hour line at Kenyon College.

This example is also pretty good proof IMO of the lack of integrity with which Blackwell ran this election.

And, that precinct managed to have a turnout of over 70%, despite all the problems, and in spite of the fact that they had to wait until 4 in the morning to vote. That is quite a tribute to those students, who voted I believe over 80% for Kerry. And that goes to show that the long lines aren't necessarily simply a manifestation of insufficient machines, but also of a high voter turnout. Can you imagine what the turnout would have been if they would have had enough machines? Which goes back to my original point -- that the real voter turnout in those four cities was likely higher than the state average.

[Orangepeel]

46. Whenever I vote, I have to sign a book first

and, in Florida at least, political parties get files from the supervisor of elections office that gives the names of those who showed up to vote.

It seems like a simple matter to compare the number of people who voted with the reported turnout percentages, allowing for some small margin for people who might not have cast a ballot.

The possibility of computer fraud changing votes would be harder to detect, but it should be very simple to detect discrepancies between the number of people who showed up and the number of votes cast.

[Time for change]

50. Yes, it should be simple

But is it done?

Take a look at this article:
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4815

There are lots of relevant quotes here, but here is one that I think is particularly important:
"From what they were able to get through, witnesses found that signature counts were very much different from the official recorded number of ballots."

That took place during the recount and refers to Cuyahoga County. And what was done about it? Not very much. Blackwell is in charge of this, and although there are a number of lawsuits pending, I don't see enough progress being made.

I wrote Michael Vu, Director of the Cuyahoga County BOE, to ask whether he's done any audits of this nature, which might clarify whether or not the poll books match the official record. Here's the response I got:

"In response to your email, the Board of Elections is responsible to conduct an audit of the election. This begins 11 days after the election. We are responsbile for accounting for any discrepancy that occurred at the polls. This entails going through the poll book, audit book to determine how many ballots were issued and how many were counted on election night. Also, we are responsbile for crediting those that voted by going through the poll book. We then match what was counted for each precinct against how many voters received credit for that precinct."

If you can make any sense of that, you're better at this than I am.

[Orangepeel]

71. I understand what he is saying

He is saying that it is a responsibility of the BOE to make sure that the number of voters who signed the poll book matches the number of votes tallied for each precinct. It is also a responsibility of the BOE to enter in their databases, based on the poll book, whether or not a voter voted in a particular election and to match that with the number of votes counted for each precinct.

He doesn't say whether or not that has been done.

[mod mom]

51. In Central Ohio, this level of coordination was not done by the Ohio Dem

Party, but through the efforts of the Kerry Campaign. Most areas had Ward chairs, prior to the campaign, but there was no precinct captain coordination set up. I organized a Kerry group in my (inner ring-near east) suburb, found precinct captains for each of the 13 precincts and coordinated volunteer activity to support the PCs. My husband served as a "runner" on election day-which meant he received the lists posted a couple times of which voters of party affiliation had voted, so that the others could be contacted. this was a highly coordinated system which required not only Precinct Captains, but trained volunteer support with specific job duties.

Central Ohio was probaly the exception to the rule for this level of coordination. I believe the Ohio Dem Pary is attempting to recreate this by seeing that PCs are found. (I have resigned from all activity with the Ohio Dems until they install new leadership with the ODP-but have submitted my former lists ).

The problem with the '04 election, is the next day all information was destroyed, clean out-gone. I happen to keep my lists of contacts, but there was no coordination of saving the voter lists etc. I believe I heard that the Kerry campaign was required to do this-but don't quote me on this. All the volunteer data banks were deleted, with the exception of those of us who had personal lists on our home computers.

My point is I believe there may be some legal reason why the lists cannot be saved. The other issue is that those lists of voters would not stans up in court. there would need to be individual affidavits filed for each of the voter. this is the problem with Parallel Elections that are held. They can be an indicator of problems, but they do not hold up in court. Each voter would need to file a statement of who they voted for -very time consuming and costly.

[Time for change]

52. "The next day all information was destroyed, clean out-gone."

Geeez, it sounds to me that that should be a federal felony. And that the only reason it isn't being prosecuted as such is that neither the Ohio government nor the federal government has any integrity.

[mod mom]

53. No, I believe it has something to do with a legal aspect, (may want to

check with Landshark) . The Kerry campaign, I believe could not directly share their information. My lists were gathered by me. I developed the data base of volunteer support (grew to 300+ for my area). I think it has something to do with people who volunteered to work for John Kerry, and perhaps there was never a waiver saying their information could be shared with the Ohio Dems (which seems like a oversight mistake).

