Riverside Cty., CA: 75,000 Uncounted Absentee Ballots (Surprise surprise!)

[Bill Bored]

Please forward to your friends and colleagues!

From David Roth
75,000 Votes Not Counted!

Dear Friends and Supporters

Like many of you, we were stunned to find out late last evening that there remain over 75,000 votes yet to be counted in our County -- including, unbelievably, EVERY SINGLE ABSENTEE VOTE cast in my race against Mary Bono. That's right, NOT ONE of the absentee votes cast in Riverside County has been counted yet by the Riverside County Registrar of Voters -- and according to their offices, as of today they are still "only in the process of verifying signatures, and have not yet begin to count the ballots."

Of the 75,000 uncounted votes, it is possible that around 40,000 apply to my race in the 45th Congressional District

While we have absolutely no idea how these uncounted absentee, provisional and paper ballots might affect the numbers in my race (and in dozens of other races in the County), it is clear that they will change many percentages and perhaps even election outcomes. So while many candidates have already claimed victory and others conceded defeat, the fact is that over 28% of the votes cast in Riverside County have not yet been counted.

Our team and the Democratic Party are monitoring the situation and we will keep you updated if and as events warrant. We also encourage you to reach out to Riverside County officials to demand that EVERY VOTE in this historic election be counted, and quickly.


Again, thanks for the outpouring of support for me and my family...and all my very, very best....

David
From David Roth

35-325 Date Palm Drive, Suite 213, Cathedral City, CA 92234 __ Tel: ( 760) 202-2828

[EFerrari]

1. Seventy five THOUSAND votes.

:mad:

[ProgressiveEconomist]

11. And Bono is ahead only by about 19,600 votes, according to CNN

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006//pages/results/states/CA/H/45/index.html .

But IMO it would be a "stretch" to think these 75,000 would tip the seat to Democrat Roth. He would have to get 47,500 of the 75,000.

Even if they're not already in CNN's count. CNN says "100 percent" of precincts have reported in CA-45,

Still, this is a shock, and another argument for mandatory national standards in national, statewide, and congressional elections.

[mitchtv]

16. er, but the evil Bonnie Garcia AD80 is ahead by only

1100 votes. and Vet Steve Clute must've known something when he didn't concede. Everyone I know voted absentee. AD 80 is the closest race in the state, so its not just CD45 at stake.

I want my fucking vote counted,
this is becoming typical of Puke dominated counties

[Gelliebeans]

26. So many of us voted absentee

in fact at Roth's campaign party after the election we were all talking about how we didn't trust the machines and voted absentee ballot.

[Old and In the Way]

2. How disgusting.

David gets the Kerry/Gore Election Fraud award this cycle. I guess this could change the results and the race can't be called at this point, right?

[Tigress DEM]

6. Actually it ISN'T Official until ALL the votes have been counted.

I don't think concession speeches are legally binding if the actual vote count is different. Usually absentee ballots are low in number and follow the general pattern, but as long as there isn't hanky panky in excluding them, if they turn the result, I think it would work like it did in Washington State.

AND since DEMS were voting early to be out and help on election day, it could be a good thing.

[xxqqqzme]

3. You need to get in touch w/ the Jerry McNerney

people in District 11 - he beat pombo. We are still counting absentee ballots here in OC (more than 140,000) in the State Senate race. The Dem party here has observers in 2 hour shifts watching the count and signature verification. McNerney people contacted us w/ the offer of assistance if we needed it. I don't have the number w/ me but there should still be a website up and maybe a working phone number. Good luck.

bono has a worse influential standing than my un-representative (whorbacher). Too bad they were both returned to congress w/ even less influence.

[williesgirl]

4. Good luck - recommended

[nicknameless]

5. Will Riverside ever get a clean election?

From Mischelle Townsend to their new crooked RoV, Barbara Dunmore. What a deliberate, undemocratic mess.

:grr:

[Gelliebeans]

17. No not until that witch is thrown out!

:grr:

[nicknameless]

22. Why is it that CA's RoVs are all a bunch of crooks?

Dunmore must have broken some law. She should be charged with violating voters' rights.

[Gelliebeans]

23. I thought they were voted in

state legislators. :shrug: I am not sure how the process works. So they are ones that maybe we could complain to. We can also take our complaints to our brand spanking new Secretary of State, Debra Bowen. She won't be willing to put up with Registrars that are trying to hide stuff.

This woman Barbara Dunsmore is awful. She wouldn't allow us to watch the counting of the votes and she fought tooth and nail for retrofitting the Edge II machines with a paper trail (not that paper trail will fix this). She is just horrible about transparency except of course where her loyalties lie.

She made us write our names on the outside of the paper ballots during the June primary, then I got mysteriously kicked off the rolls. It was against the law and we were told if we didn't fill it out they couldn't accept our ballots.
The kicker here is that those paper ballots that we filled out because we didn't trust the machines were opened up at the county offices and manually entered onto the same machines the voters refused to use in the first place.
more--->http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1423&Itemid=113

This woman NEEDS TO GO.

[nicknameless]

24. RoVs are appointed by the Board of Supervisors.

Wonder how they managed to find such crooks.
I hope Bowen will be able to straighten out this mess.

