Haven’t heard too much from on the ground in Massachusetts this morning yet (happily), but that’s not much of a surprise. The real questions come later, as we will all wonder whether or not the “results,” whatever they are, as reported by Diebold and never counted by actual humans, have anything to do with the way voters actually voted.
In the meantime today, a group of election integrity experts, after having posted an “Orange Alert” yesterday about the serious e-voting concerns in today’s election, have sent an open letter to Sec. of State Bill Galvin, along with a public records request [PDF], calling for the retention of all election materials, such as voted, spoiled, and unvoted ballots, as well as all of the easily-tampered-with memory cards and electronic databases, etc., to ensure they are all secured and available for inspection by the public after the close of polls.
Election integrity advocates Susan Pynchon, Shelia Parks, and John Brakey also put the entire sorry matter in stark terms, demonstrating how simple this all could have been in a very short piece at OpEd News asking why MA didn’t simply just determine to count the ballots, by hand, in front of everyone at the polling place, especially given that it was a single race on the ballot with just three people on it…
This is not going to happen, however. A simple measure — hand-counting the votes as a check on the machines on election night, before there are questions about chain-of-custody of the ballots — will not be done. The second question one has to ask is, “Why not?”
As to the ballots themselves, Greg Sargent at The Plum Line reports an odd situation: Two different voters, from two different towns, have both informed him that they were handed ballots that had Scott Brown’s bubble already inked in when they went to vote. Here’s the report from the second voter Sargent heard from…
“I was handed a ballot and when I went to fill it out I saw that the bubble next to Brown’s name was already filled in,†Volynskaya, who voted today in Brighton. Election workers, she added, promised her they “were going to look into how this happened.â€
The two reports are too anecdotal at this point to make too much of them just yet, but it seems worth noting for the moment. May come in handy later.
[UPDATED as more reports of pre-marked ballots have come in! Please see additional follow-ups now below.]Are you hearing, reading, seeing other points of concern today? Let us know in comments. Links are always welcome…
P.S. Have done a flurry of radio appearances to discuss all of this, last night and early early this morning. Appearances from Mike Malloy, Stephanie Miller, and Nicole Sandler’s shows are now archived online if you’d like to give them a listen, right here…
P.P.S. Might I also recommend, request, that all you folks on Twitter (we can be followed here), Retweet the following as far and as loud as you can:
UPDATE 4:03pm PT: Coakley Campaign Manager Kevin Conroy issued the following “ALERT!” on the campaign website, and via email about an hour ago concerning the reports of ballots being handed to voters pre-marked for Brown, as mentioned above…
We do not yet know why this is happening, but you and everyone you know needs to be aware of the situation so that you can carefully inspect your ballot. If a vote has already been marked, you must return the ballot to the elections official, demand a clean ballot, and call our Voter Protection Hotline at 617-351-6866.
The campaign followed it up with a presser led by election attorney Marc Elias. If that name sounds familiar, he’s the attorney who led Sen. Al Franken’s successful 8-month election contest with former Sen. Norm Coleman in MN last year. Read into that what you will, but Elias did an excellent job (by Democratic election attorney standards anyway) on Franken’s behalf last year, so these guys look prepared to play hardball if necessary.
Let’s just hope that keeps them AND/OR Scott Brown from prematurely conceding before the votes of the people of Massachusetts are actually counted!
UPDATE 4:21pm PT: The Coakley campaign is alleging that they’ve now received five reports of pre-marked ballots from “at least” three different jurisdictions. From Boston’s ABC affiliate coverage of the Coakley/Elias presser:
Elias said the voters caught the errors and brought the ballots to back to the poll workers.
“This is obviously a serious violation, and our legal team is taking immediate steps to protect the integrity of this election,” campaign manager Kevin Conroy said. “We do not yet know why this is happening, but you and everyone you know needs to be aware of the situation so that you can carefully inspect your ballot.”
For their part, Scott Brown’s campaign attorney Daniel B. Winslow is quoting as rejecting the reports as some sort of political dirty trick. “In fact, news reports point out that today’s accusation was a pre-dated, in the bag political attack.”
