Dear friends,
First and foremost, I
want to be clear that I support neither the Democratic nor Republican
party. I am registered non-partisan. It is very clear to me that the
problems we are facing have nothing to do with Republican vs.
Democrat or Conservative vs. Liberal. Elections fraud an issue is
of concern to anyone who cares about representative democracy.
I am clear that these polarizations are to some degree
contrived and enhanced by the power elite to divert our attention
from where the real problem is, which is between the power elite and
the rest of us. Too many within the power elite want to keep us
subservient. Thankfully, there is also an increasing number
of wonderful people even within the power elite who join us in wanting
what is best for all people. They, too, are working behind the scenes
to expose all that is happening.
It is critical to the
survival of a healthy democracy that the electoral process be
clean and fair. If you read our summaries at http://www.WantToKnow.info/coveruparchive#elections
you will see that our current electoral system is in need of serious
repair. Below is a summary of elections improprieties written by the
Democratic Staff of the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee.
Though this is a partisan report, it demonstrates well the
deep problems which must be dealt with if our government is to truly
represent the will of the people. You can download the entire report
(over 100 pages) at the link at the bottom of the article.
For those who would
like to join in a call for action, at http://www.lightwingarts.com/faxsenator.asp you
will find it amazingly easy to send a fax to persuade key senators
to question the elections. Click on the arrow in the "Fax to" box to
choose which senator you would like to fax. You can also easily change
or entirely replace the message that is pre-written there. A
simple click sends the fax. I recommend doing this as soon as possible.
Thanks for caring! Please help to spread the news on this most vital
topic by sharing this message widely. Take care and have a wonderful
new year!
With best wishes,
Fred Burks for the WantToKnow.info
team
Preserving Democracy:
What Went Wrong in Ohio
Status Report of the House Judiciary Committee Democratic
Staff
Wednesday 05
January 2005
Executive
Summary
Representative
John Conyers, Jr., the Ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary
Committee, asked the Democratic staff to conduct an investigation into
irregularities reported in the Ohio presidential election and to
prepare a Status Report concerning the same prior to the Joint Meeting
of Congress scheduled for January 6, 2005, to receive and consider the
votes of the electoral college for president. The following Report
includes a brief chronology of the events; summarizes the relevant
background law; provides detailed findings (including factual findings
and legal analysis); and describes various recommendations for acting
on this Report going forward.
We
have found numerous, serious election irregularities in the Ohio
presidential election, which resulted in a significant
disenfranchisement of voters. Cumulatively, these irregularities, which
affected hundreds of thousand of votes and voters in Ohio, raise grave
doubts regarding whether it can be said the Ohio electors selected on
December 13, 2004, were chosen in a manner that conforms to Ohio law,
let alone federal requirements and constitutional standards.
This
report, therefore, makes three recommendations: (1) consistent with the
requirements of the United States Constitution concerning the counting
of electoral votes by Congress and Federal law implementing these
requirements, there are ample grounds for challenging the electors from
the State of Ohio; (2) Congress should engage in further hearings into
the widespread irregularities reported in Ohio; we believe the problems
are serious enough to warrant the appointment of a joint select
Committee of the House and Senate to investigate and report back to the
Members; and (3) Congress needs to enact election reform to restore our
people's trust in our democracy. These changes should include putting
in place more specific federal protections for federal elections,
particularly in the areas of audit capability for electronic voting
machines and casting and counting of provisional ballots, as well as
other needed changes to federal and state election laws.
With
regards to our factual finding, in brief, we find that there were
massive and unprecedented voter irregularities and anomalies in Ohio.
In many cases these irregularities were caused by intentional
misconduct and illegal behavior, much of it involving Secretary of
State J. Kenneth Blackwell, the co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign in
Ohio.
First,
in the run up to election day, the following actions by Mr. Blackwell,
the Republican Party and election officials disenfranchised hundreds of
thousands of Ohio citizens, predominantly minority and
Democratic voters:
- The misallocation of
voting machines led to unprecedented long lines that disenfranchised
scores, if not hundreds of thousands, of predominantly minority and
Democratic voters. This was illustrated by the fact that
the Washington Post reported that in Franklin County, "27 of the 30
wards with the most machines per registered voter showed majorities for
Bush. At the other end of the spectrum, six of the seven wards with the
fewest machines delivered large margins for Kerry." (See Powell
and Slevin, supra). Among other things, the conscious failure to
provide sufficient voting machinery violates the Ohio Revised Code
which requires the Boards of Elections to "provide adequate facilities
at each polling place for conducting the election."
- Mr. Blackwell's decision to restrict provisional
ballots resulted in the disenfranchisement of tens, if not hundreds, of
thousands of voters, again predominantly minority and Democratic voters.
