Turnout at Broward County, Florida’s precinct D001 was excellent in last Tuesday’s primary election, according to the “unofficial results” posted on this county webpage.
With 1,028 ballots cast, and 930 registered voters at the precincts, voters having turned out, the turnout was an impressive 110.54%!
The BRAD BLOG called the Broward County Supervisor of Elections office to find out if there was any explanation for these numbers. We spoke with Patricia McCallister, an assistant to Supervisor Dr. Brenda C. Snipes…
McCallister told us that they are “still reviewing that information” and that they “don’t have an answer” at this time for the anomalous numbers.
The results will “become official this coming Friday,” she told us, recommending that we call back on Monday after the final results have been determined, for further explanation as to what may have happened. The complete “unofficial results” for Broward are available here.
For the record, Broward used paperless ES&S iVotronic touch-screen voting machines last Tuesday. The same machines which apparently lost some 18,000 votes in the razor thin, 369-vote margin race between Republican Vern Buchanan and Democrat Christine Jennings for the Congressional seat previously occupied by former FL SoS Katherine Harris. In that November 2006 election, Buchanan was announced the winner in that race, despite the fact, more than a full year later, no definitive explanation has ever been determined to explain the thousands of missing votes in Sarasota County’s 13th Congressional district race.
Perhaps a few of those lost ES&S iVotronic votes from Sarasota in ’06 have finally shown up shown up on ES&S iVotronic machines in Broward County in ’08.
Last Tuesday’s primary election in the Sunshine State was the last to use such touch-screen systems, as the State’s Republican Governor and Legislature have finally agreed to trash the unreliable, untransparent, hackable voting systems once and for all. They will still be in wide-use, however, across the country in many other states this year, where Election Officials continue to be in dangerous denial about the unsuitability of such machines — with or without so-called “paper trails” — for American elections.
Special Pre-Emptive Note to the Management of Daily Kos and their Front-Page Diarists:
The BRAD BLOG is not alleging fraud, conspiracy (dark or otherwise), or that Hillary Clinton or John McCain, who both won their respective races in that precinct, have stolen any election anywhere at any time, much less in Broward County, FL. We simply post the above item, as part of our continuing, ongoing efforts towards ensuring transparent, verified, and accurate elections in America. We look forward to your joining us some day in that fight. Until then, best of luck in your endeavors.
UPDATE 3:55pm PT: Additional breakdown of precinct numbers in both the Republican and Democratic Primary races, as well as a Property Tax Initiative that was on the ballot in Broward’s D001 precinct, now follow below. Unfortunately, they seem to beg more questions than they answer…
According to Broward County’s website, here is how the numbers break down in each race on the ballot:
ALL VOTES (Early, Election Day & Absentee)
Republican: 181
Democratic: 786
Tax Initiative: 1011
Broken down, the numbers look like this (click on the header to see the numbers on the Broward County website in each category):
EARLY VOTING
Republican: 8
Democratic: 627
(Total D+R: 635)
Tax Initiative: 640ELECTION DAY VOTING
Republican: 138
Democratic: 146
(Total D+R: 284)
Tax Initiative: 325ABSENTEE VOTING
Republican: 35
Democratic: 13
(Total D+R: 48)
Tax Initiative: 46
In total, that amounts to…
TOTAL D+R VOTERS: 967
TOTAL TAX INITIATIVE VOTERS: 1011
Why one part of the same website declares 1028 votes total, as per the graphic at the top of this article, yet the maximum number of votes recorded is 1011 total for the tax initiative, is unknown.
If 1028 voters voted, that means that 17 of them went to the trouble of casting a ballot with no vote on it whatsoever, for either Primary or for the tax initiative.
As to why there are 44 voters who seem to have voted for the tax initiative, but chose not to vote in either the D or R Presidential Primaries, we also can’t tell you. Perhaps some voters voted only on the tax initiative and had no preference in either Presidential Primary. Or perhaps they “wrote in” another candidate, if that was allowed, whose votes are not reflected on the Broward County website results. Or perhaps they voted in the Presidential Primary, but as in the Sarasota FL-13 race in 2006, their votes were simply “lost” to the ether.
