Election Day Registration is getting more Democratic support. So far States that allow voters to register and vote on the same day have a experienced a spike in turnout. For example, New Hampshire’s Primary turnout was highest of all primaries thus far at 52.4% (up from 44.4% in 2000), and Iowa’s caucus turnout was highest of all caucuses thus far at 16.4% (up from 6.8% in 2000).

A total of eight States have Election Day Registration: New Hampshire, Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Montana, Maine, Wyoming, and Idaho. North Carolina allows same day registration at early voting sites three days before an election but not on Election Day. States with Election Day Registration routinely have turnout at a rate of 10-12 percentage points higher than States that don’t.

While there are some reputable studies purporting that Election Day Registration is not a knight in shining armor, 22 States now have introduced pending legislation in favor of it and more are sure to follow suit. Moreover, a few members of Congress led by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) are introducing a bill (top-heavy on the Democratic side of the aisle) in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Indiana Voter ID decision. However, increasing turnout is not a red or blue issue, and when it comes to the sanctity of our elections we should be thinking red, white and blue.

Rhode Island Secretary of State Ralph A. Mollis, at right in the above photo, yesterday introduced a package of state-level election reform bills that would bring weekend voting to Rhode Islanders, change the way the state’s voter rolls are handled, and change Election Day canvassing rules.

In August, we highlighted the fact that Secretary Mollis was considering weekend voting, and publicized his public hearing to discuss that and other issues.

The complete press release from Secretary Mollis’ office follows. Read the rest of this entry »

Why Tuesday? Board Member Norman J. Ornstein

You readers may have noticed that there is a big election coming up in November. (If you hadn’t noticed, perhaps the Tuesday primary in Pennsylvania jogged your memory.) There are many things to be concerned about, some of which I addressed last week. But there is another large, uncomfortable issue that needs to be raised, one Congress really should consider in the coming months: What happens if there is a serious disruption of the election itself?

I have raised this issue before, namely in the months leading up to the 2004 election, and got some serious pushback. Some of it was focused on the idea that by raising the prospect of a disruption, I was notifying terrorists that this was a great target — putting up a flashing neon sign to invite an attack. The assumption here — that the terrorists out there are naïve or unsophisticated enough that this would give them a new idea — is almost absurd on its face, but should have been demolished entirely with al-Qaeda’s carefully timed attack to disrupt and influence the Spanish elections. Some of the response I got was simple bluster: We will never postpone or alter our election plans, no matter what!

Read the rest of this entry »

Lauren Wolfe and Awais Khaleel are President and Vice President of the College Democrats of America, and they are Superdelegates. They claim in this YouTube video to be deciding who their votes will go to will be based on feedback they receive over the Web. This is… interesting? Strange? What do you think this says about our voting system?

Via HuffPo’s Off The Bus.

It’s always drive-time radio in Los Angeles. I just spent the afternoon maneuvering around this sweltering city, and today’s Supreme Court decision to uphold Indiana’s voter identification law was part of a feature segment at least twice this afternoon on NPR member station 89.3 KPCC here.

Rick Hasen of Loyola Marymount University and electionlawblog.org (who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on this case) broke down the specifics of the decision on AirTalk with Larry Mantle (listen here with Real Player). Today Hasen wrote for the Huffington Post that he believes this case “will encourage further litigation, because it relegates challenges to laws imposing onerous burdens on a small group of voters to “as applied” challenges, but those challenges will be difficult to win.”

Patt Morrison also took up the issue on her program (listen here with Real Player). For the full text of the Supreme Court’s decision via the New York Times, click here.

Los Angeles traffic photo via fredcamino on Flickr.

From the Associated Press via NPR:

WASHINGTON April 27, 2008, 09:09 pm ET · U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan can speak to their families by Web camera and fight insurgents using sophisticated electronic warfare. Yet when it comes to voting, most troops are stuck in the past.

Communities in 13 states will send overseas troops presidential election ballots by e-mail this year, and districts in at least seven states will also let them return completed ballots over the Internet, according to data compiled by The Associated Press and the Overseas Vote Foundation.

That still leaves tens of thousands of service members in far-flung military bases struggling to meet voting deadlines and relying largely on regular mail to get ballots and cast votes — often at the last minute because of delays in ballot preparations in some states.

For the rest of the story, click here. For more on Internet voting, click here.

I was introduced this morning on NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday as the newest contributor to Sunday Soapbox, their political blog. My first video blog for Sunday Soapbox was all about what we do, and it was played on-air. I posed (and answered) the question that everyone’s always asking around here: why do we vote on Tuesday? Listen now.

For more about NPR Sunday Soapbox, click here.