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Recounts/Recanvasses

Courant stands for election integrity ( with Windsor/Hartford log of events)

By Luther Weeks on August 28, 2012

Such questions must be answered so that all voters can have faith in the integrity of the system.

We would add to the Courant’s concern in this obvious and difficult situation, that part of the cure is more attention to detail ahead of time and in every election, this close or not. Learning from experience and reducing the odds of lingering questions.

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Basics you need to know about election integrity in fifteen minutes

By Luther Weeks on April 16, 2012

Kevin O’Neill, Capitol Thinking, interviews the authors of Broken Ballots – Will Your Vote Count, Prof Doug Jones and Dr. Barbara Simons <podcast> When it comes to elections and verifiability, Doug Jones and Barbara Simons are true experts that everyone can understand.

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Enthusiastic support for the Secretary’s Performance Task Force Recommendations

By Luther Weeks on March 12, 2012

Given the many members, the brief meetings, and the lack of representation of all interests, we were skeptical when the Task Force was convened. To our delight, we find that we can offer endorsement of each of the twenty-one recommendations in the report.

There is a lot to do in all the recommendations. It will take time, money, and deliberate work with everyone at the table. Our hope is that each of the recommendations will be thoroughly explored, evaluated, and acted upon, that none get overlooked.

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Scanners like ours: Optical scanner counts differ for same ballots

By Luther Weeks on November 29, 2011

There should be an investigation, however, we suggest that determining the cause is not a complete cure. I could happen again. It could have happened in the past. Maybe in Connecticut.

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Governor Extends Voter Registration Deadline via Executive Order

By Luther Weeks on November 1, 2011

If the governor has such powers, perhaps in election emergencies, the governor could be called upon or even expected to do what the Secretary of the State cannot do – order polls to stay open late in an emergency, choose extra voting districts for audit, or order discrepancy recanvasses in districts with questionable results!

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Welcome to Post-Confidence Elections

By Luther Weeks on June 2, 2011

Laws and procedures which are not enforced for elections in the name of “trust us” and “it would be too much work”, are no more real than the laws and Constitutional provisions ignored in the name of national security. “It is time to learn from this recount, fix the problems it uncovered and ensure that future elections are different.”

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Brad Friedman questions value of “Faith Based ‘Recount'” – we agree.

By Luther Weeks on May 21, 2011

What’s the point of having a “recount”, or of using security procedures and physical seals for the ballots after the election, if violations of those procedures and seals are of little concern to the state’s top election agency?

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When are recounts reasonable?

By Luther Weeks on April 29, 2011

The Wisconsin Supreme Court election recount started this week. The margin was a bit over 7,000 votes and the percentage just under 0.5% as required by law. John Nichols writes of past instances where the loser asked for recounts in much wider margins and of cases with relatively close margins where the original result was overturned

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NY: Hard lesson in why we need recounts and uniform election laws

By Luther Weeks on February 22, 2011

Supermajority and candidate doomed by vague election law crafted by his own lawyer.

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Coalition Report: Bridgeport Recount and Recommendations

By Luther Weeks on January 12, 2011

Votes were miscounted and miscalculated adding votes to each candidate, but not changing winner in the race for governor

Each candidate for the governor’s race gained votes in the recount when compared to the officially reported results, as follows: Foley (+174), Malloy (+761), and Marsh (+19). These differences parallel candidate shares in the initially reported results. Counting of all ballots in the governor’s race resulted in differences in many counts, totaling 1,520 votes miscounted, of these 1,236 were initially under reported and 284 were initially over reported.

Simply printing more ballots only reduces the chance of the specific problem that occurred in Bridgeport. There are other causes that could result in a municipality having to scramble to photocopy ballots or perform hand counting such as a massive power failure or ballots lost in a fire, flood, or accident shortly before or during Election Day.

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