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| 5-4-08: One million cancelled or alte... |
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| Author |
Message |
    
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8011
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 18 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, May 4, 2008 - 6:10 pm: | 
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In April 2008 when Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita announced the release of "record high" voter registration rolls, with 4.3 million voters set to vote in the Tuesday May 6 primary, he didn't mention that a whopping 1,134,427 voter registrations have been cancelled.
Now, the voter rolls are supposed to be tidied up prior to each election. Indiana's last general election was in Nov. 2006, and they have had a slew of special and general elections since then. So how have 1.1 million voters -- 26 percent of the current statewide list -- escaped the regularly scheduled voter registration cleanup squads? Who are these million voters and where do they come from?
One quarter-million of them come from just two northwestern Indiana counties: Lake and Porter. Lake County reports purging 137,164 voters and neighboring Porter County cancelled out 124,958 voters.
Lake County, the home of Gary, Indiana, has spawned the Jackson Five and a great old musical (The Music Man) and and has been referred to as "the second most liberal county in America." Lake County has one of the heaviest concentrations of African-American voters that you'll find anywhere in the USA.
Nearby Porter County, the home of Valparaiso, is 95% white and went solidly for Bush in the 2004 election. It also has a lot of college kids.
For whatever reason, these two counties had ... what ... massive data entry problems? Exceptionally messy records? Lots of dead people who climbed back into their graves? Or will we see a lot of disappointed voters on Tuesday, when they perhaps learn that they were among the lucky million people who got purged?
HERE'S WHERE THE HEAVIEST PURGES ARE:
Lake 137,164 48% (Gary)
Porter 124,958 115% (Valparaiso)
Marion 68,120 10% (Indianapolis)
Monroe 66,009 85% (Bloomington)
Tippecanoe 53,456 58%
Madison 42,952 47% (Anderson)
Hamilton 42,325 26%
The percentage represents the ratio of the number of purges to the current voter list. Example: If a location currently has 100,000 voters on its rolls, and purged 53,000 along the way, we assign a ratio of 53% to the purge vs. current list.
It would be nice to have the original quantities, it would make for a cleaner number, but this is not available on the Secretary of State's Web site, so I haven't got a tidier statistic for you, wish I did. I also wish the time period for these purges was clearly indicated, but it is not indicated -- nor can it be derived -- from available information at Indiana's official election Web site.
TOOLS YOU CAN USE
It's always interesting to look for impossible numbers on election night, like the "more votes than voters" situation that sometimes crops up. It speeds things up to have a place to plug the information in. Here is a spreadsheet -- quick and not too fancy, I'm sure you can improve on it. It has every Indiana county, along with their official registered voter statistics for the 2008 primary, and some historical data from 1992 to the present, along with links for the source documents from the secretary of state:
http://www.bbvdocs.org/IN/state/quickrank-INDIANAreg.xls
(Excel file, 71 KB)
Here are links that may be very good to provide additional statistical information which you can plug in:
http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/elections/index.html
And here is a link to the source document containing the cancelled registration information used for this article:
http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/pdfs/Statewide_Voter_Count_by_County5.1.08.pdf
Here's a quick spreadsheet with the Indiana voting machines by county -- you can get that on the Sec. State's Web site too, but it's not in a database format. You can cut and paste these into your analysis sheets if you'd like to get comparisons of results by county.
http://www.bbvdocs.org/IN/state/IN-spreadsheet-template.xls
AND NOW ABOUT THOSE VOTING MACHINES
Another press release on the Indiana Secretary of State's Web site deals with the $360,000 penalty he's hitting Microvote with for failing to follow the law. Oh yes, and the Microvote Infinity, which will be very widely used in the Tuesday May 6 primary, has been decertified!
That's not going to stop anyone in Indiana from using it, however. The decision was that anyone who already bought these things gets to use them -- despite the fact that these machines have been embroiled in lawsuits in at least three counties, one in Pennsylvania for machines that just didn't work, and two in Tennessee where candidates have asked to redo elections due to bizarre anomalies -- like vote totals that wandered away in the wee hours of the night.
Microvote's insurance company declined to cover the firm, according to yet another lawsuit, because the insurance company alleged that Microvote was selling defective products. The judge ruled against the insurance company, saying the product wasn't defective, it just didn't work.
