California Disgrace: Why my vote and thousands of others may not count
I never assume that I will be allowed to vote or that my vote will be counted. I’ve seen too much, that’s just the way it is. So I over prepare. I bring that little goofy proof of registration card with me every time I vote, wherever I am. Today was no different. Even though, officially, you do not have to provide any kind of identification to vote in California - I played it “safe.”
Walking into my assigned polling place, a neighbor’s garage, I presented my little beige registration confirmation card to the first poll worker beyond the door and was immediately told:
“You’re not on the list.”
“Excuse me??”
“Your name, your name is not on the list. You’ll have to fill out a provisional ballot.”
What the hell???!!! [Now all of you conspiracy folks out there, simmer down for a sec. My full name is not easily characterized, it's a good ol' jumble of cultures/ethnicities so I can't believe it was a targeted omission. And anyway, this gets much worse.]
You could say, I.was.not.happy.
So I am directed to the third table where an obviously nervous man, now a little flustered but basically sincere greets me with this:
“Um. Well, um you’re not on the list. Hmm. Well um, I guess you’ll have to fill out a provisional ballot. Ummm…so if you’ll be patient with me I’ll be patient with you.”
“Erm…okay?.”
It didn’t bother me then, but now I am wondering if he was worried I was gonna jump salty on him or something. Or maybe I am truly being “oversensitive,” I don’t know. It was all kind of weird.
So anyway, I proceed to fill out the bright pink provisional ballot envelope and request a Democratic ballot, as I had been instructed to do by the Obama campaign. The poll worker then tells me:
“Oh no, you don’t get a separate ballot, you get an independent ballot but you just have to fill it out in a Democrat booth.”
Ummkay. On it’s face, this is a basic instruction easy enough to follow given that there are three little booths marked Democrat and three little booths marked Republican. I take my ballot to the Democratic booth. Figuring out how to slide the thing in the voting slot, was confusing enough. I then mark my twenty or so ballot initiatives and finish with a hole punch for Barack Obama. I pull out my ballot, and walk it over to the gentleman who had helped me before. He takes my ballot, places it into that bright pink provisional envelope I filled out earlier, seals it up and slides it down into something that looks like a tuppeware box on steroids. I can’t help myself. I start laughing.
“My vote is never going to be counted is it?”
He purses his lips and glances down.
“Look, I was an investigative producer for a long time. I know how this goes. Thanks for your help anyway.”
Strained smile. Silence.
So deflated, but proudly rocking my chipper “I voted” sticker I headed out and headed home. When I got home, I sat down to the computer, checked my email and found this from the Obama campaign:
URGENT CALIFORNIA UPDATE:
Carmen –Californians have reported problems voting as “Decline to State” voters, commonly referred to as “unaffiliated,” “independent” or “non-partisan” voters.Please read this email for clarification of how “Decline to State” (DTS) voters can vote in today’s election for Barack Obama. Even if you’ve already voted, please make sure this information gets to as many voters as possible.
DTS voters have the right to vote for Barack Obama in the Democratic Presidential Primary.
DTS voters must identify themselves as DTS or non-partisan voters and ask to vote in the Democratic Presidential Primary when they arrive at their polling location. They will get instructions from a poll worker on how to vote in the Democratic Primary. If a voter gets into the voting booth and finds that he or she does not have an option to vote for Barack Obama, the voter should not cast his or her ballot. Instead, he or she should return the partially filled-out or unmarked ballot to the poll worker, and ask the poll worker to seek clarification from the supervisor at the polling location or from the County Registrar of Voters.
In Los Angeles County, DTS voters will be given a non-partisan ballot which they must take into a “Democratic” booth. They must mark both the “Democratic” bubble and the bubble for Barack Obama.
Damn. It’s true. My vote won’t count. I specifically did not mark Democrat, because I was told all I had to do was go to a Democratic booth and vote for the candidate of my choice.
But I am not the only one. It seems this problem is epidemic in Los Angeles:
Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo Tuesday issued the following statement in the wake of numerous reports of wide-spread nonpartisan voter confusion over Los Angeles County’s “double bubble” voter ballot:
“I have heard numerous reports from voters throughout the City of Los Angeles which point to wide-spread voter confusion over Los Angeles County’s so-called ‘double-bubble’ Decline-to-State non-partisan voter ballot. We understand this ballot is unique to the County of Los Angeles.“In light of these reports, I am calling upon Secretary of State Debra Bowen and L.A. County Registrar Dean Logan to review the county’s unique and potentially confusing ballot design.
