I felt a little bad about poking fun at Adams County Auditor Nancy McBroom’s quote in the Seattle P-I, so I thought I’d give her a call and chat about the election. As one might expect, she turned out to be articulate, friendly and informative.
The election has already been hashed out ad infinitum, so there wasn’t any breaking news she could add to the discussion. But she did elaborate on the circumstances behind Adams County’s failure to match signatures on provisional ballots. In the past, provisional voters have always been treated like regular polling place voters, with the exception that their ballots weren’t counted until voter eligibility could later be verified. That means provisional voters sign into the poll books like everybody else; and since poll book signatures are never matched before counting the ballot, neither were provisional signatures.
According to Nancy, with passage of legislation bringing Washington into compliance with the Help Americans Vote Act (HAVA), this was supposed to change, and starting with the November 2004 election provisional signatures were to be matched just like those on absentee ballots. Nancy confirmed that this was not done in Adams County. (Nor, apparently, in Stevens, Walla Walla, and Whitman counties.)
Nancy didn’t explain why Adams County failed to comply with the new statute, but she assured me it would never happen again… since all future elections in Adams County will be conducted entirely by mail. In any case, Nancy didn’t seem particularly concerned that her staff’s failure to comply with the new statute created much opportunity for fraud. Adams is a small county, and according to Nancy, everybody knows everybody, what they’re up to, who’s getting married, who’s getting divorced, and all the other usual gossip. When you sign into the poll book at Adams County’s single polling place, chances are the old lady behind the table knows you.
That’s right, for 6,477 registered voters Adams County has a lone polling place in Othello, serving four precincts; the other 27 precincts were already vote-by-mail. And Nancy says that Adams is moving to an all vote-by-mail system because they are finding it too expensive and too difficult to find and train enough people to staff their single polling place. The old ladies are getting older, and just don’t have the stamina to last those 12-hour shifts.
Compare that to King County, with over 3000 poll workers operating 540 polling places and 2,616 precincts for 1,082,406 registered voters. And so I asked Nancy to do exactly that, and comment on the controversy surrounding the performance of King County Elections. After a brief pause and a nervous laugh, Nancy described it as “unfortunate, but not surprising” given the large number of voters. She went on to say that King County Elections had problems before Dean Logan came in, and that “it’s hard to wave your wand or twitch your nose and fix everything at one time,” but she expressed confidence that given the necessary time, they would.
Many Republicans have called for Dean Logan to be fired, and some — like EFF President Bob Williams — have even said that he should be “jailed.” But at least on the subject of provisional ballots, it’s hard to scapegoat Logan in light of the problems in other counties. King County’s procedures regarding the handling of provisional ballots fully complied with state and federal law, and they instructed their staff accordingly; unfortunately poll workers did not always follow or enforce the procedures, resulting in a relatively small number of provisional ballots being improperly canvassed (compared to percentages in Adams, Stevens, Walla Walla and Whitman.)
Nancy, on the other hand, issued procedures and instructions that clearly failed to comply with the law, and yet nobody is asking for her to be imprisoned or forced to resign. Nor should they.
In both Adams and King, mistakes were made… mistakes that should be fixed, but which had little if any impact on the election considering the fact that the vast majority of these provisional ballots would have been counted anyway had they been properly canvassed.
If anything, the news about mishandled provisional ballots in pro-Rossi, Eastern Washington counties merely reinforces my impression that the only thing extraordinary about this election was its extraordinary closeness. None of this is evidence of fraud or corruption or gross incompetence, but rather the normal and random distribution of human errors to which human beings are prone. Of course we can and should do a better job, but until somebody proves to me that any of these errors likely changed the outcome of this election, I’ll remain comfortable with the results.
Goldy, there is no statute which requires that provisional ballots have their signatures verified. Absolutely nothing in the RCW concerning this. As for the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), here is a link to the full text of the act:
http://www.fec.gov/hava/law_ext.txt
Look at Section 302(a) of HAVA. There is nothing which requires verification of the voter signatures on provisional ballots.
In fact, Section 302(a)(4) of HAVA would seem to prohibit signature verification, and require the provisional ballot to be counted if the individual in question is determined to be eligible to vote (registered to vote, and didn’t already vote):
“If the appropriate State or local election official to whom the ballot or voter information is transmitted under paragraph (3) determines that the individual is eligible under State law to vote, the individual’s provisional ballot shall be counted as a vote in that election in accordance with State law.”
