Culture of Voter Suppression

I understand that Republicans generally err on the side of suppressing votes, and in a tight election it's commonplace to challenge ballots for a variety of reasons - to keep them out of the count, and simply to make your position look better by keeping your opponent's ballots on the side for as long as possible. But this is completely ridiculous from Jim Tedisco.

This just in from Columbia County: when Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s absentee ballot came up in the queue, the poll watchers for Jim Tedisco objected to it, saying the senator was in the county on election day and should have voted in person.

First of all, Gillibrand's office maintains that she wasn't in the county on Election Day. Second, there's no law that the absentee voter has to be out of the county, if you want to get technical. Gillibrand's statement says it the best.

“The Republican’s challenge is frivolous and without merit. This is part of their larger attempt to disenfranchise legal Democratic voters and delay the inevitable Democratic victory in the 20th. Every day that the national Republicans waste with their dishonest stalling tactics is another day Upstate New Yorkers are deprived their Member of Congress. Senator Gillibrand looks forward to working with Scott Murphy in Congress to support President Obama plans to turn this economy around and create good paying jobs.”

They're never going to stop with this nonsense. Tedisco is predictably using the language of "voter fraud" to deny legitimate voters the franchise. Despite the fact that actual cases of fraud are almost nonexistent.

Murphy's going to win this anyway. But the damage to the electoral system has in many ways already been done.

...Sen. Gillibrand posts at Daily Kos, saying "let my vote and every vote be counted."

Making A List And Checking It Twice

The Albany Project is all over the twists and turns of the NY-20 special election between Scott Murphy and Jim Tedisco. Both candidates have been listed as ahead today, with the latest reversal showing Murphy up by 83 votes. More important, a judge ruled that absentee ballot counting will begin Wednesday, despite a deadline for overseas ballots having been extended to April 13. The Tedisco campaign had been arguing for a delay in the counting, and Phillip Anderson speculates why:

It looks increasingly obvious what the Tedisco/Stone/Ciampoli game plan is. They are trying to delay the counting of absentee votes while they build a list of paper ballots to challenge. It will be much harder for them to challenge those ballots once they are opened and counted, so they are looking to delay that for as long as possible so that they can prepare a list of names to challenge before those ballots ever see the light of day.

Yep, that's got Roger Stone written all over it.

How are they compiling that list of names to challenge? Through polling.

A friend in Columbia County just got polled (Monday) about how he voted on his absentee.
He quizzed the pollster, and it was done on behalf if Tedisco.

Why poll? I suppose the GOP could claim either pure curiosity or that they're trying to decide how/where to target resources for their challenge. Or if the result is favorable, to create an impression of victory.

The concern would be if the poll results are NOT truly anonymous and become a basis for challenging ballots before they're opened.

Any other reports? This was in Columbia County.

UPDATE: Looks like plenty of folks have been polled about their absentee ballots. Since I posted this originally, I've received confirmations from about half a dozen folks. This message from a reader in Saratoga County is a representative example:

"I got a call on Thursday of last week about my father's absentee ballot. My father uses my address for mailing but actually lives in a memory care facility.

Anyway they asked for my father and when I told them he wasn't there but I was quite sure he had voted, they asked me if I knew for whom he had voted. I told them I couldn't disclose that (I actually don't know) but I could tell them I voted for Murphy."

So this has actually been going on since right after election day.

UPDATE: From another reader in Dutchess County:

"Funny you should mention that poll - I got polled a few nights ago.

Poll - Hi ***** how are you? We are conducting an exit poll in the 20th CD to see how people voted. Do you have a few minutes.

Me - Sure

Poll - Did you vote in the 20th CD?

Me- Yes

Poll- Did you vote in person or by absentee?

Me - Absentee.

Poll - Did you vote for James Tedisco, Scott Murphy, or Eric Sundwall?

Me - Wait - The order of your question neither makes sense alphabetically, or in order of how they appear on the ballot. You must be from Tedisco's camp

Poll - Ummmm ummmmm.

I voted for Murphy. Click."

It's possible, I suppose, that Tedisco and our pal Roger Stone have all the data they need to start challenging voters on Wednesday. I'll give them points for innovation in voter suppression, at the least.