Using the 1011 votes counted for the tax initiative, the undervote rate in the Presidential primaries would be 4.35%.
Using the 1028 number, the undervote rate for the Presidential primaries would be 5.93%.
Of course, whether the total number of voters was 1011 or 1028, it still does not explain why there were so many more voters than the 930 said to be registered in that precinct.
For what it’s worth, the Broward County website says that no provisional ballots were cast in that precinct, so the numbers remain a mystery for now.
Florida has held fewer free, fair, and accurate elections this decade than Turkmenistan.
Many lefty bloggers condemn polls and embrace polls depending on what day it is. When the polls don’t agree with election results, they say polls have no validity and should be completely ignored. But as the political yackers approach the next election contest, polls magically become valid again and are widely studied and dissected. They’re denounced when they’re possible indicators of fraud but back again when they can provide fodder for the blogs and their political prognosticators.
Yuh, and sun in Curly with a Larry rising….
Unfortunately your admonishments will go unheeded and the first time anyone at dkos mentions fraud or conspiracy in regards to Florida elections… or fails to mention fraud or conspiracy in regards to Florida elections… they and anyone else who questions election results will be labeled “fraudster” and blamed on “Brad” or “Bev” and the purges of the unclean will continue.
Ethnic cleansing… dkosian style.
Hey Moe !!! did you steal the recipe for the flaming Homer again !?!
Us Floridians know how to do it up right, don’t we?…for the last time I hope
floridas sos web site says 4,250,391 total votes were cast the 29th but ovr 580,000 voters didnt pick a pres candidate…ovr half mill undervotes
according to same site 4,142,934 did vote on the prop tax amend
blackbox has a spreadsheet about it
Karen, that tax initiative is a joke.
Another Republican plan to put $300 dollars in the average homeowners pocket, about a half mil savings to the upper crust and cutting public services.
Rearranging the deck chairs again….typical
“moon in the house of moe” #2
Kos, would you please stop posting here using such names?
Lets talk like adults dude.
With faith anything is possible, even 110.54 percent!
Praise the Lord Diebold as these wonderful, spine tingling miracles happeneth!!!
TAKE UP YOUR EVOTE MACHINE, PHIL AND FLORIDIOT 😉 , AND WALK PRAISE GOD-DIEBOLD!!!!
Right on Agent 99 #3, rising right up into lil’ Moe’s bum.
Ellen, as you know I filed to run against the current SOE in Broward. The information above is indicative of the absolute need for change in that office!!! Without question, we need to address the inconsistencies, and quit blaming some nebulous entity for “glitches.” Let’s get it right and bring accountability and integrity back into the process!!!
You do great work!! Keep it up!! Get the information out there!!!
Adriane Reesey, Candidate for Supervisor of Elections http://www.votereesey2008.com or email to info@votereesey2008.com
Please come to my campaign kick off on February 12, 2008 at the ArtServe located at 1350 East Sunrise Blvd in Ft Lauderdale!
Hope to see you there!!
Adriane
Brad, if you feel like coming east to see the ocean from this side…..or my kick-off…….you would be most welcome!
Adriane
{Ed Note: Racist comment deleted. –99}
What a joke! So, what does that kos guy have to say about that? Nothing! Right?
I’d be curious to know how many signatures in the poll book for that precinct.
And OF COURSE no provisional ballots were given out — they have to save every last one of those for the Democrats in November.
Unfortunately I think too many people jumped on the “sour grapes”, “conspiracy theory” bandwagon in 2004 and now are stuck looking like total fools if they admit there really has been a serious problem all along.
Imagine all the people who put so much time and energy into ridiculing anybody who ever suggested the votes are being manipulated. They’ve essentially set themselves up to where they can never really say anything if it looked like “their horse” lost under suspicious circumstances… without eating large amounts of crow that is.
I read a report somewhere that said in Florida you could swipe an ID through the machine multiple times to allow multiple votes for the same person. I also heard about machines getting stuck at the voting submission process, and they had to go back, reselecting their candidate – working like a double-post. Has anyone heard about issues like these?
