NY Times reporters probably hold key to proving Kerry victory in Ohio

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Mon Aug-01-05 04:01 PM
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NY Times reporters probably hold key to proving Kerry victory in Ohio

Reports of massive new voter registration in Democratic counties in Ohio (not to mention other swing states) were an important reason why many believed that Kerry would win Ohio and the general election in 2004 -- and why many still do believe that. Especially striking were reports in the New York Times by Ford Fessenden in September 2004 (http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/printer_092704K.shtml) and Kate Zernike in October 2004 (http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/100504W.shtm) that indicated that new voter registration in Democratic areas of Ohio vastly exceeded new voter registration in Republican areas of Ohio.

I believe that information that those reporters (and possibly others as well) used to produce their reports could now be used to show that Kerry won Ohio – and therefore the presidential election – in 2004. Here is why:

Reports of massive new voter registration in Democratic areas of Ohio

Here are some examples from the article by Ford Fessenden that document the massive relative increases in new voter registration in Democratic, as compared to Republican areas of Ohio:

"A sweeping voter registration campaign in heavily Democratic areas has added tens of thousands of new voters to the rolls in the swing states of Ohio and Florida, a surge that has far exceeded the efforts of Republicans in both states, a review of registration data shows." ....

"county-by-county data shows that in Democratic areas of Ohio - primarily low-income and minority neighborhoods - new registrations since January have risen 250 percent over the same period in 2000. In comparison, new registrations have increased just 25 percent in Republican areas." ....

"These numbers are similar across Ohio. The Times examined registration from Jan. 1 to July 31 in a sample of counties ... In rock-ribbed Republican areas ... 35,000 new voters have registered, a substantial increase over the 28,000 that registered in those areas in the first seven months of 2000.... But in heavily Democratic areas - 60 ZIP codes mostly in the core of big cities like Cleveland, Dayton, Columbus and Youngstown .... new registrations have more than tripled over 2000, to 63,000 from 17,000.

What is the significance of this massive increase in new voter registration?

The recently released Democratic national Committee (DNC) report on the 2004 Ohio election (Section VI, Figure 12) showed that new voter registration was associated with increased voter turnout by precinct (http://a9.g.akamai.net/7/9/8082/v001/www.democrats.org/pdfs/ohvrireport/section06.pdf). Since voter turnout is defined as the percent of registered voters who actually vote, the increase in new voter registration would have to have led to proportionately greater numbers of voters in the 2004 election compared to the 2000 election in those precincts in which it occurred. There are two reasons for this: a larger pool of voters to begin with, and a larger likelihood of voting among voters in that larger pool – as demonstrated by the DNC report.

Therefore, if the reports of massive increases in voter registration in Democratic areas of Ohio were anywhere near accurate, that would have led to proportionately more votes in Democratic counties (compared to Republican counties), as well as higher Kerry percentages in those counties, compared to 2000.

Discrepancies between the Fesseden/Zernike reports and current official figures released by the Ohio Secretary of State

Yet, in spite of the above noted reports, official figures show that the number of registered voters in Democratic Ohio counties in 2004 exceeded those numbers for 2000 by less than the increases in voter registration from 2000 to 2004 in Republican Ohio counties.
This can be demonstrated in three ways: First, the correlation coefficient for the Kerry % of the vote in 2004 with the ratio of 2004 to 2000 registered voters, by county, was negative (r = -0.22, p<0.05).

Secondly, one can calculate the effect in net votes of the registration figures released by Kenneth Blackwell’s office by assuming that Kerry and Bush received the exact same percent of the vote in each county as indicated by the official 2004 vote tallies, but with the number of voters in each county proportional to the number of registered voters in November of 2000 (compared with November 2004) or March of 2004.

Using the November 2000 registration figures, Bush would have won by 87,531. Using the March 2004 registration figures, Bush would have won by 112,080. That's about the time when, according to Fessenden and Zernike, voter registration in Democratic counties increased massively compared to Republican counties. Assuming that these new voters would have voted approximately in the same manner as the already registered voters in each county, this should have resulted in substantial improvement for Kerry, compared with the March 2004 result of a 112,080 win for Bush. Instead, it got even worse, with Bush's margin rising to 118,426 in the final official count. So, that confirms a massive discrepancy between the Fessenden and Zernike reports, as compared to Blackwell's voter registration numbers.

