49,500 Independent Votes Won't Count in CA Primary -confusing ballot design [View All]

[babylonsister]

Some independent votes won't count in L.A. County

An estimated 49,500 primary nonpartisan ballots are marked wrong, due to design and poll instruction problems.
By Richard C. Paddock, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
February 12, 2008

An estimated 49,500 votes were cast incorrectly in Los Angeles County by nonpartisan voters in the presidential primaries and cannot be counted because the voters' intentions are unclear, acting Registrar Dean Logan said Monday.

The mismarked ballots were the result of a confusing ballot design and poor education of poll workers and the public, Logan said. That left many decline-to-state voters unaware of the need to fill in a bubble indicating whether they were voting in the Democratic Party or American Independent Party primary.

The Republican Party did not allow nonpartisans to vote in its primary.

"Unfortunately we are not in a position to count those votes because of the limitations of the system and the ballot layout itself," Logan said.

"We want voters to know that we hear loud and clear that this ballot layout is confusing and we need to identify a less confusing method for crossover voting for future primaries."

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http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-vote12feb12,0,6970893.story