New Jersey's email voting suffers major glitches, deadline extended to Friday [View all]

Source: NBC News

New Jersey's emergency experiment with email voting hasn't fared well. One election official described it as a "catastrophe" and voters are complaining that computer glitches are blocking their last-minute efforts to obtain electronic ballots. An avalanche of requests for e-mail ballots that overwhelmed county clerks' offices forced the state to extend its e-mail voting deadline to Friday afternoon at 8 p.m., though e-mail ballot requests must still be filed by 5 p.m. Tuesday.

"It has become apparent that County Clerks are receiving applications at a rate that outpages their capacity to process them without an extension," said Lt. Gov. Kim Guadango in her order extending the deadline.

Several election officials say misunderstanding is at the root of the problem: Email ballots are only permitted for residents displaced by Hurricane Sandy, but many who are not displaced are nevertheless deluging the system.

"The numbers are overwhelming. The county clerks are inundated with requests," said Michael Harper, clerk of the Board of Elections for Hudson County, N.J. which includes Hoboken, one of the hardest-hit regions recovering from Sandy. Asked to describe the situation, he said, "I would lean more towards catastrophe."

Read more: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/11/06/14974588-new-jerseys-email-voting-suffers-major-glitches-deadline-extended-to-friday?lite

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This could be very bad. If there are a lot of ineligible people trying to vote this way, those people may miss the chance to vote altogether.

I could have predicted that this would run into problems. Who thought that they could possibly throw something like this together so quickly?