On Wednesday, we covered some of the massive problems emerging from New Mexico’s Democratic Party Caucus on Super Tuesday. The razor-thin margin between Obama and Clinton remains in question at this hour after ballot boxes were discovered to have been kept overnight, uncounted, at the home of a party official; voters faced long lines at the polls; and some 17,000 voters (11% versus 4% in the last caucus) were forced to vote on provisional ballots.
NPR had reported on Thursday that the state’s Democratic party, which ran the election, as opposed to the state itself, had decided to do a full recount of all ballots. Tonight, though, John Gideon informs us the report was incorrect, and only “all qualified provisional ballots” are set to be counted by officials.
We had updated our previous story several times while covering the mess, before finally noting:
Remember, NM is where former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was fired because he refused to prosecute the bogus “voter fraud” charges made by the Republican Party there.
Tonight, Steve Rosenfeld at Alternet jumps in with a New Mexico update, in which he tries to make sense of it all. He ends up confirming our fears in his opening graf…
Rosenfeld then aptly notes “the ongoing story is a cautionary tale for what not to do in November’s presidential election,” before pointing out the bigger question than who won or lost the Democratic Caucus, is more likely: “‘Was the state using a bad voter list provided by a private vendor – instead of using data compiled by public officials?'”
See his excellent details on the entire embarrassing brouhaha, but this graf, in particularly, should be noted in light of the mess which it seems the SoS and their trust in the unaccountable thugs and failures at ES&S has wrought…
The joys of privatizing public functions. It never ends.
I’m tellin ya dudes, someone better check those provisionals and see if they were counted, if not, check if someone/thing else voted under those peoples names and who was voted for vs the provisional.
First, I just got back from volunteering with the counting of provisional ballots in NM. The Dem party is centralizing everything in Albuquerque, and I was with Brian Colon (Dem State Chair) and Maggie Oliver and staff (Bernalillo County Clerk assisting as volunteers) and a host of other Democratic volunteers. We have been compiling the qualification lists for provisional ballots – it’s not complete yet, but should be done by early AM tomorrow, and my understanding is at that point the actual counting of ballots can begin.
Here also is my understanding as to why there were not enough provisional ballots in some locations: in 2004, there were 105,000 caucus voters, and many of those (I don’t know the %) voted absentee. This time around, there were over 140,000 caucus voters and the percentage of absentee voters was significantly less. Thus, the long lines at polling places, not that that excuses the fact that in some places there were simply too few polling places (such as Rio Rancho, where there was only one for the entire city.)
Brian Colon is a good guy, and his efforts as the new chair of the state party were part of the reason that voter turnout was so high. I don’t blame this on him, especially not with the efforts that are being made right now to correct the problem. Yes, it is going to take a few days before those provisional ballots are counted, but having seen firsthand the lengths that the state party is going to to make sure than every ballot that exists is qualified and counted accurately, I think it is worth the wait. It is a very intense process, and being that things did not go as well as they could have on Tuesday, the state party leadership must be given credit for doing everything possible to correct the situation. Unfortunately the media do not have a lot of patience, which is a huge part of the problem with our elections to begin with.
If we get to a point where it seems like ballots were not counted correctly in this provisional process, then there’s going to be cause for serious complaint. I don’t think that’s going to be the case, and believe me that the Mr. Colon and the other state party officials are not going to let this happen again.
And furthermore, if there have been some fuckups (I mean incidences, not people…except in Rio Arriba County) then I’m glad they are being identified and corrected NOW and not in the general election in November.
ES&S, however, HAS to go. I’d lay money that their voter rolls were wrong, and it is too true that ES&S has an unholy relationship with this state. Mary Herrera’s personal comment to me, was that the previous SoS, Rebecca Vigil-Giron (who, incidentally is joining the NM CD-1 preprimary race) was responsible for signing on with ES&S (at least for the M100 optical scanners, I don’t know about overseeing voter rolls) and that she (Herrera) is now stuck with cleaning up that mess. Christ, cut the cord already, even if it means the state loses money. Better to have a secure and accurate voting process. I’ve been trying to get to the bottom of the ES&S relationship for months, and to no avail…but I do know from inside sources that there was campaign money involved. Wouldn’t ya know?
Don’t worry about counting ballots ,count on something unusual occurring and these guys will look after everything from there on …
“Exclusive! The FBI Deputizes Business
By Matthew Rothschild, February 7, 2008
Today, more than 23,000 representatives of private industry are working quietly with the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security. The members of this rapidly growing group, called InfraGard, receive secret warnings of terrorist threats before the public does—and, at least on one occasion, before elected officials. In return, they provide information to the government, which alarms the ACLU. But there may be more to it than that. One business executive, who showed me his InfraGard card, told me they have permission to “shoot to kill” in the event of martial law.”
link
Good for you Soul Rebel, go get ’em.
Yeah Mick my friend, they’ve been playing us like fiddles for years I guess.
Interesting that Arizona is one of the states listed using privatized voter rolls. That’s a new swing state and I bet will be the new Ohio in 2008. I really don’t want to see a repeat of history, but brace yourselves for “less jobs, more wars”.