“It would be unfortunate if non-partisan voters, confused by the county’s unique “double bubble” ballot design, did not have their vote counted.
“I urge the Secretary of State and County Registrar to do everything within their power to ensure that every vote is counted, and to carefully weigh voter intent against this confusing Los Angeles County ballot design.
“Los Angeles’ non-partisan voters must not be disenfranchised because of a confusing ballot design.”
Los Angeles County voters registered as “nonpartisan/decline to state” but who want to vote for an American Independent or Democratic candidate in the presidential primary must mark the box labeled “Democrat” or “American Independent” at the top of the ballot. Voters began to report Tuesday morning that they did not realize they needed to check the box on the ballot in addition to choosing a corresponding candidate. City Attorney Concerned About L.A. Voter Confusion SUPER TUESDAY
I have reported my experience to the Obama California election hotline. I have reported my experience to the Los Angeles election hotline. Tomorrow, I will call the City Attorney’s office. Gentle readers I promise you this: I will fight for my vote to be counted. Stay tuned, I may need your help.
Posted by: Carmen D. in 
COMPLETELY OUTRAGEOUS!!! Your experience just makes me wanna holla and scream and say, “Yes we can.” I hope you holla from the highest mountain top until something is done to eradicate this kind of ballot fixing and get your vote to count. Let us know what we can do to help too.
February 6th, 2008 at 6:45 am -[...] ever. I’ve just been reading a bunch of stories from bloggers of color who had all kinds of trouble voting. May be complete coincidence. I dunno. But I’m sure I won’t shock anyone when I [...]
February 6th, 2008 at 7:56 am -[...] disenfranchisment: hundreds of thousands of voters? Carmen at All About Race, on Brad’s voting rights Blog, on Jack and Jill Politics, early CBS [...]
February 6th, 2008 at 7:58 am -What a travesty of democracy. Thanks for taking the time to post this, Carmen (and thanks to Jack and Jill Politics for mentioning it).
Hundreds of thousands of people may have been affected by this. Brad Friedman’s voting rights blog is a good place to go for information about this — and to make sure that they’ve got your experiences. Voting rights activists are very well organized in California so expect to see some major followup.
jon
February 6th, 2008 at 8:03 am -infuriating.
February 6th, 2008 at 8:32 am -That’s so fucking ludicrous. Keep us posted on what happens.
February 6th, 2008 at 9:14 am -These election day errors suck — and are much more widespread than just California, or affecting people of color (although arguably in Calif. this could have affected the outcome of one sought-after state.)
Several (if you have the time to read) examples I encountered in Illinois:
ME: I filled out my ballot with a ballpoint pen (which I’d accidentally carried to the booth after it was handed to me for the required ‘make a signature that I was voting’ stop). After filling out the ballot, I looked up and saw a sign that read “use marker only.”
I asked the young (about 18 years old) judge, “Will this ballpoint pen be OK, or did I need to use that marker in there?” She answered — “Um, I’m not sure. Let’s ask.”
We asked the judges at the table nearby, three senior citizens. They said, “Oh no. This will have to be a spoiled ballot now.”
I started with a fresh ballot, this time with marker. That’s when I overheard a judge whisper loudly to another. “Well, it’s not our fault, there are signs posted.”
I piped up, from my nearby booth — “There are signs posted. But this is an important election, you should also tell people. The girl who was supposed to put this ballot in the machine didn’t even know what was correct.”
WHAT IF I HADN’T ASKED ABOUT THE PEN???
Two other examples:
GREEN PARTY –I read reports from the Illinois Green Party that throughout the state poll judges were asking “Democrat or Republican?” to people approaching the ballot table. They didn’t even MENTION the Green option. People would HAVE to ASK for a Green ballot. And in some cases, the place only had two or three actual green ballots at the polling place.
COLLEGE VOTERS — Not an election day error, but possibly an example of the complicated rules to be able to vote in this country: I was visiting a state university and saw several students exiting the polling place — not being able to vote “in the regular line” because they didn’t have registration cards. I only wonder if their provisional ballot experience turned out the same as Carmen’s.
But, those are just examples. As we all know, California is HUGE in this election. It’s disheartening after the debacle in 2004 Florida that American election officials haven’t addressed these significant problems that disenfranchise voters.
I hope Carmen and others in the state are able to make their voices heard. But I fear it is too late to make a difference in this election.