It’s unclear from the ABC affiliate’s report which “news reports” Winslow is referencing…
UPDATE 5:28pm PT: Here’s the video of the Coakley presser:
Trying to look further into this. Will update further if necessary…
UPDATE 5:37pm PT: Thanks to BRAD BLOG commenter Lottakatz for flagging this point from the Boston ABC News affiliate’s report on the allegedly pre-marked ballots [emphasis added]…
That’s a curious explanation for the problem. Why would poll workers have any access to “already cast” ballots? Those should be “locked up” inside the precinct’s optical-scan system.
Had the poll workers, or clerk’s office said they had no idea how a ballot ended up as being pre-marked, the notion that it was a dirty trick by Democrats, as Brown’s campaign has been suggesting, might have made more sense. But if the ABC report above holds — that “a poll worker … handed out ballots that were already cast” — then further questions will need to be answered on these points, I’d suspect.
[CORRECTION: We had earlier referenced the report from Boston ABC affiliate WCVB as a report from Boston Globe. We’ve corrected that error in the report above.]One more thought: Elias seemed to downplay the number of reports the campaign was getting on this in his presser, when he confirmed reports from five voters in “at least” three different jurisdictions.
Please keep up your pressure on this Diebold BS. Where I vote, we don’t use this company’s machines thank goodness, but this MA election has me very worried, (but hopeful).
Thanks for all you do, including the Sibel stories.
Five Thirty-Eight yesterday….
Five Thirty-Eight today….
Oy. It has a familiar ring to it….
Great obfuscation! We ALL know why they don’t want to hand count the votes, if they did, then Acorn and SEIU and the Dem machine wouldn’t be able to “slip in”last minute ballots which “happened to be found!
Total projection here, accuse the other side of doing what you would do, in order to cause a distraction for what you want to do.
You liberals are funny!
The Democrats are the masters of vote fraud and ballot-stuffing. This nonsense about Diebold is nothing but a smoke-screen. I don’t know how you can be so intellectually dishonest to repeat these lies. Do you actually believe it yourself, or do you just think your readers are stupid enough to buy it?
S.O.B. at #4, you raise a curious flag. Your claim is that the liberals here are promoting a hand count as a cover-up of their own ballot piracy. . . . which will be detected by a hand count.
Oh, I get it; you’re a shameless political hack, who knows that it’s easier to make an accusation than a point.
I saw someone come into the polling place with a jump drive and load something in the machine!
http://rawstory.com/2010/01/charges-ballot-tampering-fly-minute-massachusetts-vote/
This article has the statement:
“The city clerk’s office said a poll worker inadvertently handed out ballots that were already cast,” Boston’s ABC News affiliate added.
What is that all about? Aren’t those ballots that have been cpllected supposed to be secured and turned in somewhere? This is just way too fishy.
Secretary of State Galvin says not to worry. Are we comfortable now?
Mass. secretary of state dismissed vote problems
“In one case, someone voting in Cambridge claimed a ballot had already been marked for Republican Scott Brown. There was no way to verify the claim, but the ballot was destroyed.”
Hmm. Destroyed? I hope that’s just sloppy reporting. ALL ballots must be kept, including voted, unvoted, and spoiled (like this one) ballots. Making sure those three numbers total the exact number of ballots delivered to the polling place is an important part of ensuring no ballot box stuffing has occurred.
@Joe Rodgers #7:
Cute. But next time you bait a hook, try worms. They’re less slimy.
#2) We’ve been getting disturbing reports of voting machine irregularities from all over Massachusetts. A paper trail seems to indicate ballots are coming back already having voted for Scott Brown. If Republicans/Conservatives think they’re going to get away with election crimes like the ones perpetrated in 2000 they better take a step BACK!
What better definition of TRAITOR than those who would corrupt the election process. Our people in New England are heading to the offices of Diebold affiliate LHS Associates at this very moment with sawed off baseball bats. (and Curt Schillings house too) lol
I can’t believe the good citizens of Massachusetts want to be known as the first state to have a former porn model as Senator. lol
consciousmc.blogspot.com
As the “results” come in (whether by Diebold/LHS’s choice or the actual will of the people — and we’ll never know if the ballots are not hand counted) two things should become readily apparent to Obama and the corporate Dems who have pissed away the opportunity to capitalize on the Nov. 2008 mandate for meaningful change by siding with Wall Street over Main Street, war over peace, the health insurance cartel and pharmaceutical industries over the health and very lives of American citizens.
