Emergency Election Petition (fwd)
NYC
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Subject: Emergency Election Petition
Check out www.eccc2000.org. Sign the petition and tell everyone you know
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>From someone who was present at the recount in Palm Beach County:
Thought you'd like an update from the inside. I spent much of Wed. as the
Palm Beach County Dem. Party observer in the recount room at the Palm Beach
County Supervisor of Elections. Also present were lawyers and a staffer
representing GWB, several lawyers representing Gore, representatives of the
Reform Party, the Fla. Democratic and Republican Parties, the DNCC, US
Rep. Clay Shaw and his Dem. challenger Elaine Bloom (this race is still
contested), a Dem. State Senator and a Dem. State Representative from the
County.
The recount was supposed to begin at 1:30, was delayed until 4:00 and ended
at 11:30. Our role basically consisted of sitting in a cramped room watching
five staffers run stacks of punch card ballots through counting
machines. Pretty dull all in all until it was discovered that one precinct
had not been counted in full. This resulted in a net gain for Al of about 360
votes.
The Bush boys lost their smug attitudes and began huddling and whispering
every few minutes. The absentees came through for Al too. When one votes at
the polls in Florida, they provide a punch instrument which, if used
correctly, completely perforates the ballot. However, absentee voters often
use a pen or other implement which does not fully perforate the card. This
was apparent to us from the fact that over 10,000 voters in the County, about
2.2% of the overall turnout did not make any choice in the Presidential race,
but did vote in the US Senate or Congressional races. We theorized that many
voters had partially perforated the card, but the machines weren't reading
them. The more times the ballots are run through the counting machine, the
more likely the loosened chits fall off.
When the absentees were counted, 221 ballots that had previously registered
no vote now did show a vote in the Presidential race. These went
overwhelmingly for Gore, leading to some whooping and high-fiving from our
side. The Bushies really lost it at this point and got a little hostile with
the staffers, which in turn elicited some harsh responses from the assembled
masses.
Gore's net gain in the County was 643. Word from other counties is that Gore
closed the 1,700 deficit by over 1,200. Only half of the counties conducted
their recounts on Wednesday. The rest are on Thursday. The bigger problem is
that the ballot in Palm Beach County, which differs in its layout from the
ballots elsewhere in the State, is illegal for several reasons. Florida
statutes specifically mandate the precise layout of the ballot and the order
of candidates. The law was not followed. Bush's name was first, with Buchanan
below him and Gore third. This is completely improper, as well as the fact
that the law requires the names to be placed to the left with the punch
holes to the right of the candidates' names.
On this ballot, some names were on the right and some on the left, with all
of the punch holes in the middle. It was difficult to line up the name with
the correct hole.
Moreover, 19,000 ballots were disqualified because they voted for two or more
candidates. This is a direct result of the confusing layout of the names on
the ballot. This represents over 4% of the total ballots. It was as high as
15% in some predominantly African-American precincts and about 10% in some
precincts with large numbers of Jewish retirees. The Gore vote in many of
these precincts was over 90%.
This explains the networks' exit polling which reflected voters' belief that
they had voted for Gore, but in fact their ballots had been
disqualified. This led to the initial awarding of Florida to Gore. Folks,
the bottom line is that if the names on the ballot were properly situated
Gore would have had an additional 11-13,000 vote margin in this County, and
the election would be over. We have done a precinct by precinct
analysis of where the disqualified votes came from. By attributing the same
percentage of the vote Gore obtained in those precincts to the disqualified
ballots, Gore would be winning Florida by at least 10,000 votes.
In other words, Gore has actually won the election both in the popular vote
and in the electoral vote, but he may well still lose it. You should also be
aware that other large counties in the State disqualified about one half of
one percent of their ballots for casting two or more votes in the
Presidential race. In Palm Beach County it was 4.4%.
Lastly, don't expect the recount to be over on Thursday, as the media is
stating. Legal actions are underway. The next question, will a judge order
are-vote just in Palm Beach County with a new ballot?
Alice Liu
chunk...@aol.com
www.missingchunk.com
(212) 995-0698
(212) 769-6468
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Before you buy.