I haven't plugged this in yet, but those of you who are comfortable with spreadsheets can quickly add the voting machines by county to your voter registration spreadsheet to see how many votes all together will be subjected to Microvote.
Ah, but we aren't done with Indiana voting machines yet. Indiana is also fond of the ES&S paperless iVotronic touch-screens, the ones that lost 18,000 votes in Sarasota County Florida and were the subject of a blistering report by Dan Rather. In Rather's report, he showed shocking footage of the touch-screens being manufactured in a sweat shop in the Philippines. Their quality control test was to shake the machine and if it didn't rattle, it passed the test.
THINGS YOU CAN DO ABOUT INDIANA
1. Do some public records requests to either the state or the counties, and ask for their VRG-5 form, which is the NVRA tracking form on which the number of voters purged must be reported.
For tips on how to do them, here's our tool kit, scroll down to the section on public records:
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/toolkit.html
I'm pushing hard right now to get TOOL KIT 2008 done -- it's a stripped-down model with emergency measures for the fall election. Unless you tell me not to, I'll let you know as soon as it's ready for download.
2. Another useful form you can request: The CEB-9 form, which is the County Election Report that must be turned in after the election. Here's one, take a look at the information it contains:
http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/pdfs/CEB-9.pdf
3. If you are a number-cruncher, grab the spreadsheets here and wail on 'em during Election night. You can get additional historical information from this site:
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/index.html
(Choose the drop-down menu "general by state" and select Indiana, then choose the year you want. Confusion factor -- this site color-codes Republican as blue and Democrat as Red. Has lots of good stuff).
TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE: People usually catch things like "more votes than voters" weeks after the election. The dang Indiana information doesn't break voter registrations out by party which makes crunching the primary numbers a little harder. But you may still get the jump on some red flags if you track this stuff as it's coming in on spreadsheets that tell you what the stats are going in.
A WORD ABOUT THE TV PROJECTIONS
The first number they quote is the adjusted exit poll number, and it comes from asking people about who they voted for.
You'll notice that those projections often change -- sometimes dramatically -- just an hour or so later. That's because we have learned that they are paying elections officials (through their associations or otherwise) to call and fax them the results off the voting machine poll tape.
In fact, the National Election Pool (used to be Voter News Service) is getting this stuff BEFORE the election officials and way before the secretary of state.
The point here is, when what you thought was "exit polls" suddenly changes, that is the impact of those called-in poll tape results. Yep. That's the voting machines talking, and when they say something different than the people answering the exit pollers' questions, we should be looking at the programming on the machine, not the exit pollers, for answers.
I expect to see early projections altered significantly as soon as those poll tape numbers are called in to NEP.
So to recap, good things to do Tuesday:
1. Public records
2. Number crunching
3. Pray
Good luck to us, all,
Bev Harris
Founder - Black Box Voting |
John Howard
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Harmonyguy
Post Number: 580
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, May 4, 2008 - 9:43 pm: |
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Another tool for Indiana on Tuesday...
Late Monday night (early Tuesday morning) I'll be uploading my compendium of Indiana election info, with the precinct location lists, precinct results pages, and links to sample ballots (similar to what I did with Pennsylvania a couple of weeks ago). Of course, it won't be 100% complete, since some counties simply don't post the info in advance.
The file I post will be an HTML file with live links to the results pages, and hopefully someone will download the file and use it with web mirroring software like HTTrack to capture a series of results throughout Tuesday evening, so we can record as results go up (and down).
Presumably there will be a few counties (and the State) who will only switch on their live result sites later on Tuesday, so I'll try to upload an updated version of the page on Tuesday closer to the poll-closing time.
HG;) |
Russell Novkov
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rnovkov
Post Number: 254
Registered: 2-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, May 4, 2008 - 10:10 pm: |
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There needs to be action taken now.
Russell J. Novkov
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Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8013
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 6:40 am: |
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Fantastic, John! For those who are attending to this important discussion of CITIZEN CONTROLS, it is amazingly difficult for citizens to even get the information as to what precincts exist and how many voters each precinct should have. This information is needed so that when results roll in, anomalies can be spotted IMMEDIATELY, rather than waiting months for public records requests.
And I have just been in communication with Steve Rosenfeld regarding the 1.1 million purges.
Be warned: On explanation that may be put forth looks to be imploded. Election officials in Indiana may claim that they were purging "inactive" voters as per federal law. After two federal election cycles if you have not voted in anything and have not responded to any communications from your elections office, you can be purged from the rolls.
