DETROIT'S DIRTY ELECTIONS
By Michelle Malkin · November 14, 2005 08:13 AM
http://michellemalkin.com/
What a mess:
Quote:
Detroit elections officials lost track of ballots in nine precincts -- or almost 3,000 votes -- in Tuesday's election, and did not count them until two days after polls closed.
State Elections Director Chris Thomas ordered city officials late Friday to keep their hands off voting records until he meets with them today.
Thomas' order came after he learned of the problem Friday afternoon from the Free Press, and as city elections officials were preparing to hold an emergency meeting with software engineers to try to resolve ongoing discrepancies in the vote totals.
The addition of the missing votes did not appear to alter the result of the most hotly contested mayoral race in recent memory. However, it's not entirely clear what impact the missing votes had on other races on the city ballot, including the City Council and the school board.
Thomas said he was "absolutely dismayed" to learn of the missing votes.
"We cannot believe that in this climate that Detroit election officials wouldn't publicly disclose that all of the precincts were not counted," Thomas said.
The missing votes raise fresh concerns about how votes have been secured and counted under outgoing City Clerk Jackie Currie, whose absentee ballot program is under federal investigation.
City elections officials acknowledged that a wayward poll worker took home the results from two precincts late Tuesday; and nonchalantly delivered them to election headquarters about noon Wednesday. Elections staffers discovered the results from seven other precincts inside locked ballot boxes after a fevered search...
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If Republicans were in charge of Detroit's elections, this mass disenfranchisement would be front-page NYTimes news, the Congressional Black Caucus would be on red alert, and Louis Farrakhan and Howard Dean would be blaming Bush's racism for the debacle.
More background from the Detroit News.
Ballot count draws scrutiny
Tally takes place amid reports of vote mishandling; mayoral win likely to stand, Detroit officials say.
By David Josar and Lisa M. Collins / The Detroit News
Top-level representatives of Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and challenger Freman Hendrix stood watch Saturday as the official canvass of more than 220,000 votes cast in last week's mayoral election began amid new reports of mishandling of ballots by city poll workers.
State officials said there was no indication that any of the election results would change. In unofficial tallies released early Wednesday, Kilpatrick had 117,354 votes, or 52.78 percent of the total, compared with 103,446, or 46.52 percent, for Hendrix.
The Nov. 8 election has emerged as one of the most controversial in recent Detroit history, following allegations of fraud and other irregularities in the Detroit City Clerk's office. As of Saturday, no protests or challenges had been filed.
Counting was suspended late Saturday and was to resume Monday morning. Meanwhile, the state Bureau of Elections called in the Michigan State Police to provide round-the-clock armed security at Detroit's Department of Elections. "We want to preserve the integrity of this process," said state elections spokeswoman Kelly Chesney. "We want Detroit voters to have faith in this process. We want them to know their vote was counted and counted correctly."
Despite intense scrutiny of the final vote count by county, state and federal officials, some mistakes have surfaced.
On Friday, city officials found that
one election worker had taken home two electronic devices that store vote tallies and those votes weren't tallied on election night. In addition, some results weren't tabulated correctly because of a computer programming error.
Some city workers also failed to subtract dummy votes that are cast -- 20 in each precinct -- to ensure voting equipment works properly.
Less than 3,000 votes were affected by the errors, Chesney said. She said election workers have many ways, including an examination of the original ballots, to check the final tallies.
No irregularities had been discovered with absentee ballots, Chesney said.
The city has 14 days from Election Day to certify the results. In the past, election workers have completed that task in about six days. Candidates then have nine days to contest the results.
For the problems to put the outcome of the mayoral race in question, the number of affected votes would have to total around
7,000.
On Election Day, the FBI obtained a court order to preserve absentee ballots and other records for investigation. Earlier, a Wayne County circuit judge handed supervision of the election to state Bureau of Elections director Chris Thomas and Wayne County Clerk Cathy Garrett. The court also appointed two prominent Detroiters, Charlie Williams and Elliott Hall, as monitors. The orders came in a lawsuit challenging City Clerk Jackie Currie's handling of Detroit's August primary. Currie was cited for contempt of court after she disobeyed a court order not to distribute absentee ballot applications.
On Oct. 30, a Detroit News report outlined how legally incapacitated people were voting, that people had voted who listed addresses at vacant lots and in abandoned buildings and that a significant percentage of Detroit's voter rolls were inaccurate. The story raised questions about how Currie manages absentee voter ballots.
Supporters of Hendrix and Kilpatrick said they are doing what they can to ensure the final tallies are correct, although the Hendrix camp is slowly raising questions of impropriety. "There's a lot of weird stuff," Greg Bowens, a spokesman for Hendrix, said Saturday while he stood outside the city Department of Elections office on West Grand Boulevard. "We're very concerned about the integrity of the vote."
Although the Hendrix team has consulted with a team of lawyers about the election process, Cathy Nedd, another Hendrix spokeswoman, said there has been no dialogue about challenging the results or asking for a recount. "People are calling us, e-mailing us, lots of people, that we should ask for a recount, but there has been no discussion," she said Saturday.
Inside the Department of Elections, city workers, under watch by four members each from Kilpatrick's and Hendrix's camps, began auditing the votes.
Around noon, Christine Beatty, Kilpatrick's chief of staff, arrived and went inside.
Mayoral spokeswoman Ceeon Quiett, who was also outside the election department, said the mayor too wants to ensure the integrity of the election and make sure "every vote is counted."
In addition to the mayoral election, voters ousted Currie, selected a new school board and elected four new City Council members.
http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/05...B01-380342.htm
Nothing about any of this on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, Yahoo, Netscape, MSN or anything else.