Mr. Blackwell's decision departed from past Ohio law on provisional
ballots, and there is no evidence that a broader construction would
have led to any significant disruption at the polling places, and did
not do so in other states.
- Mr. Blackwell's widely reviled decision to reject voter
registration applications based on paper weight may have resulted in
thousands of new voters not being registered in time for the 2004
election.
- The Ohio Republican Party's decision to engage in
preelection "caging" tactics, selectively targeting 35,000
predominantly minority voters for intimidation had a negative impact on
voter turnout. The Third Circuit found these activities to be
illegal and in direct violation of consent decrees barring the
Republican Party from targeting minority voters for poll challenges.
- The Ohio Republican Party's decision to utilize thousands
of partisan challengers concentrated in minority and Democratic areas
likely disenfranchised tens of thousands of legal voters, who were not
only intimidated, but became discouraged by the long lines.
Shockingly, these disruptions were publicly predicted and acknowledged
by Republican officials: Mark Weaver, a lawyer for the Ohio Republican
Party, admitted the challenges "can't help but create chaos, longer
lines and frustration."
- Mr. Blackwell's decision to prevent voters who
requested absentee ballots but did not receive them on a timely basis
from being able to receive provisional ballots 6 likely disenfranchised
thousands, if not tens of thousands, of voters, particularly seniors.
A federal court found Mr. Blackwell's order to be illegal and in
violation of HAVA.
Second, on
election day, there were numerous unexplained anomalies and
irregularities involving hundreds of thousands of votes
that have yet to be accounted for:
- There were widespread
instances of intimidation and misinformation in violation of the Voting
Rights Act, the Civil Rights Act of 1968, Equal Protection, Due Process
and the Ohio right to vote. Mr. Blackwell's apparent failure to
institute a single investigation into these many serious allegations
represents a violation of his statutory duty under Ohio law to
investigate election irregularities.
- We learned of improper purging and other registration
errors by election officials that likely disenfranchised tens of
thousands of voters statewide. The Greater Cleveland Voter
Registration Coalition projects that in Cuyahoga County alone over
10,000 Ohio citizens lost their right to vote as a result of official
registration errors.
- There were 93,000 spoiled ballots where no vote was cast
for president, the vast majority of which have yet to be inspected.
The problem was particularly acute in two precincts in Montgomery
County which had an undervote rate of over 25% each - accounting for
nearly 6,000 voters who stood in line to vote, but purportedly declined
to vote for president.
- There were numerous, significant unexplained irregularities
in other counties throughout the state: (i) in Mahoning county
at least 25 electronic machines transferred an unknown number of Kerry
votes to the Bush column; (ii) Warren County locked out public
observers from vote counting citing an FBI warning about a potential
terrorist threat, yet the FBI states that it issued no such warning;
(iii) the voting records of Perry county show significantly more votes
than voters in some precincts, significantly less ballots than voters
in other precincts, and voters casting more than one ballot; (iv) in
Butler county a down ballot and underfunded Democratic State Supreme
Court candidate implausibly received more votes than the best funded
Democratic Presidential candidate in history; (v) in Cuyahoga county,
poll worker error may have led to little known thirdparty candidates
receiving twenty times more votes than such candidates had ever
received in otherwise reliably Democratic leaning areas; (vi) in Miami
county, voter turnout was an improbable and highly suspect 98.55
percent, and after 100 percent of the precincts were reported, an
additional 19,000 extra votes were recorded for President Bush.
Third, in the
post-election period we learned of numerous irregularities in tallying
provisional ballots and conducting and completing the recount
that disenfanchised thousands of voters and call the entire recount
procedure into question (as of this date the recount is still not
complete):
- Mr. Blackwell's failure to
articulate clear and consistent standards for the counting of
provisional ballots resulted in the loss of thousands of predominantly
minority votes. In Cuyahoga County alone, the lack of guidance
and the ultimate narrow and arbitrary review standards significantly
contributed to the fact that 8,099 out of 24,472 provisional ballots
were ruled invalid, the highest proportion in the state.
- Mr. Blackwell's failure to issue specific standards
for the recount contributed to a lack of uniformity in violation of
both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clauses.
We found innumerable irregularities in the recount in violation of Ohio
law, including (i) counties which did not randomly select the precinct
samples; (ii) counties which did not conduct a full hand court after
the 3% hand and machine counts did not match; (iii) counties which
allowed for irregular marking of ballots and failed to secure and store
ballots and machinery; and (iv) counties which prevented witnesses for
candidates from observing the various aspects of the recount.
- The voting computer company Triad has essentially admitted
that it engaged in a course of behavior during the recount in numerous
counties to provide "cheat sheets" to those counting the ballots.
The cheat sheets informed election officials how many votes they should
find for each candidate, and how many over and under votes they should
calculate to match the machine count. In that way, they could avoid
doing a full county-wide hand recount mandated by state law.