Apparently Indiana was required to purge its inactives by August 2006, which means there is only one federal election cycle in there, no federally required purges. We can look at the reported "inactive" list at the time and see if it has anywhere near enough voters to explain these massive purges. It does not.
Look at this:
Porter County purged 124,958 according to the report released 5 days ago. According to Rosenfeld, here are Porter County's inactive numbers from Indiana's 2005-2006 NVRA info: Porter - 21,910 inactive
Porter County purged six times as many voters as the data can support, even if every single one of its inactive voters -- 100% -- disappeared from the face of the earth and was a legitimate purge.
Other numbers are also out of whack.
I was disturbed this morning when the news identified northern Indiana, and in particular the area where the 260,000 votes were purged, as the mostly hotly contested area in Indiana. Of course, they didn't report the purge, just the politics. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8014
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 6:41 am: |
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John, can you walk me through how to get and use the Web mirroring software? I know it was very helpful in one of the previous investigations carried out by Black Box Voting participants. Can you use it on several sites at once? |
hb lipton
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Hbbean
Post Number: 1
Registered: 1-2008
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 7:00 am: |
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Bev,
What can we do to bring light to the purging situation? Do we have to wait until after Tuesday to take any action? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8017
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 8:38 am: |
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Hi, HB, and welcome to Black Box Voting. (We have a policy of real first and last names, so unless you go by "HB" as your name, perhaps you can edit your profile to include your real name -- and thanks!
Black Box Voting sent this message out to 20,000 people including many voting rights groups. Other things you can do:
1. Send this info to the media (by FAX). Make sure to include a link to the source document from the state of Indiana:
http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/pdfs/Statewide_Voter_Count_by_County5.1.08.pdf
Those who have access to media lists, please do send a press notice that 1.1 million voters were purged in Indiana, a quarter-million of them from the hotly contested northwestern counties.
2. I encourage you to let other election groups and civil rights groups know as well. Groups like the League of Women Voters, the ACLU, and other organizations you believe may be interested.
Now, two things have come in through my e-mail so far that I'd like to share with you:
- One person wrote to say this is "old news" because Indiana announced Aug. 1, 2006 that it was putting about a million people on the inactive list and if they didn't respond to a postcard and didn't vote before 2008, they'd be purged.
However: The information I have so far on the inactive list from back then had about 700,000 people on it, not a million, and the county by county numbers don't seem to match up for number of purges.
So far I haven't seen that the original list of inactives corresponds with the 2008 purges. I'm still trying to lay my hands on the specific database showing the county by county breakdown of the "inactives" due to be purged as of that Aug. 2006 article. The information I've been able to obtain so far indicates that the breakdown by county does NOT match the actual 2008 purges.
- Another person, who is in the election reform movement wrote to tell me "well, the good thing is people who were purged can fix this by November."
That statement actually kept me awake last night, and it is an excellent illustration of how Party partisanship taints the voting rights movement. What this individual is saying is that it doesn't matter if voters' choices for their candidate are lost, as long as they can vote for the Party in the fall. That doesn't cut it, and is exactly why many Americans have come to detest both major political parties. |
Alan Gifford
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Alan
Post Number: 2
Registered: 5-2008
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 10:39 am: |
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What this individual is saying is that it doesn't matter if voters' choices for their candidate are lost, as long as they can vote for the Party in the fall. That doesn't cut it, and is exactly why many Americans have come to detest both major political parties.
Count me as one of "many Americans" cited here. |
V. Kurt Bellman
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Formerelecdir
Post Number: 2374
Registered: 4-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 12:18 pm: |
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According to the NVRA of 1993, once an individual has been put on "Inactive" status (a poorly chosen word), then they may be purged after they have failed to vote in "two consecutive federal elections".
In the "best" case, then even if they were put on Inactive status in summer of 2006, they could not be purged until after the 2008 General Election.
The only people, other than confirmed dead or registered elswewhere, that could be purged under federal law now are those who have been "Inactive" since before the 2004 General Election, and have not voted in ANY election since then.
