Minneapolis discovery costs Franken 36 votes
By Jason Hoppin
jhoppin@pioneerpress.com

Updated: 12/03/2008 04:29:03 PM CST

What Maplewood giveth, Minneapolis taketh away.

Elections officials in Minnesota’s largest city today discovered that one precinct came up 133 ballots short of election day totals, resulting in a net loss for Democratic challenger Al Franken of 36 votes.

The development wipes away what had been a boon for Franken in his bid to overtake Republican U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, after Ramsey County officials found an additional 37 votes for Franken from a Maplewood precinct on Tuesday.

Minneapolis elections director Cindy Reichert said she believes the error occurred when election judges at the precinct on election night mistakenly ran ballots with write-in candidates through a counting machine twice. There were 129 such ballots.

Reichert said although the numbers do not match exactly, she is confident that that’s what happened and will report those numbers to the Secretary of State’s Office. She also detailed a search for any potential missing envelopes that contain ballots, including opening the counting machine, talking to election judges and calling the church where the polling place was located.

“We believe that we have all the ballot envelopes here,” Reichert said. “There are human errors that are made on election day.”

If people weren’t presenting any of the many legally valid forms of residency proof (the utility bill category includes a lot more than heat & electric — it is phones, water, solid waste, sewage, satellite or cable TV, even ISP), or getting an eligible person to vouch for them, then the crime would be to allow them to vote. (See Minn. Statute 201.061, subdivision 5.) I’m an election official myself and have been for a while; my knowledgeable perspective is that there’s no discretion regarding acceptable forms of identity and residency proof. The legislature and the SoS have spent a lot of time working on defining valid forms of proof for same day registration and have even expanded the acceptable forms of proof in recent years. (See Minn. Statute 201.061 subdivision 3 and Minn. Regulation 8200.5100 subpart 2.) But the key point is that the legislature (and the SoS, by legislative authority) has defined an exclusive list. If the item brought by the the person attempting to vote doesn’t conform to the defined proofs, then it isn’t valid. If an election official knowingly accepted forms of proof that are not legally valid, then the official would be guilty of an election crime just as they would be if they knowingly turned away a voter with valid forms of proof. Any good election official (and one who has the time) is going to work hard to find a solution for the person attempting to register by figuring out what proof forms they have access to, but it is hardly credible to suggest that rejecting an invalid proof rises to the level of a crime.

The larger question I’d have is how election officials in past elections could have used a letter like the first one provided in the article. That would not have been valid in past elections anymore than it was in this election. And if it is true that in past elections a letter like the first one had been accepted as valid, then I’d look at that polling place as one where the judges doing same day registration would need to get remedial training because clearly that was not a valid form of proof.

As for why the third invoice-mimicking version passed muster whereas the two previous ones didn’t pass the test, that again goes to defined language. Specifically, look to Minn. Regulation 8200.5100 subpart 2.B., which says: “A rent statement from a landlord that itemizes utility expenses and meets the requirements of this paragraph is a utility bill for purposes of providing proof of residence.” The “other requirements” clause is referencing the need for the itemized rent statement to have the person’s name and address and to be dated within 30 days before or after the election, as well as the need that the recognized utility types I mentioned earlier. I’ll give great credit to The Chateau that they were willing to go to such lengths to aid their residents — that speaks well of the building’s management. But the insinuation that something was wrong with the elections officials who turned away this voter does them a disservice. If I were to fault them, I’d fault them for not giving clearer directions to the voter / The Chateau as to what would be a sufficient form of proof, as well as for not putting more emphasis on the voucher option (since the student in the article said her roommate was properly registered and was thus a perfect candidate for serving as a voucher). But on a busy day of voting, I’m not totally surprised that they would not have managed that level of customer service.

Final point — I guess I’m a bit disappointed in MNIndy here for sensationalizing what look to me to be a non-story. I’d think that a part of basic reporting is understanding the main laws, rules and regulations involved in a situation that is as technical as election administration. A fairer and better researched article would have been able to point out why the third invoice-like letter was acceptable and why the prior two letters were legitimately rejected by the elections officials. Am I being unfair to this article’s reporter in my assessment? I don’t know since I’ve not taken a class in basic reporting, but I do know that this story casts the pollworkers in an unfair light. And in the wake of the recount, I’m more and more disappointed with that kind of reporting. The people who work on election day are doing a public and civil service, usually working an inordinately long day, and doing their best to apply a lot of complex laws and rules. In addition, they are doing this highly technical work after just a few hours of training, plus whatever experience they have built up over time (experience that consists of only the day or two per year in all but the most unusual of circumstances). And on the presidential years, they are also dealing with the pressure of a huge crush of voters, some of whom are less reasonable than others. The first lesson I learned as an election official is that democracy is sometimes messy when you see it up close over the course of a day. But to confuse messiness with something more sinister is a fallacy. Even worse, it leads to unnecessary erosion in the public trust in election administration, which is a keystone to democracy.

Minnesota law makes it a crime to prevent people from voting, unless you have “personal knowledge” that they are not eligible. Sounds like they committed a crime here!

At the very least, we ought to know their names, so we can object to them being designated as “election officials” next election.