Take care,
February 6th, 2008 at 9:15 am -Mimi
This really matters. There were about 700 hundred THOUSAND voters just like you. Assuming most of those voters voted for Barack…which I assume they did because they, like you have decided it’s time for a real change from politics as usual…those votes could change the Clinton “win” to the Obama win.
February 6th, 2008 at 9:42 am -We had the same kind of thing happen in the last Puerto Rico general election, it went to the courts, we ended up with a very split government that has done nothing here for four years, we have been in a recession for 2 years, last year the northeast of PR entered an official depression {25% unemployment}.
February 6th, 2008 at 10:10 am -These screwups have very very serious consequences.
Knowing your capabilities Carmen I know that something will be done, but I am not so sure it will be the just thing. One need only look back at Florida 2000 and the bizarre US Supreme Court decision to realize that voting is probably a contact sport.
I’m with Nez, this kind of thing enrages me. I have lived the consequences a few times {right now is one of those times} and so I am not just upset about theory.
Agreed all around.
There’s starting to be action about this around the blogosphere. Julia Rosen’s Count Every Vote in LA on Courage Campaign is great. Also, SFGate has a story on running out of ballots in Alameda, Santa Clara, and Contra Costa counties.
February 6th, 2008 at 10:14 am -Carmen,
February 6th, 2008 at 11:25 am -Keep us updated on this and holler for help if you need it. I’ve got your back…
Mike
Thank you everyone for your comments and support!!! It is so gratifying to be a part of community that really wants to make the world better. I feel a whole lot better than I did last night…I don’t feel alone in this at all. ONWARD!!!
February 6th, 2008 at 11:52 am -Somebody on the discussion on Crooks and Liars just posted that they knew 10 people who something like this happened to … and they were all voting Obama.
Here’s what should have happened, according to an election worker who’s posted a couple of places:
Yeah, that seems to me how elections should be run …
jon
February 6th, 2008 at 12:02 pm -[...] today, this issue was on my mind when I came across Carmen’s post at AllAboutRace where she described her experience at a California poll and her belief that her vote was not [...]
February 6th, 2008 at 3:53 pm -Ah!!!!! Well, Hillary probably benefitted from this. I don’t think she or her party are responsible or that she learned something from the chad fiasco in Florida…back in the day. But she did probably benefit from this.
-C
February 7th, 2008 at 7:19 am -(cross-posted on Jack and Jill Politics)
Interesting news: there’s a chance for a full recount in Los Angeles County! If you’re a Los Angeles County Decline-to-State (DTS) voter who attempted to vote on February 5, please visit the Courage Campaign’s page.
And please help get the word out, online and off!
I’ve been tracking status and discussions of Double Bubble Trouble and other February 5 voter disenfranchisement on my blog Liminal States. If there’s other stuff I should add, please leave it in a comment. Thanks!
jon
PS: Here’s excerpts from the latest update from Julia Rosen of Courage Campaign on Calitics:
…
Today the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors held a hearing. Several people testified including Rick Jacobs and the Registrar of Voters Dean Logan. The good news is that Logan sounded amenable towards counting the votes, but made no specific promises.
Any Decline-to-State (DTS) voter who failed to mark the extra bubble indicating that they wanted to vote in the Democratic primary has not been counted thus far. There are no guarantees it will happen and so we are continuing to press the issue until every vote possible is counted.
The Courage Campaign is doing three things right now.
1. Requesting that the L.A. ROV conduct a count of all DTS votes, precinct by precinct.
2. Requesting that the L.A. ROV immediately take steps to fix the DTS ballot design flaw for future primary elections
3. Asking DTS voters across Los Angeles County to hold on to the receipt of their vote (”voting stub”) until further notice.
February 7th, 2008 at 8:00 am -Carole, since DTS voters favored Obama by a 2-1 ratio, this almost certainly benefited Clinton. I saw one estimate that this had an effect of at least 1.6% in the Los Angeles area.
The Clinton campaign was contacted about this issue on Tuesday about the issues Courage Campaign and the Obama campaign had started bringing up a couple days before the election, and their person-of-spoke Averill “Ace” Smith said
“Every California campaign has known the ground rules on this for three months. I can’t imagine why they waited until 2 pm. on Election Day to wake up … it strikes me as strange. If you wait until the last minute to complain, they must really be worried we’re going to win.
“We’ve certainly worked with our voters for months and months” to educate them on the process. “They’re blaming other people for not having done their homework…this is nothing more than a cynical attempt to create confusion.”