Federal law does not seem to allow for signature verification after the fact. Instead, the only permitted method of identity verification under federal law would seem to be to make sure the person casting a provisional ballot really is the person who he or she claims to be when they are at the polling place filling out the ballot.
In any event, neither federal law nor state law requires that signatures on provisional ballots be verified after these ballots are cast by voters at the various precincts on election day.
So stop calling the Adams County auditor and the other three eastern Washington auditors negligent. They may actually be the only four county auditors out of all 39 counties that followed HAVA in processing provisional ballots.
Richard, I reported what Nancy McBroom told me.
And I’m not calling her negligent. I pointed out that it was a technical violation that had little if any impact on the election, and as such was similar to mistakes that occurred in KC.
Hmmm. . . that mean that if King County DID check signatures and rejected otherwise valid provisional ballots because of signature mismatches. . . well, it means that we need to take into account those improperly rejected provisional ballots in any “adjustment” procedure! Sweet!
Let’s see here . . . 307 “signature rejected” provisionals in KC plus the new 87 unopened absentees. That ought to put Gregoire up an additional 70 or so. . . .
Seriously, though, I think Richard makes an excellent point. My understanding is that counties have the lattitude to check signatures if they want, so KC cannot ask for adjustment (in the unlikely case adjustment occurs). But, as Goldy points out ( http://www.horsesass.org/my-co.....ment-20059 ), it does show that KC was using higher standards by one measure than the four non-verifying counties.
Let’s not forget that Adams county had the greatest variation in ballots counted as a percentage of ballots than any other county. After the machine recount their totals changed by 0.788%. After the manual recount that number lowered only slightly to 0.692%. King county by comparison saw only a 0.170% change after the manual recount.
No surprise that Nancy McBroom would have a nervous laugh when asked to comment on the performance of another county, all the while surely wishing the performance of her own county could be swept under the carpet and forgotten.
Goldy, remember Asst SoS Excell’s words: the only thing that made King’s errors serious, was the closeness of the election. The transgressions, in King just like Adams, Walla Walla or anywhere–only have meaning because of the statewide result. SNMFU, where ‘M’ means “mildly.”
How much longer until Rossi gives up this futility? He gives new meaning to the phrase “sore loser”.
The threshold for having to prove he was somehow robbed of his rightful thrown is less and less easier to attain. Practically everything that’s come out in the last 10 days favors Gregiore staying put.
Taxpayers in Washington should be pissed at Rossi tying up their courts and wasting their money.
Carla @ 7
Taxpayers of this state should be PISSED at KC for screwing up so many damn times, and then trying to cover it up.
King county isnt the only county, but the most OBVIOUS mismanaged county.
As far as my money is concerned, I don’t mind. But if i lived in KC i would be livid. Such a waste of prime real estate…
DJ @ 4
Those 307 signature rejected provisionals in King County might actually favor the Republicans, if they were counted.
They started out with 929 signature rejected provisionals on 11-12-2004, when the Dems sued and Judge Dean Lum ordered the list released as public records that Friday afternoon.
The Dems worked their a$$es off to get signatures for these ballots. Chris Vance mostly sat on his a$$. The Dems came up with over 600 signatures for these ballots. They sent out teams door-to-door and tried their best to only get Gregoire supporters to sign.
So it is likely that the 307 remaining mismatched provisional ballots favor Rossi. Possibly by enough to wipe out Gregoire’s apparent 129 vote victory margin.
One interesting thing is that King County had still rejected 415 provisional ballots for signature mismatch as of their 11/17/2004 canvassing board certification report. Under the WAC rules, signatures could only be turned in until 4:30 p.m. on 11/16/2004.
However, the final report issued by King County after the manual recount shows only 307 provisional ballots being rejected for signature mismatch — a magical improvement of 108 ballots!
In addition, King County counted 105 more provisional ballots in the machine recount on 11/24/2004, than were counted in the initial count on 11/17/2004.
Where did the extra 105 provisional ballots come from to be counted? How did 108 signature mismatches disappear? Did King County Elections accept additional signature affidavits from the Democrats after the 11/16/2004 4:30 p.m. deadline?
A very informative posting, with a reasonable conclusion.
Richard,
it is likely that the 307 remaining mismatched provisional ballots favor Rossi. Possibly by enough to wipe out Gregoire’s apparent 129 vote victory margin.