They have a choice. They must move immediately to (a) remedy the catastrophe that is e-voting and (b) move sharply to the left. If they do neither, they risk not only losing the Presidency and control of Congress but risk a future America that descends towards a Christian fundamentalist theocracy where the peaceful means for meaningful change could be forever lost.
In light of recent history, I won’t hold my breath waiting for corporate Dems to wake up to the folly of their corrupt ways.
Brad, All ~ RE-TWEET Brad’s missive to hash tags #Masen #Brown and/or #Coakley to make sure the tweet is included in all the threads. This way the folks following both candidates can view / copy / re-tweet.
What did I say in the last thread? This reminds me of Bush v Gore: the mainstream media ONLY said BAD things about Coakley…if anything at all about her. No reporting on things Scott Brown said like Obama’s mother wasn’t married when she had him, etc… (Al Gore invented the internet, etc…) Mysterious swings in “polls”, etc…
Then they have their “setup” why Coakley lost: she didn’t know who Curt Schilling was, etc…stupid things like that. Nothing bad about Brown. That’s in the MAIN media.
“…In addition to the incidents in Brighton and Cambridge, voters at the Centerville Elementary School in Beverly said they also received ballots that were already marked for Brown. The city clerk’s office said a poll worker inadvertently handed out ballots that were already cast…”
–How can the city clerk’s office blame one lone poll worker, when the pre-marked ballots for Brown occurred at 3 separate locations???? That excuse would mean 3 different poll workers at 3 different locations–How “inadvertent” is that?
And, as Brad pointed out–Why would a poll worker have their paws on a cast ballot????
those 2 hacks up thread are just hilarious, coming HERE w/their “ACORN is worse than Diebold” shtick. I know there are very serious issues to be discussed, treason to be outed etc., but man, that is just too funny. All the years of exhaustive reporting by Brad and friends(national treasure) and they think we don’t know the score, I’m this time almost really L’ing OL!!
9:30 ET and a report just claimed Coakley conceeded??? The Gore/Kerry spineless/complicit award goes to………..
It seems that the die is cast … Brown is going to “win (mandatory slavery paying off a private corporate health-care machine anyone?)” with a point-and-a-half lead, the Dems will be wetting their Depends crying fraud, and some top state judge somewhere will be bought off to swear Brown in.
Blackwater (Xe) moves in next month to assist the Federalized National Guard to quell civil unrest.
Goddam all interesting times.
DanD
No really, I know this is gonna sound like terrorism and maybe it is but can’t we have our own hi-tech guy come in here who’s also into “living machines”(which I’d normally be against)and program the comment cyber channels here to be sensitive in a way that when some of these clowns go off the deep end and are just TOO stupid that the living program censor thingee we have senses it and sends a mild shock back to them through their fingers?
That’s too horrible, isn’t it?
How about if it makes I Love Lucy reruns be the only thing they can get on their computer?
Or ice cream, actual ice cream start coming out of their screen. It can even be really good ice cream, but they get billed for it? And they can’t stop it? And it goes at least a week, increasing by increments of a week depending on how stupid the comment is?
I’m serious.
SOMETHING!!!
from my local news channel: Coakley has conceded with less than 55% of the precincts counted; 48% v 52% for Brown. Obama called Brown to congratulate him. Damn.
Coakley Concession begins: 9:56 ET…
SOB@#4, that has to be the richest, most audacious statement I’ve ever heard. Not only are Repubs major projectionists, but now they (you) are actually accusing liberals of being projectionists. That’s meta-projection!
Democrats/liberals could be accused of many things, but I doubt projecting is one of them. That would imply actual offense. But all D’s seem to be able to muster up is futile attempts to deny the deluge of bogus claims levied against them by bobblehead wingnuts and tea-baggers. In the IT industry, we call that a denial of service attack. D’s don’t have the stones to be projectionists.
And I LOVE the Jon Stewart routine about these pussy democrats whining and hand-wringing about Coakley’s loss taking away their super-majority and thus their ability to do anything meaningful, while Bush never had that majority and was able to do pretty much whatever insane god-damned (literally) evil fucking thing he wanted to. Why? Because of a bunch of fucking pussy democrats cowing to the terror card and taking impeachment off the table.
In short, I agree 100% with Ernest Canning@#12, but I sound like a raving fucking lunatic when I say it because I don’t have any journalistic integrity I need to preserve. BWAAAA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!