Don’t worry. The ID machines didn’t work either last Tuesday. And yes, Rush Limbaugh had the problem you refer to. Details on Rush here.
The other problems here.
Remote flag 125; Shut it down.
CHECKSUM failure.
The result of the math equation is greater than the sum of its parts….
Any video game, embedded firmware or BIOS has this feature.
But this crap does not.
Wake up people, it’s a fake.
I found similar anomalies in some small precincts in the 2006 elections in Miami-Dade and they never fixed or explained the results. I’m guessing there was some error in how the votes were recorded. Perhaps they don’t have a way to audit it and find the true totals so they just pretend there’s no problem. We need to go to a totally paper ballot, hand-counted in public system if we want to have confidence in our elections.
937 d+r votes out of 930 registered. Hmmmm
And yet….Nothing will be done about it.
How about writing letters to the Editor of the Sun Sentinel. In reading the paper in Broward today, the SOE had a glowing article concerning her assisting a 90 year old with her ballot. NOTHING mentioned about the anomolies………
At least it would get peoples attention there in Broward who at this point are being fed stories that look like fairytales related to the election.
The mainstream media has not even come close to calling this election anything but “smooth,” and well run.
“As to why there are 44 voters who seem to have voted for the tax initiative, but chose not to vote in either the D or R Presidential Primaries, we also can’t tell you.”
Potential explanation: Florida has closed primaries, i.e. one must be registered Republican to vote for Repubilcan primary candidates and Democrat for Democratic primary candidates. Independents, greens, librertarians, etc. are excluded. However, any and all registered voters are enigible to vote for any state initiatives and in the general election in November.
A good point, but where is the explaination from the SOE; and what is the breakdown of voters in that particular precint. What is the NPA total, and does it account for 44?
Richard, that explanation does not begin to address the fact that close to 100% of the voters would come out and vote in a primary, no less. It would be great to see that registration book with no blank signatures. That would be one for the history books.
Wheeehew! Those vote Grinches sure are a busy bunch. They just never rest. Every where you look vote theft is the rule not the exception. I wish we (the law abiding) would fight as hard for the truth as they (the lawless) do for fraud.
Just emailed K. Olberman at countdown@msnbc..explained that the so called progressive blogs are gate keepers on this subject…since bloggers want to dicuss it…As a way to get ahead of the curve, since his show is generally liked by bloggers..Have Brad Friedman on as a consultant like Rachel Maddow. Ratings would go up and his show would get out ahead of the internet. Perfect opportunity from a marketing stand point. Democracy Now is a disappointment too in this area.
I’m an election judge. It’s true that some voters will cast a ballot with no votes on it. Perhaps some people want to get out of work or a class, take a longer lunch hour or whatever on an Election Day excuse. This probably occurs most often in counties where the citizens who vote get receipts, but also does (rarely) happen in mine where all I do is slap an “I voted” sticker on ya.
So, Yinn, if in fact some voters go to the trouble of voting an entirely blank ballot, how does that explain more votes (blank and voted) than registered voters in the precinct?
A couple of observations Brad:
There could have been 17 people who voted for the candidates and not the tax initiative and 61 folks who voted for the tax initiative and not for a candidate (or write in).
I’d like to know how many people who were registered voters didn’t vote? How many possible double votes were there?
And none of the candidates want to question the results?
Why do they bother asking us for money if they don’t want to be sure that the vote tallies are correct? And why do we bother sending them money?
Why can’t voters ask for recounts, why only candidates?
You realize there was more media outrage and airtime over the suspicion that Ron Paul people might somehow be spamming the online and call-in opinion polls…. but 110% voter turn outs, etc are just minor glitches.
you said it all Art:
COMMENT #22 [Permalink]
… Art said on 2/1/2008 @ 5:06 am PT…
And yet….Nothing will be done about it.
Daily Kos: Trying to Vote for Obama, Machine Resets to Clinton in NJ
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/5/123158/7065/255/450294
Christie Mayo
Bolton MA 01740