Why the voter lists were destroyed, however, might have been the short-sighted attempt by the field staff to "clean out" the staging sites. the field staff was very depressed over the concession, and were anxious to move out of town.

I was very involved with the campaign and all attempts to contact them regarding information post election were totally ignored. You talk of feeling "used". Our post election investigations were self funded, time donated and the DNC/Kerry Campaign didn't even have the decency to talk to those of us involved in the investigation when they decided to host their own (whitewash).

[Time for change]

57. Well, I for one certainly appreciate all the work you've done on this

But I'm confused about what you're saying.

What about auditing the poll books to see if the it matches with the official counts? I was thinking that that was what you meant by "voter lists", but I guess I was mistaken.

As far as I can tell, no legitimate auditing of that nature has taken place. If I had a dollar for every time I've seen someone on DU dismiss a fraud theory in Ohio because "it could be easily checked by looking at the poll books" or "all you would need to do to make sure that there was no central tabulator fraud is match the pre-tabulator with the post-tabulator count", I would ... well, I'd probably be $100 richer than I am. Yet, not once have I seen anyone say that such a thing has been done.

Do you have any insights into that?

[Orangepeel]

54. In Florida, any candidate can get voting history info from the SOE office

that's how candidates target people for a GOTV campaign. Such information HAS to be available in Ohio.

The party (or a candidate) ought to be able to get a list of registered voters from the state, which should include their address and which elections they've voted in.

I don't know about standing up in court, although I am not taking about campaign voter lists. I am talking about information from the SOE office. Compare their information on who voted in each district with their reported voter turnout in each district.

At the moment, I'm more concerned with publicity than court cases. I think that we should work toward raising the level of public concern in a way that is accurate so that the push to get the problem corrected builds.

[mod mom]

55. I believe you mean party affiliation. Our votes are secret. My area

was full of Independents. Phone Banking and Canvassing were used to determine how the I's would lean.

[Orangepeel]

58. I don't mean HOW they voted. I mean WHETHER they voted.

whether or not someone voted is not secret and is appended to supervisor of election office lists after the fact.

[EOTE]

56. Kicked and nominated.....

One could argue that THIS is the only issue that really matters. Bush's approval is at 33%. He and his party are entrenched in scandal. All indications point to a massive Democratic victory in 2006 and 2008. Of course, that's not going to happen. The pundits will argue that * and the republicans managed to swing things in their favor and regain the public's trust, but it will just be more tripe used to explain the unexplainable: How a party that does nothing but go against the public's interest and loses in pre-election and exit polls manages to make gains on election day. We have nothing but a facade of a democracy now. Until this is resolved, all the protesting, fax blasting and demonstrating in the world won't do a thing.

[Time for change]

64. Thank you EOTE. Yes, I have to say that this is a President and a Party

that doesn't seem to care how much damage they do -- to their own citizens or to the world. It would indeed seem that one reason for that would be that they have confidence that they can win most elections without actually getting the most votes.

Another reason of course is the news media. When you campaign on a tax policy that will only benefit 1% of Americans and somehow almost half of them fail to receive that message, that's a pretty good sign that we don't really have an independent press.

[jmrobins]

60. kick

n/t

[Time for change]

67. Wellcome to the DU jmrobbins

That's something -- I don't think I've ever received someone's first kick before.
:hi:

[lovuian]

62. Missouri Florida Ohio California all stolen elections!!!

this will be the reality... a cabal took over this country!!!

History is going to show it!!!

[mod mom]

63. New Mexico as well. You are correct, we must make sure history reports

the truth!

[Time for change]

68. Here's a response I received from Micahel Vu

Director of the Cuyahoga County BOE.

I asked him if efforts had been made to see if the poll books in Cuyahoga County matched the official results. If that had been done, that would alleviate some of the suspicions that I express in my OP. Here is the answer he gave me:

"In response to your email, the Board of Elections is responsible to conduct an audit of the election. This begins 11 days after the election. We are responsbile for accounting for any discrepancy that occurred at the polls. This entails going through the poll book, audit book to determine how many ballots were issued and how many were counted on election night. Also, we are responsbile for crediting those that voted by going through the poll book. We then match what was counted for each precinct against how many voters received credit for that precinct."