Nice. I particularly like “‘our’ voters” part.
jon
February 7th, 2008 at 8:08 am -I am a non-affiliated voter in New York and ran into the same problem in my polling place, where I was told that I was unable to vote in the primary due to my unaffiliated status. I called the Board of Elections and received the same information. Perhaps the rules governing party primaries differ from state to state, but I would love some clarification on New York’s policy if anyone has information handy. I was thoroughly disgusted. I also heard from another, older voter in line behind me that her son, a registerd independent, was also turned away at the polling place earlier that day.
February 7th, 2008 at 2:57 pm -OUTRAGEOUS is an understatement but not surprising! From hangin’ chads to unmarked parties… what the hell is this??!!
February 7th, 2008 at 5:30 pm -It still boggles my mind that we live in such a technologically advanced world yet when it comes to something as important as electing our President, we revert to the freakin’ stone age!
Why, I say, Way!!
Carmen you FIGHT for that vote… too many died for you to have that right and let no one stand in your way!!!
HOW THE HELL DO YOU THINK I FEEL? I VOTE IN MARYLAND WHERE THERE ARE ELECTRONIC MACHINES WITH NO PAPER TRAIL… JUST A LITTLE BLACK DATABOX/CARD. DO YOU THINK MY VOTE HAS COUNTED IN THE LAST TWO ELECTIONS? I KNOW THE LANDSLIDE MARGINS BY MARGINAL/ LITTLE KNOWN CANDIDATES ISN’T AN ACCIDENT!
February 7th, 2008 at 8:41 pm -Hi Jackie! Welcome to the conversation. Thanks for the “atta girl” I truly appreciate it.
February 7th, 2008 at 9:10 pm -Hey fcg#p. Not to be corny, but I think my life has shifted. I am going to work for voter reform. There is NO reason that electronic voting machines cannot issue a numbered receipt. We as an electorate MUST demand accurate elections. Demand it!
February 7th, 2008 at 9:12 pm -That was the subject all day at A.E.I.!
February 7th, 2008 at 11:34 pm -Thats why my local candidate is leaving a medical practice
and taking out loans to run against our resident empty suit!
America is pissed off at feeling powerless to a bunch of
idiots that are robbing us blind and showing us the hand.
We need REAL CHANGE, and not just for changes sake! we have to
remove the parts of govt. that are broken and clean house.
No Program, or Job should be immune to review! we cant start putting
these monkeys in charge of fixing their own wagon while it
is rolling to oblivion! Citizen unrest has stopped congress cold on
2 occasions within the past few months… i suggest they should get
a little more used to the drill!
I don’t know why obama supporters dont call talk radio shows.
yes they are conservatives but damn it, conservatives like a CLEAN
fight and hate injustice. I’ll be damned if they wouldn’t jump all over this.
IF YOUR LIFE HAS SHIFTED… I’M RIGHT WITH YOU!
[...] to all of you in the AAR community who offered support to me and to everyone in California who was heartbroken over being disenfranchised. We are in this together and when we all push at once, we can make our country and our world [...]
February 28th, 2008 at 7:29 am -[...] address the Decline to State fiasco, which almost disenfranchised 50,000 voters, the elections board has really beefed up its poll [...]
May 21st, 2008 at 8:29 am -You have to admit that the same thing affects Decline to State voters who tried to vote for Hilary.
May 30th, 2008 at 8:31 pm -Unless, of course, you think Hilary supporters are smarter somehow.
May 30th, 2008 at 8:32 pm -pteranodon, yes of course. There was no sinister invisible hand, just incompetence. But we were thisclose to our own Katherine Harris moment. I attended the public hearing, I should still write about it someday. It was fascinating…and really scary.
May 30th, 2008 at 8:48 pm -I have to tell ya, what scares me are the no-paper, electronic voting only machines. I just saw a program on how a guy in Vegas programmed a slot machine to pay out on command. I’ll bet voting machine security is no better than a vidwo slot. Get a good hacker and every 10th Obamz vote goes to Hilary.
On the other hand, all it took in the Washington state governor’s election was an unsealed box of mystery ballots and a sympathetic judge.
May 30th, 2008 at 11:21 pm -I agree, pteranodon. Please take a look at my ‘Poll Dancing aka Protecting Democracy’ post. It has a few links you might find of interest.
May 31st, 2008 at 2:34 am -Link please?
June 1st, 2008 at 12:14 am -