==========================================
http://kurtspeak.blogspot.com
(some relevant to subjects here, most not)
|
Michael Polsinelli
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Jankdc
Post Number: 37
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 12:33 pm: |
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Just saw this on Daily Kos:
Breaking: A State With a Population of 6.3 Million Can't Have 5.4 Million Registered Voters
by dedmonds
Mon May 05, 2008 at 11:22:29 AM PDT
What is it with this site and election hysteria?
A diary that is rocketing to the top of the Rec list claims that over a million voters have been purged from Indiana's registered voter lists this year, dropping the state from 5.4 million registered voters to 4.3 million.
It's been recommended like mad.
It can't possibly be true (or if it is true, it is a good thing).
Follow me over the jump for a lesson on Indiana demographics.
* dedmonds's diary :: ::
*
According the the most recent 2006 estimates, the state of Indiana has an approximate population of 6.3 million people. Given that probably at least a good 20-25% of that population would be too young to vote, a voter registration of 5.4 million would represent more than 100% of the voting age population of Indiana.
4.3 million would still represent a better than 90% registration, which is truly impressive in American politics.
So if there were 5.4 million registered voters, it's a good thing some of them were purged from the rolls.
Now, should there be some checking into the exact details of the purging? Almost certainly.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/5/5/141313/9290/18/509493 |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8018
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 1:23 pm: |
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The source for this article is the Secretary of State's own numbers, which are linked in the original article. And here it is, again:
http://www.in.gov/sos/elections/pdfs/Statewide_Voter_Count_by_County5.1.08.pdf
Now, as for "poorly sourced", all speculations about who was purged, and why, are poorly sourced unless they are supported by documents.
Again, the secretary of state's OWN NUMBERS show 1.1 million voter registrations cancelled. There's no explanation as to why a preponderance of the cancellations come from just two counties.
I suggested possible explanations...correcting sloppy voter rolls, correcting stuffed voter rolls, etc. But unless the questions are answered with documentation, not speculation, we may have a problem. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8019
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 1:30 pm: |
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And Michael: I have edited out the disinformation from the Kos blog -- and by the way, the Kos site is famous for its gatekeeping and propaganda, as well as for its disdain for the work of Black Box Voting and BradBlog.
The parts I eliminated were the misstatement, repeated ad nauseum, that there was no source for the material in my story (the source is clearly in the story, with a link, and references the state's own numbers).
And I eliminated the Kos blogger's propaganda that this is "crying wolf".
It will only be reprinted as disinformation and propaganda as I have just done here. Crying wolf means warning of something that is not real.
The documents show that 1.1 million registrations were cancelled. The reasons for the cancellations aren't supported by adequate documentation, and the only similar documentation I have been able to find does not match these purge numbers (ie. six times as many cancellations in Porter County as they had inactives on the rolls). |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8020
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 1:45 pm: |
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Now here's a very interesting statistic.
According to the EAC NVRA State Data Table, Porter County Indiana had 88,666 registered voters in 2004, with zero inactives.
According to the Secretary of state documents, Porter County now has 108,603 registered voters, consisting of 93,127 active voters and 15,476 inactives. And according to the Secretary of state, Porter County cancelled 124,958 registrations.
If they had only 88,666 registrations in 2004, and they have 108,603 now, and they listed only 21,910 inactive voters in their 2005-06 numbers, where did the 124,958 registrations come from to be cancelled?
Am I the only one that thinks these numbers don't make sense? |
V. Kurt Bellman
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Formerelecdir
Post Number: 2375
Registered: 4-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 1:56 pm: |
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Bev,
We may need to watch our choice of verbs here.
"Purged" in the lexicon of modern election admin, means "purged" in the NVRA sense, after two federal elections of being on Inactive status.
However, there are other ways to be deleted from a county's files without being "purged", per se. If a voter dies, or registers elsewhere, that is ALWAYS a cause for deletion, but it does not fall under the description "purge".
Is it possible that these two counties had lots and lots of people who had moved? Is there a big city that straddles the county line? If so, movers of a few blocks could be in a new county. (I trot this out there because Bethlehem, PA, a decent sized burg, straddles a county line.)
By sifting through the disinformatiion for the good data in the Kos post, it seems mathematically that Indiana may have a history of some fairly lax "list maintenence", and this could be a gross figure of all types of Indiana list maintenence, not simply a "purge" per se, although an NVRA type purge may be a subset of these numbers. The question that jumps out at you for those is why, if an NVRA purge event was triggered by the 2006 General Election, the last time it COULD BE under law, why wasn't that purge done about a year ago?