Sounds like a pretty good way to avoid answering a question without saying so, if you ask me.

[mod mom]

69. Have you speculated on why he avoided the question? #47 contains

my speculation.

[Time for change]

73. Yes, I see what you mean

I was going to say that I thought you were exactly right about that, but I didn't quite comprehend your last sentence. Now I see what you mean.

I think I should discuss this with Vicki Lovegren.

[mod mom]

74. self delete

[Orangepeel]

70. could you write him back

and say, "Thank you for letting me know who is responsible for confirming that the number of voters signing the poll book is consistent with the number of votes tallied. Can you please let me know whether or not your office has completed this task and what, exactly, the results of the audit were? Thank you again."

[mod mom]

72. maybe even do a request for public records to see if,when and by whom it

was completed.

[Time for change]

77. I wrote him again

Hopefully he'll give me what I'm asking for this time, but it will probably take a public records request. Do you think it would be better if a lawyer did that?

[mod mom]

78. I'll ask a friend who is on CASE with me.

[Time for change]

79. That would be great -- Thank you n/t

[Time for change]

75. Yes, I did write him back

And I did thank him, and I did ask him to answer my question, but probably not quite as nicely as your suggested response.

[Orangepeel]

80. kinda like, "thanks for the non-answer, schmuck!"

I understand the temptation!

Please let us know if and what he responds.

[Time for change]

83. Here's what I wrote this morning:

"Thank you, but I don’t quite understand what you’re saying.

You say that you’re responsible for accounting for any discrepancy that occurred at the polls, and then taking various actions. But my question was whether you actually audited the poll books to see if there was any discrepancies between the poll books and the number of votes cast. Did you feel the need to do that, and was it done?"


Then, he came back with this by this afternoon:

"As stated in my previous email, the Board reviews the Audit Book during the canvassing period and at the time of giving credit to each voter that voted. The agency then compares this number to the total of votes counted (votes cast) for each precinct.

Therefore, the simple answer to your question is, yes."


And then, a few minutes ago I responded with this:

"Thank you Mr. Vu.

Can you tell me what was found when this was done please?"

[Orangepeel]

88. that was very polite

I'm sure he thinks that you are a pain in the ass, but if he had just answered your question in the first place, you wouldn't have to be. He's either elected or appointed to serve the people (I'm not sure which in Ohio) so he shouldn't complain.

Thanks for keeping up with this. I'm pretty sure that the audit will check out (if votes can be deleted, they can be switched, and that would be much harder if not impossible to detect). But, it is frustrating that it seems to be a chore to verify when it should be so simple.

[Time for change]

89. Well, here's a quote from some stuff that was discovered during the

partial recount:

From what they were able to get through, witnesses found that signature counts were very much different from the official recorded number of ballots.

It's from this article:
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4815

It doesn't sound to me like they're able to make things match up very well.

[Time for change]

96. He wrote me another e-mail

He said he'd send me their findings. This should be interesting.

[Time for change]

85. Well, at least he's very punctual n/t

[WI_DEM]

81. But voter turnout was up significantly in Ohio in numbers

For instance Kerry received more than 500,000 votes more than Gore did in 2000, if Bush's vote had not increased significantly he would have carried Ohio. But Bush too had 400,000 votes more than he received in 2000--however, we don't know how many of those were legitimate.

[mod mom]

82. Low voter turnouts were recorded in dense urban precincts. Total

registered voters increased but mainly in repub counties due to VOTER PURGES IN HIGH DEM COUNTIES. Does anyone have access to the chart posted on ER +D last summer?

[Time for change]

84. I don't have the chart, but I did an analysis of the voter registration

problem:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1974460

And more recently I found some additional evidence to substantiate the claim that the NY Times reporters were probably right, and there was probably a lot of purging done, especially in Cuyahoga County:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2237782

[Time for change]

86. I do have a file

that shows voter registration in every county as of Nov. 2000, March 2004 and Nov 2004, as well as some other dates. But I think that I'd have to send that by e-mail. Is that what you were looking for?

[mod mom]

91. I have downloaded a chart entitled "Ohio Vote Purge: Analysis of Registere

voters in Ohio and the Influence of Voter Purging in Kerry vs Bush Counties before Vote Certification". I don't know how to post a chart onto DU. I think this dramatically shows the effects of purging.