Voters have a right to a secret ballot. Requiring that you sign your name on your ballot would certainly appear to be a violation of that right.
It's my understanding that under CA Election Code 15004, the public does have the right to observe the vote count.
http://www.countedascast.com/docs/ElectionMonitoringV1.0.htm
http://www.election-reform.org/laws/Calif.html

IMO, Dunsmore doesn't just need to go, she should be sued for intentional violation of voters' rights.

[Gelliebeans]

25. I forgot to add on last reply, She let some voting groups

finally observe some counting however and this is a big however...
She only let them watch from behind a glass window and far enough away that they couldn't see what was going on. :eyes:

I made a complaint with Bruce McPherson regarding my name and address requirement on my paper ballot however I never received any confirmation of that complaint. Instead I got the boot from the rolls and had to re-register.

I can't wait for Debra Bowen to get into office and start kicking some ass.

[nicknameless]

27. I think McCormack did the same thing in 2004.

I don't think it's legal.

From http://www.countedascast.com/docs/ElectionMonitoringV1.0.htm

ISSUES/IRREGULARITIES

Problems with observing: (Note if these happen)

o You are not allowed to see the computer screen.

o You cannot see who is in the counting room.

o Some of the processing and tabulation takes place in rooms you cannot see.

o You cannot find out if or observe other networked machines.

o You can’t see who is handling memory cards, cartridges or disks.

o They won’t tell you the names of the people who are tabulating and processing votes.

[Gelliebeans]

28. thanks for the information :)

[philb]

7. Historically in florida, the Repubs have big absentee campaign- figure out how

many votes are needed to win, and get enough absentees from voters who haven't voted to win.
You may remember that the 2000 Bush/Gore election was swung by a judge allowing absentees filled in by
Repub operatives in 2 SOS offices of at least enough absentees to swing the Bush/Gore count.
Something like this also happened in Osceola County in 2004 I heard, and in lots of races in the past.
All you have to do in close races is figure out who's not going to vote and have a process to get absentees filled out
for those voters. In some cases operatives go to the voters residence to get the signatures, but there have been cases where that would have taken too much time. So look at the signatures to see if they really were likely signed by the voter. In Florida in many close races, whoever has the best organized absentee drive at the end wins. Thats almost always the Repubs. That means the Repubs win lots of elections even where the DEMS have a lot more eligable voters.

[philb]

8. What race is this?

[OnionPatch]

9. I guess my vote hasn't been counted, then.

I voted absentee in Riverside County. As did my husband and many of my friends. :mad:

[Spangle]

10. Not even verified the signatures???

WHAT were they doing before the election when all those were comining in? Good grief! That step is something that can be done before election day. The ballots should have all ready been 'processed' and ready to be counted. Then the final "opening' of the last envelop and the ballot is ran through the machine on eleciton day as one precent. Not a HARD task, if it's handled as they come in.

That SOE didn't plan well at all.

And 28% is alot of votes left not counted. Someone would have to be winning by a landslide, for the race to be called before the last 28% is in.

[snot]

12. K & R -- nt

[rumpel]

13. I posted earlier also

that the State has a pdf form of yet to be counted estimate absentee and provisional votes -broken down by county - the majority of counties seem not to have reported the numbers up to the SOS - they are simply blank

and yet from all the ones that did report they are talking about 300 some thousand votes - so we should keep an eye on this everywhere.

None of the large counties reported -


on edit the link is here - I have not checked if they updated since.

duh forgot link
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x457625

[rumpel]

14. Can someone tell me is it normal to have 25,000 "damaged"

from a total of 786,653 absentee and provisional ballots? (That is the current figure as of 11/10 12:21:51PM

Is the USPS so bad in handling mail? I presume "damaged" is not "spoiled" ballots.

[philb]

19. That sounds rather serious. Thats a lot of votes.

Is that just an excuse for not counting votes from some areas?
That can't be normal. Its surely not acceptable. We need a more reliable/more transparent system.

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. This is part of a bigger problem.

I think the Repubs hedge their bets by intentionally holding back the count of absentee ballots, or selectively holding back scantroned paper ballots, so that it looks like their Repub candidate is winning. That's why it's not a good idea to allow the poll worker to take the ballot out of the privacy sleeve to see how you voted.

[philb]

20. Some counties have an online list of whose absentees were accepted, all should

Large numbers of absentees are not accepted by some counties and historically there has been a clear bias in which are accepted in some counties. All counties should have an online list for people to check.
One year when I voted absentee, my county had a list and someone saw that mine had not been accepted because they required
2 signatures(one inside/one outside?) and I only signed one. I made arrangements and voted again.

[Gelliebeans]

18. I'm going to keep on hounding the County until

all the votes get counted. This just makes me livid. :grr:


2724 Gateway Drive - Riverside, CA 92507
Ph: [phone] | Toll Free: (800) 773-VOTE(8683)
TTY: [phone]

[freedomfries]

21. K & R

[Febble]

29. Jeez

I never fail to be amazed at Americans' willingness to concede races before all the votes are counted. It's just one more symptoms of a culture of approximation when it comes to elections. As is the obsession with bloody exit polls.

Thanks for posting.