==========================================
http://kurtspeak.blogspot.com
(some relevant to subjects here, most not)
|
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8021
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 2:50 pm: |
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Kurt, if these cancellations were duplicates, triplicates, people who had moved, you'd see inflated rolls in earlier years with reduced numbers now.
Like this:
INFLATO COUNTY, USA
2004 reg voters: 210,000
2006 reg voters: 200,000
2008 reg voters: 150,000
You wouldn't see this:
Porter County
2004: reg voters 88,000 source: EAC data
2006: reg voters 82,416 source: EAC data
2008: reg voters 109,000 source: IN Sec State data
I've been looking at the EAC data tables for 2004 and 2006. It breaks out the number of duplicates, moved, and invalid addresses and comes up with a total of 5,110 for Porter County in 2004-2006.
So you see, we have:
21,910 inactive
5,110 moved, duplicate, invalid
======
27,120 registrations possibly needing cancellation
That's a far cry from cancelling 124,958.
I need to take some time to look at the other weirdo counties, because I'm a little stuck on Porter, but I can't find any rationale for the Porter County numbers. They seem to be impossible.
And as for the hysteria at Kos, they're back to the crazed libel and rabies attacks. Maybe that's a sign that there's something to see here and we shouldn't move along. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8022
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 3:05 pm: |
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Lake County:
2004 registered voters: 353,826
2006 registered voters: 242,567
2008 registered voters: 285,404
The 2004 numbers had a number of indicators that there was not just poor list maintenance, but fraud. For example, it shows 101% of the voters voting. 
The 2006 numbers look like they cleaned the list, dropping the number on the voting rolls by 111,259.
The 2008 numbers have jumped up from 2006, by about 42,000, a nice healthy jump.
The EAC numbers for duplicates, moved, etc. come to about 15,000 that need to be cancelled. The inactives are about 115,000.
Okay, so Lake County, with 137,000 purges, if they waited until now to purge all 115,000 inactives and also waited until now to cancel the 15,000 duplicates etc, that would be 130,000 needing to be cancelled, with actual cancellations of 137,000.
We're in the ball park in Lake County, but ONLY if they didn't cancel any of those back in 2006. And frankly, the 111,000 registrations cancelled in 2006 matches up with about 130,000 inactives+moved etc. I say this because it makes reasonable sense to me that if you send two postcards each to 115,000 people, and also have a federal and several local elections, that having at least 11,000 of those 115,000 get active again is likely.
And, I've been told but have not confirmed that Indiana was REQUIRED to do those big purges by the end of August 2006, which would also jive with the 111,000 that we know were dropped from the rolls in 2006.
Which would bring us back to: Where would they find another 137,000 registrations to purge in Lake County? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8023
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 3:23 pm: |
|
I had a little trouble finding it, so for anyone else who's interested,the data tables from the EAC up through 2006 can be found here:
http://www.eac.gov/clearinghouse/data-files-and-survey-chapters |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8024
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 3:31 pm: |
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Here's a plausible theory that could explain Lake County (but not Porter County)
Suppose they cleaned the Lake County list prior to the Nov. 2006 election. In doing so, the size of the voter rolls dropped from 353,826 to 242,567, knocking about 111,000 registrations off the rolls.
Now suppose they reported the newly cleaned 2006 voter registration totals to the EAC, but didn't report the "number dropped from the rolls". The column in the EAC charts for the "number dropped for any reason" is not filled out for Indiana.
Now suppose they decided they'd better "balance the books" and so even through they dropped these registrations back in 2006, they stuck them on for cancellations in 2008. That would balance the books. In doing that, these guys need to make a journal entry on that to make it clear what they're doing, if that's what they did!
But that still doesn't even come close to explaining Porter County.
And I still haven't gone into detail on the other counties. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8025
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 3:37 pm: |
|
And one more thing (I seem to be talking to myself here):
The EAC tables show "none" for every entry in New Hampshire. That's because New Hampshire refuses to fill out the EAC reports. I used to think that's because New Hampshire is independent-minded and a states rights enthusiast. After looking at the reports for New Hampshire, obtained in our Freedom of Information reports, I now think that New Hampshire couldn't come up with accurate stats on their best day, because their records don't add up. |
From the Mailbag
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Mailbag
Post Number: 223
Registered: 10-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 3:55 pm: |
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(From Steve Rosenfeld)
quote:"Hi. Herešs the latest from Indiana.