Here is an example of the effects:

-October 4, 2004 was filing deadline for new voter registrations. At that point there were approximately 20,000 unprocessed voter registration applications with less than a month before the election. One mail tray containing 4,500-7,000 (estimates vary) unprocessed “Project Voter” registrations were discovered on or about October 18,2004.
SOURCE: SOS Investigation Lucas County , 2005 pg 10

***Of interest here is information obtained from the SOS website entitled ElectionsVoter/results 2003 and 2004 which show the # of registered voters number change from ‘03-’04 was 11,947 in Lucas County: reg voters 2003 in Lucas=288,190 ; registered voter in 2004=300,137.

[Time for change]

94. Can I see what you have?

If I pm you my e-mail address will you mail it to me?

[mod mom]

95. of course.

[Joe Chi Minh]

92. "Huge voting lines in combination with low voter turnout

just don’t make sense,....".

Must be quantum physics. A lot of paradoxes there.

[mod mom]

93. Sure it can. In Franklin County inner city neighborhoods saw huge

increases of voter registrations while the number of machines used during the primaries dramatically decreased. Less machines caused long lines while increased voter registrations would mean allow for lower turnout.

Example: assuming 5 minutes per voter (with initiatives this is probable) lets say a precinct had 3 machines in the primary. This means this precinct could process 36 voters per hour. If the machines were decreased to 2 machines for the general election then only 48 voters could be processed per hour. If the new voter regristrations increased dramatically lines would increase while actual turnout (now a percentage of the new reg voters as well) could go down. Does this make sense?

[Joe Chi Minh]

101. I was taking the rise out of them, mod mod.

But thanks for your patient explanation of how new voter registrations could dramatically increase, while actual turnout could go down.

[journalist3072]

97. More ammunition to add to the fire...

This is a portion of a Washington Post article from December 2004:

Several Factors Contributed to 'Lost' Voters in Ohio

By Michael Powell and Peter Slevin

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Tanya Thivener's is a tale of two voting precincts
in Franklin County. In her city neighborhood, which is vastly
Democratic and majority black, the 38-year-old mortgage broker found a line
snaking out of the precinct door.

She stood in line for four hours -- one hour in the rain -- and
watched dozens of potential voters mutter in disgust and walk away without
casting a ballot. Afterward, Thivener hopped in her car and drove to her
mother's house, in the vastly Republican and majority white suburb of
Harrisburg. How long, she asked, did it take her to vote?

Fifteen minutes, her mother replied.

"It was . . . poor planning," Thivener said. "County officials knew
they had this huge increase in registrations, and yet there weren't
enough machines in the city. You really hope this wasn't intentional."

Electoral problems prevented many thousands of Ohioans from voting on
Nov. 2. In Columbus, bipartisan estimates say that 5,000 to 15,000
frustrated voters turned away without casting ballots. It is unlikely that
such "lost" voters would have changed the election result -- Ohio
tipped to President Bush by a 118,000-vote margin and cemented his electoral
college majority.

But similar problems occurred across the state and fueled protest
marches and demands for a recount. The foul-ups appeared particularly
acute in Democratic-leaning districts, according to interviews with voters,
poll workers, election observers and election board and party
officials, as well as an examination of precinct voting patterns in several
cities.

In Cleveland, poorly trained poll workers apparently gave faulty
instructions to voters that led to the disqualification of thousands of
provisional ballots and misdirected several hundred votes to third-party
candidates. In Youngstown, 25 electronic machines transferred an unknown
number of votes for Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) to the Bush column.

In Columbus, Cincinnati and Toledo, and on college campuses, election
officials allocated far too few voting machines to busy precincts, with
the result that voters stood on line as long as 10 hours -- many
leaving without voting. Some longtime voters discovered their registrations
had been purged.

"There isn't enough to prove fraud, but there have been very
significant problems in running elections in Ohio this year that demand
reform," said Edward B. Foley, who is director of the election law program at
the Ohio State University law school and a former Ohio state solicitor.
"We clearly ended up disenfranchising people, and I don't want to
minimize that."

[Time for change]

99. Thank you for the additional ammunition

It WAS intentional:

http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/111704Fitrakis/111704fitrakis.html

[journalist3072]

102. You're welcome and you are absolutely right!!

It was very much intentional. Disenfranchise and supress votes in most Democratic and African-American neighborhoods.

[Zinfandel]

98. And they are working on 2008...for perfection.

[Time for change]

100. Very little doubt about that n/t