AZ GOP Sues To Limit Mail-In Ballots Counted, Dems Cry Voter Suppression

[demmiblue]

Source: TPM/AP

PHOENIX (AP) — Republicans filed a lawsuit Wednesday night to challenge the way some Arizona counties count mail-in ballots as election officials began to slowly tally more than 600,000 outstanding votes in the narrow U.S. Senate race — a task that could take days.

Republican Rep. Martha McSally and Democratic Rep. Kyrsten Sinema were separated by a small fraction of the 1.7 million tabulated votes.

About 75 percent of Arizona voters cast ballots by mail, but those ballots have to go through the laborious signature confirmation process, and only then can be opened and tabulated. If county recorders have issues verifying signatures they are allowed to ask voters to verify their identity.

The suit filed Wednesday by four county Republican parties alleges that the state’s 15 county recorders don’t follow a uniform standard for allowing voters to adjust problems with their mail-in ballots, and that two counties improperly allow those fixes after Election Day.

Read more: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/az-gop-sues-to-limit-mail-in-ballots-counted-dems-cry-voter-suppression

[watoos]

1. Don't give in Dems.

Hey, ACLU! Where are you? I just renewed my membership.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

6. +1

What are you afraid of gop? Let All the votes be counted. No more rip-off's.
SURELY the "it's too expensive "thing is OUT the window. Probably will cost one weekend of red dons golf.

[Iliyah]

2. GOPs are afraid of voters.

[Fullduplexxx]

3. Because they lose when more people vote

[watoos]

9. I hear what you are saying and agree but,

Do you realize that 7 million more people voted for Democrats in the House? Do you realize that more people voted for Democrats in the Senate?

[Demit]

10. Re: the Senate, that's because low-population states still get 2 senators.

The notorious example is: Montana has a population of 600,000 and gets 2 senators, and California, a blue state, has a population of 40 million and gets two senators.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. To paraphrase Josef Stalin, it's not who votes for you,

it's who counts the votes.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

7. Count the votes. Cant cost more than one weekends golf or a trip by melatoma.

[global1]

5. Can The Mail-In Voters - Can They....

enmasse sue the GOP for suppressing their vote or not counting their vote? Aren't their rights being violated?

[luvtheGWN]

8. I'm thinking a new how-to book should be written:

"Vote-Counting Procedures for Dummies".

Boggles my mind that in what Americans purport to be "the greatest democracy in the history of the world", the very foundation of a democratic society -- voting -- is so fraught with problems. When you have so many people and organizations questioning the validity of election outcomes, then folks, you ain't got a true democracy.

Of course, if you had separate federal and state elections, with a functioning non-partisan FEC, then maybe these problems could be avoided. But giving individual states the right to run federal elections is just plain dumb.

[JonLP24]

11. Voting is so simple and secure in other countries

How Estonia Secures Its Electronic Elections From Kremlin Attacks

Americans fret a lot about the threat of a crippling cyber attack. But the small European country of Estonia lived through one, a 2007 Kremlin-led effort to destabilize the country by attacking government websites. Yet the experience only strengthened Estonians resolve to extend digital service to its people, most notably electronic voting.

Just two years before Russia’s attack, Estonia began a pilot program that essentially allows its citizens to vote from home or work. To many Americans, this seems to promise a solution to increasingly common election-day problems: long lines, fewer polling places, uneven hours, etc. Some 25 U.S. states are experimenting with some form of e-voting for military service members. But most U.S. citizens can’t do it, despite polls showing a strong preference for it, particularly among young voters.

The Estonians haven’t had any major problems with e-voting, thanks to pioneering approaches to securing elections and keeping digital records that have made its government a best-practices showcase. But not all of them are easily transferable to the United States.

To begin, everybody in Estonia has a unique national identification number, similar to a social security number. “Your vote is tied to your personal Identification number but kept away from the prying eyes of politicians and election officials, unless there’s a certain incident where they have to see what happened in one precinct or another. In any case, it’s secure,” Erki Kodar, Undersecretary for Legal and Admin Affairs at the Estonian Defense Ministry, said during a recent visit to his country’s embassy in Washington, D.C

That state-issued number works alongside a personal identification number chosen by each citizen. The two, together, form a lock and key relationship, authenticating one another. You log into the system with your state ID number and your PIN. Result: there’s no question of whether someone should be disqualified because of a dubious signature discrepancy. Instead, an individual uses their secret PIN with their state ID number to verify who they are. “In the sense of your PIN number, that’s your digital signature,” said Kodar.

https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2018/11/how-estonia-secures-its-electronic-elections-kremlin-attacks/152582/

[lark]

13. Repugs would never agree to this. They would have too hard of a time suppressing & stealing votes.

The cheating frauds want things to continue as is so they can hack the machines anytime they want and disenfranchise anyone at will. They know their message is awful and destructive and only by cheating can they possibly win.