The SOS's chief of staff says the numbers you is using are not what you think, they do not refer to purged voters. The column labeled "cancelled" does not mean cancelled registrations.
It means anytime an existing voter file is updated, it records that as a computer event that "cancels" the prior record. That's why the figure for Butler County is so much higher than the inactive voters listed on the 2005-0 EAC NVRA report.
He said, yes, there have been big voter roll removals since 2006, when the DOJ and the state settled a NVRA list maintenance suit. He said yes, the state had some of the worst voter rolls in the country.
But it's not 1.13 million votes. He said since August 2006, when the state listed 609,000 inactive voters, starting the purge process, the state has been following the NVRA gudelines. Since then names have been removed, but they have also been added. Since last November, there have been 303,000 new and updated registrations. He said he didnšt have time today to run the numbers and get me a list of purged voter names, but if itšs somewhere between that -609,000 and +303,000, you're essentially at 15% or so of the list, which is not unheard of."
Steve Rosenfeld
Comment from admin): Using this explanation, the number of voters dropped from the rolls would not be a concern (at least, not from these numbers) but the number of changes made to voter records WOULD be a concern.
Now, in Indiana it is my understanding that any party can vote in the Democratic primary. That means, if I have this right, that altering someone's registration from Democrat to Republican will not disenfranchise them (but I'm not sure if vice versa is true...)
However: What we still have here is a huge number of records being altered in two very hotly contested counties. In Porter County, going by the explanation provided to Rosenfeld, this would mean that 100% of the records were altered in some way, some more than once.
We have 85% of the records being altered in Monroe County, 89% of them being changed in some way in Gibson County.
We only have a verbal statement as to whether "cancel" means "cancel registration" or "cancel registration and reinstate registration with a change"
Much appreciation to Rosenfeld for the additional information. |
karen reineke
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Karen_r
Post Number: 123
Registered: 12-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, May 5, 2008 - 5:01 pm: |
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It means anytime an existing voter file is updated, it records that as a computer event that "cancels" the prior record.
still a huge number of "updates" in the heaviest populated areas...my suspious self would guess that the updates r "trys" at disenfrachsizing voters.....
ty john howard in advance for all the work u do
early votes reported on north carolinas web site
470,003
ab ballots 22,933
indianas ab votes reported on web site 167,783
if any one can find indianas county by county ab report i would like to see it |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8037
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 10:21 am: |
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I'm not sure about the protocols on this, maybe someone can fill me in:
\quote
{http://www.reporter-times.com/stories/2008/05/06/news.nw-089659.sto
Voting in the Primary election has begun well with a only few minor hitches, according to Morgan County Clerk Peggy Mayfield.
This morning, Mayfield said the biggest problems seem to involve voters who were apparently purged from voter rolls after the 2004 election, when the county changed over to the statewide system.
"I appreciate them being so persistent (in questioning their registration status)," Mayfield said. Voters who claimed to be registered had to be researched under old records to find out that they should still be listed as registered...}
Now, if someone isn't on the reg list, it sounds like they are looking them up in old reg lists and then they let them vote? I may be reading this wrong... |
V. Kurt Bellman
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Formerelecdir
Post Number: 2384
Registered: 4-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 10:39 am: |
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Bev,
Sounds right. But then isn't this an admission that they badly bungled the switchover to the statewide system?
I mean, these are very easy errors to make, but didn't they do testing? Didn't they do a practice mode? Didn't they have every county do a before and after record count and verify?
This is database switchover 101. Not rocket science.
==========================================
http://kurtspeak.blogspot.com
(some relevant to subjects here, most not)
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Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8039
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 11:00 am: |
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One good thing from all this:
I'm not a fan of the EAC. But the EAC data sets on voter registration are an outstanding project.
Steve Rosenfeld turned me on to these. There are two jumbo downloads that have a ton of information, and will offer citizens the opportunity to do much faster red-flag raising, which is an important citizen-based quality control.
There is an extensive set of data files for 2004 and another for 2004-06, which provide the raw data county by county nationwide (except for New Hampshire which refuses to send its numbers. Uh, New Hampshire, are you aware that Barnstead had a maximum possible number of about 600 Democratic voters but reports 900 Democratic votes in the primary?)