Bye Norm

The Minnesota Supreme Court just ruled that absentee ballots had to have been legally cast to be counted in the Senate election, meaning that at least 13 of the 19 categories of rejected ballots will not be part of any review. Which means that the universe of ballots that Coleman would need to win overwhelmingly just got a lot smaller. Considering that Coleman put an admitted forgerer on the stand to prove thatthese types of ballots should be counted, it's not a surprising ruling. Brad Friedman has more.

Oh well, Norm. But of course, he did his job. He ran interference long enough for the stimulus package to finish without the input of an extra Democratic Senator like Al Franken, increasing Republican leverage over the bill. That's all this lawsuit was intended to do.

This Should Be Resolved Around The Time Of The Next MN-Sen Election

The never-ending saga of the Norm Coleman/Al Franken election appeared to be thrown into more uncertainty today when the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that up to 4,800 ballots may be presented by the Coleman campaign to see if they are eligible to be counted. It was one of the few rulings that have gone Coleman's way in this case, and since 4,800 ballots is far more than needed to catch up to Franken, it looked like a ray of hope for the former Senator.

Until the later ruling.

The Minnesota election court has just handed down a major ruling, completely denying Norm Coleman's motion for summary judgment that would have opened up and counted a set of roughly 4,500 rejected absentee ballots that his campaign insists were wrongly rejected and ought to be counted [...]

The upshot of the two decisions is that Coleman may argue on behalf of these voters, but there is no guarantee that they'll be counted. Instead, he'll need to argue for them one by one. And of course, the Franken campaign will have a full opportunity to cross-examine Coleman's witnesses -- many of whom have demonstrated that they in fact committed clear errors in filling out their ballots -- and to also play this same game down the road.

Specifically, the court shot down the Coleman campaign's claim that absentee voting in Minnesota should be regarded as a right, rather than a privilege, and that the four specific reasons for rejecting an absentee ballot are clear and fully binding: "A citizen who exercises this privilege can register and vote, by the terms of the law, only by complying with provisions."

As Nate Silver explains, this puts a very high burden of proof on the ballots, and "will make Coleman's rate of success very, very, very low, as opposed to merely very, very low." I would imagine that putting thousands of people before the court, subject to cross-examination, and determining if they acted within the rules of the election and their vote is eligible would be an interminably long process, and all along Minnesota is without adequate representation in the Senate.

Meanwhile, why is the media completely silent about the fact that Norm Coleman has been caught red-handed in a corruption scandal? They seem to like corruption when Democrats like Rod Blagojevich are fingered (although, in fairness, Blago is much more entertaining).

What, you say--Norm Coleman? Yes, Norm Coleman! Let me explain. The soon-to-be-former senator's scandal is pretty simple. Nasser Kazeminy, a wealthy businessman and close Coleman friend, allegedly paid him $75,000 under the table.

And by "allegedly," I mean "almost certainly." Here's how the almost certainly true alleged scheme worked. The payments to Coleman came in the form of what Tony Soprano would call a "no-show job." One of Kazeminy's companies is called Deep Marine Technology. Kazeminy allegedly ordered Deep Marine's CEO, Paul McKim, to make a series of $25,000 payments that would go to Coleman's wife. According to McKim, Kazeminy was utterly blatant. He said the reason for the payments was that Coleman needed the money and McKim should disguise them as a legitimate business transaction [...]

In Coleman's defense, he's currently just a subject of an FBI investigation, while Blagojevich has been voted out of office. And, of course, Coleman hasn't been caught boasting about his scheme. On the other hand, Coleman is accused by a Houston businessman of having actually accepted illicit funds, while Blagojevich is merely being accused of harboring an intention to sell his Senate seat.

Now consider how the two stories have fared in the national press. Blagojevich has turned into the biggest crime story since O.J. Simpson. Can you guess how many articles about the Coleman scandal have appeared in the national media? One short wire story. When I bring up Coleman's scandals with my colleagues, many of whom follow politics for a living, invariably they have little or no idea what I'm talking about.

Why the scandal is not a part of media accounts is pretty stunning.