Widespread Incidents of Voter Suppression in Virginia

[giza]

Sec. of Virginia State Board of Elections Finds Widespread Incidents of Voter Suppression

This article is quite an interesting read. It discusses several specific incidents and gives /lots/ of details about different attempts to suppress voters in Virginia.

Here is one of the tricks used:

4) Voter Machine Problems.

a. On many ballots in heavily Democratic neighborhoods, Jim’s name is cut off. The ballots say: “James H. (Jim)” with no Webb.

b. New reports that ballots in Essex County have Jim’s name split on 2 pages. The “James H (Jim)” on one page, “Webb” on the next.

c. Reports of voting machines in Isle of White that do not provide a clear image of the ballot, making voting a challenge.

Note that it is only the Democratic candidate's name that keeps getting butchered in this fashion.

Comments

[wildw0lf.livejournal.com]

I suppose this shouldn't be surprising about hearing about election fraud. It makes me wonder exactly how close some of these elections really were with the Diebold voting machine fiasco.

Giza, thanks for posting yesterday the link to the HBO special on Google Video on or just before election day. I do scan news sites daily, but more likely than not, would not have found this on my own.

Take care.

[zannyvix.livejournal.com]

Yep, they tried to get us too. Nius and I got a phone call from someone claiming to be a Webb supporter (democrat), telling us to go to the wrong polling place to vote. We thought it was just a mistake until we heard that this was happening to other people all over the state as well. Screw them. We went out and voted at the RIGHT place. Our whole county went democratic.

[xoagray.livejournal.com]

Heh, welcome back to the 9th grade. WTF? Thretening and misleading phone calls? Fucking with the ballots, damn. Most people grow out of this kind of shit after high school.
I thought the campaign mud slinging was bad, this is just fucked up, though, I think it shows clearly how desperate the Republicans are.

X
999

Never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetance

[coyoteden.livejournal.com]

The forst three complaints in that article are typical electioneering. No shocker there.

I think fourth part, the one about the voting machines, is fear mongering. As easy as it would be to compromise certain machines, it seems to me all of those problems can be explained by poor software design, not malicious activity.

The Diebold Accuvote's UI is HORRENDOUS. It looks like something from the Windows 3.1 era. On my ballot's review page, one of the candidates I voted for ended up off the bottom of the screen, and the scroll arrows aren't obvious. However, if this only occurs in "heavily democratic" districts in VA, it may be due to the way the machine wraps the text given the particular ballot in that district.

[tlttlotd.livejournal.com]

For what it's worth, the e-voting machines in my area (northern Virginia) weren't Diebold. I've been hunting down who manufactured them, but without identifying information (there wasn't any) it's slow going.

[kellic.livejournal.com]

Thankfully this time we overcame the Bushit.

[xydexx.livejournal.com]

Despite all this, Webb still won. -=)