The EAC sheets allow very rapid spotting of the ratio to registered vs. votes. You immediately see that Lake County Indiana reported 101% of its eligible voters voting in 2004.
The 2004-2006 reports contain the number of people moved, # of duplicates, # of purges, # died, # removed for any reason, etc.
So if I'm a fraudster I NEED those ID matches and electronic pollbooks, because my opportunities for purging without getting caught are made more difficult with these publicly available EAC databases. I the ID match and the computerized databases because if I'm a fraudster, I can use them to introduce disenfranchising error that doesn't show up in the reporting system and has plausible deniability.
By the way, the release of detailed raw data, especially in spreadsheet formats as the EAC has done, falls into the category of change that is actually meaningful, rather than just giving us more hamster wheels to run on.
Immediacy of the data is also important, and that includes the interim results and the precinct detail results (unofficial is fine for the interim reports, of course). That's why the tools John Howard has been preparing are so important. |
karen reineke
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Karen_r
Post Number: 125
Registered: 12-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 2:12 pm: |
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msnbc is reporting "ovr 127,000" early hoosier votes but indiana sos web site shows 173,525
this might be nothing but bev,john if u could save the page on sos site for me showing 173,525 i would apprciate...it might be helpful later
ty |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8046
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 2:23 pm: |
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link, Karen? |
karen reineke
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Karen_r
Post Number: 126
Registered: 12-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 3:48 pm: |
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http://www.in.gov/sos/ |
christine c reid
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ctwatcher
Post Number: 818
Registered: 12-2007
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, May 7, 2008 - 6:28 am: |
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Bev, you commented about NH:
Barnstead had a maximum possible number of about 600 Democratic voters but reports 900 Democratic votes in the primary.
For those who are unfamiliar with NH, in NH you can change parties, vote in the primary, and change back on the same day.
By max, Bev, are you basing the statement on looking at the stats on how many people changed parties? Other possible areas to consider: Could provisionals change the numbers reported in any way? Do presidential ballots as apparently codified in NVRA (people who moved after registration deadline and can't vote in their new state being able to vote for prez in their old state) apply to the primary, or just the general election?
Thanks. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8065
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, May 7, 2008 - 5:43 pm: |
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By max, I am saying this:
According to their own numbers, at the END of Election Day, they had 217 names on the Democratic voter registration rolls. So that would include same-day registration voters.
According to their own numbers, they also had 425 unaffiliated voters who voted on Democratic ballots. Here's how they do that: The unaffiliated voter has to become a temporary Democrat, and has the option to change back to unaffiliated after voting. And let's suppose that 100% of the unaffiliateds who became Democrat for a day changed back to unaffiliated, meaning that none of them would be on the Democratic rolls as of close of Election Day.
I'm being generous here. With 217 Democrats on the rolls voting -- a 100% turnout (!) and with every one of the 425 unaffiliateds who voted Democrat changing back to unaffiliated so they don't show up on the rolls at the end of the day, we get:
217 + 425 = 674
According to their own numbers they had 917 Democratic ballots cast. That, my friends, is a 135% turnout.
That is an impossible number. Or a town clerk that can't add (and she's adding up the town revenues, so that ain't good...). Or fraud. Take your pick.
And bear in mind, a few of the unaffiliated probably decided to stay Democrat, and turnout was probably not 100%, so the votes stuffed onto the books in Barnstead are probably more than 37%.
And yes, with that piddly number of votes, they used voting machines. |
christine c reid
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ctwatcher
Post Number: 820
Registered: 12-2007
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, May 7, 2008 - 8:32 pm: |
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Thanks for explanation. I found those tally sheets showing who had voted and who had switched back very confusing -- may be easier if you live/vote there.
What about provisionals? Ah, yes, I recall that NH doesn't HAVE provisionals -- they verify on the spot. So no extras there.
How are absentees dealt with as regards these totals and poll books? Are they included? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 8073
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, May 8, 2008 - 3:59 pm: |
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Absentees are delivered to the polls and counted on Election Day. They are included. |
christine c reid
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ctwatcher
Post Number: 822
Registered: 12-2007
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, May 9, 2008 - 4:48 am: |
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Well, I've exhausted my list of possible reasons why the discrepancy could occur....thanks for the info. Seems like a good story for a local newspaper or letter to editor, if any NH residents want to raise the question. |
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