Goldy is right that Sam Reed is wrong about the ballot deadline. Most ballots were in before election day, and fewer ballots were counted than were in, so the backlog was due to the time it takes to count the ballots, not the fact that they were still in the mail somewhere.
Of course, not all of the ballots were in on time. As someone who put his ballot in the mail the last possible day, I for one am glad to know what the firm deadline was. And I’m not sure why the tradeoff between that and having the ballots counted, say, on the same day would be a good one even if it was true.
It’s kind of annoying not having election night be quite the same event it is in the rest of the country. And I imagine if we’re ever a swing state again, it’ll drive people from out of state who aren’t used to it up a wall watching it in a close election. But really, we count all the ballots in plenty of time to get them certified and possibly do several recounts, as was discovered in 2004. As long as that’s the case, there’s no reason to push the deadlines forward.
A-f**king-men. The push for this seems to be purely media-driven: nothing to do with making sure elections are conducted fairly and securely. There should be no guessing involved in knowing when the deadline is for submitting your ballot.
It’s always been this way. Usually the guy you’re voting for has already conceded. It’s way better to be able to vote by mail ahead of election day.
Reed is pushing the GOP meme of making voting as difficult as possible and excluding as many votes as possible, because those jerks know they can’t win a fair election. The good news is we’ll soon be rid of Reed; the bad news is his replacement is another Republican, so we’re going to see a lot more of this b.s. in coming years. We can only hope Wyman won’t be another shameful shill for GOP vote suppression.
I don’t care what Goldy or Reed say, this isn’t a partisan issue. Why does everything always have to be made into one?
Oregon does just fine with an election day deadline for ballots to be returned. And the science of tabulating ballots is sure to improve in the future, rendering Goldy’s old tired argument moot..
I know, I’ll remain open minded, just show me one office an election day deadline has cost the Democrats in Oregon.
If we switched to the “received by” deadline, expect a bunch of last-minute robocalls from Republican operatives telling people in urban areas of King County that they can mail their ballots any time up to and including election day.
@4 – Exactly. That bastion of conservative tea partiers, the statehouse in Salem, has certainly set up their system to make voting difficult, resulting in horrible results for the Democrats in Oregon! It’s all a Republican plot!
Jeez. Can’t anything be just an idea, rather than a political plot?
What percentage of the ballots arrive after election day? Anyone have any idea?
@4 and 6,
I’m not sure how Goldy or I were being partisan. He goes out of his way to compliment Reed on the job he’s done in office, and I don’t have any idea how it would skew the results to make the change. It’s a difference of agreement, but I don’t think it’s particularly partisan one way or the other.
@7, According to Goldy’s article in the paper (not the Slog piece I link to in the post) for King County:
More would have come in after that but it would slow down pretty quickly. King County rounding to make it so I can do the math in my head 750,000 of a the somewhat more than 900,000 were in on election day. Not sure how many no votes or votes left to count there are, but 918,482 votes have been recorded for president as of now in KC. No clue about the rest of the state, but I don’t know why it would be too different.
I just wish everyone would stop fawning over this stupid idea of all mail voting. Bring back the polling place. That way I know my vote counts and is not being tampered with. Also Iknow that one day I will lose out on voting because my ballot will be late.
Last time I checked, our state’s association of county auditors oppose changing the deadline. Because they know that it won’t lead to faster results. But it would increase pressure to do things “faster”.
Any vote by mail advocate who wants faster results is a hypocrite. They wanted this. They should shut up and suck it up.
Upton @ 4.
How much faster are those Oregon results? Please remind me, which of those Oregon counties are as large as King County?
@4
Our current system works fine, no need to change anything.
Our gubernatorial take a couple of days to count because people run uninspired and shitty campaigns that result in close counts, not because of the ballot deadline.
@12
word.