Tech & Biz

Early Voting: Glitches, Long Lines, and Malfunctions

by Jordan Yerman | October 25, 2008 at 06:23 am

52 views | 14 Recommendations | 4 comments

Early voting is underway, and it's not going quite as smoothly as hoped. Long lines, glitches, and low voter confidence are hallmarks of the run-up to November 4. 42% of those polled have stated that they are not confident that their votes will be accurately counted.

While early turnout suggests an overall record number of voters, the same was said for previous elections, whose turnouts hovered in the thirtieth percentile. Our very own master_jim2008 is manning the early-voting stations, and is providing some great coverage from the front lines.

Forty-two percent of those surveyed in a recent CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll said they were not confident that their votes could be "accurately cast and counted." That number is up 15 percentage points from a similar poll conducted four years ago.

The poll was conducted October 17 through October 19 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Meanwhile, Florida is hoping that the third time's a charm:

Florida has switched to its third ballot system in the past three election cycles, and glitches associated with the transition are causing headaches and long lines, election officials said. The state went back to using paper ballots this year after trying out touch screens.

"Total disaster," said a voter in Florida's Broward County. "You get up there, and you waited three hours, and then the line totally stops. It's very frustrating."

In other states, the machines just seemed to break. The machines in question were manufactured by ES&S. These machines keep on not working, and ES&S employees keep on not fixing them.

"I went in there and pushed the Democrat ticket, and it jumped to the Republican ticket for president of the United States," said Calvin Thomas, an 81-year-old West Virginian.

And then there's West Virginia's Secretary of State, Betty Ireland , who basically pulled a page from Sequoia's playbook, of covering her eyes and ears and screaming loudly that everything is fine:

"There are no problems with the machines as recalibrated. Touch-screen voting in West Virginia is accurate and secure."

Because you say so? As opposed to those who are actually voting and finding it's not? That's comforting.

More detail on this issue courtesy of Erik Larson.

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recommend This comment thread is now closed

Barry Artiste

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 06:46 on October 25th, 2008

jordan, I like this story. It's good stuff.

Rhonda J Mangus

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 07:03 on October 25th, 2008

jordan, I like this story. It's great stuff.

master_jim2008

flagged this story as Good Stuff

at 07:06 on October 25th, 2008

jordan, I like this story. It's good stuff.

I am no longer working the polls because the Republicans succeeded in getting me removed because I was WAY TOO EFFECTIVE for their tastes. So now I'm working at the Obama office making calls to get out and vote. I will do a story on that later today I hope.