Ernest Canning @ comment 12-
I love you.
And I’m gonna save your comment and maybe if any of my friends who got so mad at me over the last couple of days ever calm down enough to actually want to have a conversation about how I reluctantly came to the conclusion that I just couldn’t vote for anybody today, I can also mention the substance of your words to them.
Hey, Nation, anybody ready for a little democracy, yet?
…is it just me, or is she almost chirpy-cheery about this result:
Well, that pretty much sums up the dems strategy in a nutshell.
…and OH, NO! She’s closing with “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow!!!” The DEMS seriously need to retire that tune…
Hey… unless Croakley improbably recants her concession… it would mean that my prediction on this was wrong and will stay wrong, right? Unlike FISA…
…
… 🙂
… 😎
I do feel sorry for MA voters forced to choose between a rock and a hard place with Diebold counting the votes in secret… and the post-mortem on who tried to steal what and the methods used is going to be fascinating… but this would seem destined to shake things up a bit on the corporate steamroller.
Unfortunately this upset can derail things for only a bit, but that’s still a change from this morning.
How very convenient for Diebold, no darn pesky exit polls so they can easily steal this election.
from Mark Crispin miller:
Massachusetts Exit Polls For 2010 Senate Race: There Are None
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/19/massachusetts-exit-polls_n_428655.html?view=print
Those seeking exit polls for the 2010 Massachusetts Senate Race will be disappointed to know there aren’t any.
Mike Allen of Politico reports about the lack of exit polls:
The consortium scrambled to put something together — for the “why,” more than for the call — but wasn’t confident a reliable system could be built so fast.”
Allen adds that just days ago the Boston Sunday Globe carried the headline, “Senate poll: Coakley up 15 points.” Since the election wasn’t expected to be close not long ago, some apparently thought the exit poll process wouldn’t be needed.
Curious Americans aren’t the only losers. John Fund of the Wall Street Journal writes in his blog that the missing exit polls are “disappointing journalists and political scientists alike.”
Also on the matter, MSNBC anchor David Shuster tweeted: “No news organization is doing exit polls in Mass senate race today. Only numbers will be the election results themselves. Voting ends 8pm.”
Wow, Katie…that’s…wow. I knew they were killING media exit polls (present participle tense), but I didn’t know they were already dead.
R.I.P. Exit Polls.
Unintended, involuntary bold. Sorry, again, 99!
Ah, how fickle! 99 is holding Jeannie closely… and trying to claim it was an accident… 🙂
At Kos, someone reports the vote is actually narrowing: should Coakley not have conceded yet? Thank goodness the law says, it’s the vote that counts and not premature concessions by weaklings. (REM how Carter hurt Western Dems?) It is possible to pull this out? Is it, if we can find enough evidence of fraud to require a re-examination?
She said, BOLD, zap, darling… NOT hold. Plus, as long as they don’t pass this gay marriage thing I won’t be forced to marry a woman… I don’t think…. 😛
With all those, nationally epic, recently past elections where the Democraps went down with their ship (not), who’da thunk that Coakly would’a bailed SO EARLY … !
And most people still don’t think that the Democraps and the Repukes are just two sides of the same political coin working hard for that common end to corporately fuck ALL the people?
Let me assure you, Coakly DID win … and America’s Capitalist Political (one only) Party will make fuckin’ sure that she never misses a meal, sustains a full bank account, and will always have a comfortable mansion to live in.
In the meantime, the drama-queens of the corporate media keep us all entertained with SO MUCH, irrelevant information overload.
DanD
If you were Diebold/Premier soon to be ES & S or LHS and you desired to rig an election, the best means for assuring that the rigging went undetected, aside from exclusive access to the source code, etc., would be to make sure that the results you programmed would not be contradicted by those infernal exit-polls.
Can someone tell me why there were no exit-polls performed for this election?
Have you ever seen those mysterious black helicopters? They have DIEBOLD painted in big letters on the side. Honest! 😀
They fly around secretly, airlifting uncounted Democrat ballots to secret landfills.
“The city clerk’s office said a poll worker inadvertently handed out ballots that were already cast.”
In three different precincts?
LOOK BILDERBERG OR WHATEVER, WE KNOW YOUR PARTIES RUN THE POLLS ALRIGHT? This is why nothing changes. So, just try to do a better job at faking us out okay?