[SWBTATTReg]

17. Thanks for providing. Interesting read and I just wanted to thank you for providing. NT

[Honeycombe8]

12. They should just drop signatures altogether. In both states I've lived in, there IS no signature

In both TX and LA, there IS no signature on file. You can register online. The registration site links to the Dept of Motor Vehicles, so it can authenticate your photo ID and citizenship automatically (proof of citizenship is required to get a driver's license).

The signature requirement in this day and age is ridiculous! I guess that means voters can't register online there.

They need to enter the 21st Century and drop that manual comparing of signatures, which is ridiculous. That is totally subjective, anyway. Someone needs to sue to remove the signature requirement altogether.

[LeftInTX]

14. This is why I don't feel paper ballots are the answer

Electronic with paper back up should be the norm.

Paper ballots can be thrown out etc and are at the whim of whoever.
Despite fears that electronic machines are hacked I still feel they are less subjective.

[world wide wally]

15. Analyzing signatures is a pretty subjective endeavor anyway.

I can't even read my daughters signature

[SWBTATTReg]

16. Really. On Antiques Roadshow and Gallery 63 for example, they have to ...

bring in experts to validate signatures (which could be many versions of the same person, all valid) on signed stuff. And now all of a sudden, the states that require signature validation have thousands of analysts available for signature analysis? This is grossly incompetent and unfair and too prone to misinterpretation. I am surprised that this is still going on and that that this hasn't been challenged more in courts and thrown out as a valid means of verifying voters.

This is shown clearly, numerous times on these shows. Shouldn't be too hard to go after these bylaws etc. mandating signature validations.

Do you know of any such efforts to disallow this type of verification (by signature)?

[Politicub]

18. I have a couple of styles when I write my signature

For signing stuff at work that doesn't really matter, I have a turbo signature that looks kind of like a stylized squiggle. I use this on credit card slips often times, too. I like the feel of moving with pen with flourish and pizzazz.

But for legal documents, I carefully spell out each letter of my name in as neat cursive as I can do. Which isn't very neat, but gets the job done.

[MurrayDelph]

25. I used to do that, too

When I taught for a big computer combat (that no longer exists), I had a stylized signature for the completion certificates. But now that I retired, I no longer bother.

Earlier this year, I got a notice from my small town in Oregon, telling me there was a problem with my signature. I drive the half-mile to the county office, explained that since I registered I've had two jobs replaced I my right hand and no longer hold the pen the same way. I filled out a new voter registration card, they Tom my ballot out of the Hold pile, and dropped it in the Valid pile.

I'm glad I vote early.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

19. The UN should send poll watchers to monitor our country's elections, like they do with countries

which have a history of corrupt elections.

[Power 2 the People]

20. It's been going on for years.

[DesertRat]

21. Court Update

COURT UPDATE Maricopa County Judge Margaret Mahoney wants briefs from both sides tonight in @AZGOP challenge to handling of early ballots. Sets hearing for 2pm Friday, per @ArielSalk. #AZSEN

Link to tweet

[dflprincess]

22. Cindy McCain tweet on the subject:

Link to tweet

@AZGOP I am one of those mail in ballots. I was under the impression my vote was always counted.

[diva77]

23. fingers crossed that the case isn't decided by a wingnut judge

[True_Blue]

24. The judge is letting them continue counting but

The Republicans have a court date tomorrow. Since Sinema has taken the lead now, I wonder if they'll still want to stop counting the votes.

https://ktar.com/story/2298922/maricopa-county-elections-officials-continue-to-count-ballots-amid-lawsuit/

[muntrv]

26. Remember in 2000 when GOP complained about Dems refusing to count ballots from overseas?

[Permanut]

27. I think they should just stop counting whenever the Republican is ahead..