Thirdly, we can look at some specific examples: According to Blackwell's official numbers, Cuyahoga County (which contains Cleveland) showed a DECREASE in voter registration from 2000 to 2004, while Warren County (heavily Republican, and the site of the infamous "lockdown" for bogus "national security" reasons, which allowed Republican officials to count ballots in the absence of any oversight) exhibited a 42% INCREASE in voter registration from 2000 to 2004.

What do these discrepancies suggest?

Although the above articles do not specifically compare 2000 with 2004 total voter registration counts, the picture painted in those articles is so at odds with Blackwell's official figures that it appears that either the article or Blackwell's official numbers must be fraudulent. Perhaps Blackwell knew that accurate voter registration data could be used to show the implausibility of a Bush victory in Ohio.

If the reporters are correct about the relatively massive increase in voter registration in heavily Democratic counties, then why would Blackwell’s numbers diverge so much from this assessment? I can think of two reasons:

1) Massive increases in voter registration in Democratic counties were followed by massive, perhaps illegal purges of voter registration in those counties

OR

2) Blackwell’s office manipulated the voter registration numbers in order to hide the fact that Bush’s victory in Ohio depended largely upon massive electronic deletion of votes in Democratic counties.

Either of these explanations for the discrepancy between the Blackwell numbers and the stories written by Zernike and Fessenden would indicate massive fraud committed to help Bush win the Ohio election.

What are some specific effects of this discrepancy?

Due to a paucity of specific numbers in the newspaper reports, it's not possible to calculate what the total difference in total votes would have been if the reports were accurate. But there were some specific numbers given for Cuyahoga County. According to the report by Zernike and Fessenden there were 230,000 new registrations in Cuyahoga County in 2004. Yet, according to official Ohio SOS figures, there were only 119,273 new registrations in Cuyahoga County between March and November of 2004. If we assume the Zernike/Fessenden article to be accurate, there would have been 110,727 additional registered voters in Cuyahoga County, and if they would have voted in the same proportion as indicated by the official figures, Kerry would have received a NET of 37,492 extra votes in Cuyahoga County.

But this almost certainly would represent a substantial underestimate, mainly because if the Zernike/Fessenden report is accurate, the targeting of Cuyahoga County would have almost certainly been aimed at the most heavily Democratic precincts – thus producing a far greater margin. And remember that this analysis involves only one county, though a big and important one. I could not do a similar analysis for other counties because specific numbers were not supplied in the Times reports, although they did definitely indicate that the trends were similar throughout Ohio.

What does the DNC report have to say about all this and why is that significant?

The DNC report claimed that their analysis strongly suggested that there was "no widespread fraud" in the election in Ohio. This was based upon the demonstration of a strong correlation between Kerry's share of the vote and some other variables, such as percent vote for Eric Fingerhut, the Democratic Senatorial candidate. Yet, this analysis did not even consider the possibility that fraud was committed by electronically eliminating votes in highly Democratic precincts or counties or adding them in Republican areas, which could have occurred without interfering with the above noted correlations.

If that is how fraud was committed, that would explain why the Zernike/Fessenden reports are so inconsistent with Blackwell’s official voter registration data. Relative massive increases in new voter registration in Democratic areas indicated by those reports would be inconsistent with the official election results, which show that there was a greater increase in total votes in Republican than in Democratic counties. Manipulation of either actual voter registration (through massive purging) or the official voter registration figures would have been the only way to hide this.

What can we do now?

The missing piece to this puzzle, which would prove that the official voter registration figures currently being released from Blackwell’s office represent fraud, and which could very likely show that Kerry won Ohio in 2004, are the data used to produce the Zernike and Fessenden reports.

These reporters are not listed on the New York Times web site. I wrote to the New York Times a couple of weeks ago, in order to try to get in touch with them, in the hope that they could supply more specific and documented information. Thus far I have not received a reply.

If anyone knows any way that I can get in touch with those reporters, on any other reporters who have written on this subject, please let me know.