Privatization is just another word for incompetence when eVoting Vendors are involved.
Will they ever live down the fact that it was the “you’re doin’ a heckuva job”
presidencyregime that brought republican owned eVoting machines to infamy?A decade of infamy.
COMMENT #2 [Permalink]
Soul Rebel, thank you so much for your efforts on the ground in NM! VERY interesting report. As for ES&S, I’ve been following our S.O.S. KATHY DENT’s strange and symbiotic relationship with them for over a year and a half/ very wonky/ they’ve strong-armed us at every turn re: FOUR so called “independent” tests/ attempted (successfully) to obtain copies of our election definition files/ dubious CONTRACT pushed on Canvassing Board during our recount (nothing to recount down here, by the way from iVotronics, just rolls of poll tape; no ballots to count, so we didn’t count them TWICE)/ their creepy lawyers slithering around the court-room with their misinformation and outright lies…Hell, this is the sort of stuff Joseph Heller would have a field day with!
Here’s an interesting, brief 10 minute video of their antics that you might find informative as background re: CONTRACT with S.O.E. DENT (and husband)…
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=PFEgYIHsM8w
“KATHY DENT DENIES TIES (TO ES&S)/ REVISED WITH NEW LIES”
…and this particular creepy video was taken at THE TALLAHASSEE HEARINGS in the JENNINGS/ VOTERS OF SARASOTA vs ES&S case in December of ’06:
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=bXcyzVtMGD4
“ES&S OPENING MISTATEMENTS”
My partner, Leonard Schmiege, asks ES&S Lawyer MIGUEL DeGRANDY about secret vote counts/ gets a hell of a freaky response. (Many digital stills in this clip, as we were not allowed to film in JUDGE WILLIAM L. GARY’s courtroom, despite filling out all the proper paperwork…but we had our audio rolling/ came home and cobbled this one together from so much disgust.)
We have every reason to believe money and favors have been exchanged between ES&S and our elected officials. More than enough to go on, just can’t get anyone to investigate, even harder to get someone to PROSECUTE.
Keep us upped/ following this very closely.
We gotta get these tools…
Need I point this out: the Republican agenda has always been to corporatize (don’t use the word (“privatize”) the public arena, thereby taking power off the public and giving it to corporations (or “privatizing” as Republicans put it).
Bush/Republicans have always wanted to CORPORATIZE social security so the big, bad nasty government (THEM?) won’t “ruin” it on you! Expect a last-ditch effort by the outgoing Bush/Kristol/Cheney administration to begin by planting stories that “social security is in trouble”…AGAIN…like they did before, which was the first thing they failed at tricking us into believing (see “Iraq War”, 9/11, etc…etc…etc…). The first chink in the armor was “the people” rallying around NOT falling for the Bush/Kristol/Cheney LIES about social security being in trouble. “Don’t touch our social security!” is what everyone said at the time.
They CORPORATIZED the war with Blackwater, how’d that turn out? The list goes on an on of things the Republicans have and have always wanted to CORPORATIZE.
How about CORPORATIZING democracy with e-vote machines? Oh, yes! “Privatizing” is the anser for everything…TO TAKE POWER FROM THE PUBLIC AND GIVE IT TO CORPORATIONS! (“privatization”)
Hey Floridiot, did you see this yet on the Seigelman story?
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2008/02/06/first-abu-ghriab-and-now-siegelman/
re: NM
The real problem is that Mary Herrera is dumb as a rock and she has hired the political hack and totally slimey Daniel Ivey-Soto as head of elections . He will do what he can to get a buck, and kickbacks are what he has been waiting for. He was a failed attorney who was a pet of the former head of the Bernallo County Dem Party. People need to be demanding his head or there will be more fuck ups down the line. If he can be moved out then a decent person can be put in.
This has not been Colon’s fault but he has taken full responsibility. The county chairs had the responsibility for getting and setting up polling places so the Rio Rancho one polling place mess was because of that county chair. But Colon said It’s my responsibility and it won’t happen again. I reckon that county chair should appreciate that as it has saved him a battering.
Then, this early and very expensive caucus was set on the insistance of our fat Gov who wanted to have it for his ‘string of victories’ he had planned. When he flamed out he just ignored it and DID NOT HELP WITH FINANCING IT. The Party didn’t have funds — and didn’t even know NM would be in play till His Highness dropped out. The big 2 were staying away as a courtesy to Richardson (and maybe cause they knew how nasty he can be he he thinks someone has thwarted him).
Colon is a breath of fresh air after the sludge that was running the party before, strictly on Big Bill’s behalf, John Werthheim. Give Brian a chance.
sam
Luna County, in southern New Mexico, had a very large turnout. Due to our very capable county chair, Fred Williams, everything went exceptionally smoothly. One of the frustrating things our volunteer poll workers had to deal with was a great many Republican registered people showing up to vote, not understanding that their caucus wasn’t being held untill June. I don’t think adding confussion to any political process is acceptable.