Or they were largely people who could not be located. Was there an analysis of party affiliation of the 307 remaining provisionals? Such an analysis might require too much cooperation between the Dems and Pubs to do easily.
Where did the extra 105 provisional ballots come from to be counted? How did 108 signature mismatches disappear? Did King County Elections accept additional signature affidavits from the Democrats after the 11/16/2004 4:30 p.m. deadline?
It sounds like you are claiming something illegal occurred. If so, it wouldn’t seem to be too difficult to prove. Everyone (Dems, Pubs, Libs, election officials) knew they were under the microscope by this point; it seems more likely that everyone was squeeky clean. Until proof is given, I’ll believe people (of all political bents) acted properly and legally.
so, are you gonna talk about the newly found ballots over at king county? Amazing that they’re stilling finding these things. NOT what any bank would be proud of.
M @ 12
No, it is not surprising that they are still finding these things in KC. KC is under a much greater degree of scrutiny than all of the other counties. They found these unopened absentee ballots because they were systematically going through the empty absentee envelopes looking for any that were signed by ex-felons.
The other counties have not gone through their empty absentee envelopes one by one. If they do, they will certainly find a few unopened envelopes.
“NOT what any bank would be proud of.”
Show me a bank where a single location handles 1/2 million transactions, one penny at a time, and I’ll show you a few pennies on the floor, under the till, and rolling aound in the cuffs of the teller’s pants. Shit happens.
Why aren’t you talking about the 87 or so new ballots discovered in King County?????
M @ 12 asked, “so, are you gonna talk about the newly found ballots over at king county? Amazing that they’re stilling finding these things. NOT what any bank would be proud of.”
M, what do you say we count the ballots they just found? Don’t you think that would be fair to the voters who cast them?
Or is your point that these newly found ballots prove the need for a re-election, because when you find ballots that were not counted that’s a reason to hold a new election?
Or are you truly chagrined that these uncounted ballots demonstrate that the election process has problems that require real reform, and that the focus should be on making the changes needed to ensure every ballot cast is counted in the future, rather than waste resources on a vain attempt to coronate King Rossi?
M @14,
Why am I not talking about the 87 newly discovered ballots? Because I have a life, and it’s the weekend, and I prefer to spend it enjoying it with my daughter, rather than glued to a keyboard rebutting (u)SP’s paranoia. I’ll get to the 87 ballots when I’m ready. Assuming there isn’t something else that comes along that I’d rather write about instead.
More horse droppings from the Horses’ Ass****.
The day of reckoning is at hand, time to get your
collective Marxist heads out of the sand (and elsewhere).
Do you need to borrow my pulling tractor?
See you in court! Please bring the logic presented on this
blog, I am sure it will impress the judge. Ha Ha Ha.
Goldy, How many times did your 12 year old daughter vote in the last election?
youknow @ 17
Oh please yes, we’ll see you in court! Yes! Yes! Yes! :D
Looks like the ‘court’ case will be very short. The neo’s haven’t shown anything of ‘abundance’ and Rossi will be a ‘bad word’ of the past soon.
jpgee @ 20
No, I think it’s more likely he’ll keep coming back, like a bad penny.
BS on the lady behind the table “knowing” who the voter is.
Past soc. studies I read in MBA school indicated that visual recognition by ancient village residents was generally limited to about 200 give or take a few. This was a limited factor in the “good old days” on how big a village could grow and know who belonged and who didn’t on the basis of recongition.
I don’t see a problem with picture ID when voting. If I am required to prove my identity to get a drivers license, to buy a firearm, to take a trip on an airplane, to cash a check, what is the problem when I vote?
Let’s do a bit more critical thinking about what the nice lady from Adams County was saying, rather than how it played with what you want us to think about King County and its absolute mess at being able to manage elections.
jpgee @ 20
How exactly are Rossi voters “neo’s”?
Glad Dean Logan is running things in KC and not Nancy McBroom. One shudders to imagine if KC had the error rate of Adams County …
Felix….It’s obvious you havent heard yet…..Logan was asked to resign….The Rep’s asked for Federal Investigation….Maybe Nancy Mcbroom would consider running for Logan’s post….
Personally, I believe you cant compare a county the size of KC with that of Adams…..They dont have 500 homeless people (and a couple judges) who are registered to vote and place their residence in one KC owned building..
Just my opinion…..Have a great evening :)