FL revote update: A Party-run mail-in primary, private accounting firm and direct-mail vendor

[seafan]

This is looking very promising.


Bottom line is, we need to keep the FL Legislature OUT of this process entirely.

Although Bill Nelson still advocates for the Legislature to run this primary, requiring a series of *hoops* to jump through, imposed by the Republicans... but, hopefully, we can bring him around to having the Party run it, thereby avoiding all of that Republican mucking in our process. (Give it up, Bill.)

And, the plans are moving fast. It looks like by the end of this week, the FL Dems will have a finalized plan to submit to Dean at the DNC for approval. If Dean approves, there will be a 30-day public comment period before final approval.

The deadline to have the mail-in vote completed is June 10.

County elections supervisors don't want to be involved because many of them are in the gnarly process of switching from the reviled touchscreens over to optical scanning machines. That's fine. This plan can happen entirely without them.



Here is the general consensus in the major papers this morning:


Orlando Sentinel, March 11, 2008

Top Florida Democrats said they are looking into hiring a private accounting firm and a direct-mail house to send ballots to 4.1 million Democratic voters so they can choose between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as their party's presidential nominee.

The party-run primary seemed to be overtaking the idea -- floated earlier by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist -- that the state could somehow administer a do-over election, paid for by Democratic donors.

"The more we involve the state, it's clear the more hoops we'd have to jump through," said House Minority Leader Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach, who has been promoting the mail-in-ballot idea for weeks.

"It's better if it's a party event," he added.

That's fine with Sen. Lee Constantine, R-Altamonte Springs, the chairman of the state Senate's Ethics and Elections Committee, which -- with the full Legislature -- would have to approve legislation authorizing a state-run mail-in election.

"The problem is a Democratic Party problem," Constantine said. "It's not a state-of-Florida problem."

Supervisors opposed

County elections supervisors had strongly opposed any plan that would have them running a vote-by-mail, saying they lacked the capability to quickly set up to count -- and verify the signatures on -- millions of mail-in ballots.

Some also expressed concerns that a party-run effort -- put together in haste -- could prove disastrous, resulting in chaos reminiscent of hanging chads in 2000 and balky touch-screen voting machines in 2006.

"The presidential election year is not a good year to roll out new voting systems," said Kathy Dent, Sarasota County's elections supervisor and president of the state Association of Supervisors of Elections.

.....

Palm Beach Post, March 11, 2008

TALLAHASSEE — Florida Democratic Party officials hunkered down Monday with hopes of deciphering the complicated calculus involved in holding a privately financed, party-run mail-in election within the next 90 days.

Sources said party leaders expected to emerge with details of a plan this week...

.....

The state party documents also said a private auditing firm, a mail vendor and the party would run the election.

Florida law prohibits an all mail-in election, so if the state were involved, lawmakers would have to approve the election. But the analysis documents also raised the possibility that confusion about a new voting method or suspicions over results not certified by the state would lead to a drop-off in turnout from the January contest. But the analysis, used to justify the state's Jan. 29 primary, also identified some benefits.

A mail-in election would help build the party's voter file. It also would let the state participate in one of the most closely watched primary contests in decades by ending the dispute with the DNC.

"It would have been a great party-building tool," said Bret Berlin, a state party committeeman and early advocate of a mail-in election. "At this point, I don't know that it's a viable solution."

Herald-Tribune, March 11, 2008

.....

While Democrats are debating a mail-in ballot plan, it remains unclear whether it would require support from either the Legislature or the governor.

Nelson believes that although the Democratic Party would have to pay for the revote, the state has to be involved to make sure the election is carried out fairly.

"In order to make sure there's no fraud in the system, he absolutely believes the state has to be involved," said Bryan Gulley, a spokesman for the Democratic senator. "You don't want to chance it. You don't want to hold an election and it turns out to be a situation where fraud is rampant."

House Democratic leader Dan Gelber of Miami Beach said Florida Democrats could come up with a mail-in ballot that would not require approval by the Legislature. Gelber said the plan could go forward as long as it was approved by Democratic National Committee.

"If we wanted to involve the state, we could," he said. "But we don't have to and we certainly don't need the Legislature's approval."

Gelber said the state party has had a mail-in plan under consideration for some time, although a number of obstacles remain before it could be carried out.

Democrats face a June 10 deadline for counting the votes, meaning the mail-in ballots would have to go out sometime in May. Overseas ballots would have to go out to Democratic voters by late April.

But Democrats face an additional deadline in that if they submit a revote plan to the DNC, the national Democrats must have 30 days to take comments on the proposal before endorsing or rejecting it. For that reason, state Democrats said they expect to see a proposal emerge before the end of this week.

.....

This will be a pivotal week.

[seafan]

1. MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT from Tallahassee at 2:15 EDT today expected.

Re: Revote in FL

Just reported on WINZ AM 940 radio early this morning.

[seafan]

4. Am hearing that the FL Legislature is submitting "their plan" to the DNC for consideration.

Early report on WINZ right now, 8:45 am, is that the FL Legislature is submitting "their plan" for a revote to the DNC. No other details given.

We are also awaiting the Party's plan which is still in the works, expected by the end of this week.


(Is this some early grandstanding by Bill Nelson in his quest to cede control over what should be a Party-controlled process to Republicans? ...Sorry for the cynicism. We'll see what happens.)

[seafan]

5. Steve Geller, FL Senate Dem minority leader: "...the DNC should stop acting like little children."

Now we know that Geller is still perpetuating the lie that Dean is at fault. Not helpful, Steve.

''The best of all scenarios is for the DNC to stop acting like little children,'' Geller said.

The "parent" of the FL Democratic Party/FL Democratic elected officials issued a pre-emptive warning against legislating for an early primary. The "children" ignored the parent, and now are outraged over their punishment.

Steve Geller is one of the children. Along with the FL Democratic Party Leadership.

[Tesha]

2. This sounds like an equitable solution. (NT)

[tekisui]

3. Let's speedily rectify this mess, the best way possible at this point.