Showing posts with label Jena Griswold. Show all posts

Monday, September 14, 2020

DeJoy's Latest Stunt: Sending Out Postcards With Misinformation On Mail Voting To Millions (Colorado's Response)

This past Saturday, as reported in The Sunday Denver Post (p. 2B), the Colorado Secretary of State, Jena Griswold, was forced to file a lawsuit against the United States Postal Service. Her office learned on Thursday the USPS planned to send out mailers to every household in the nation, but with misinformation- i.e. it does not "align with state election rules". This is mega serious given we already are aware how Trump Toady Louis DeJoy is already slowing mail to a crawl by nixing overtime as well as mass-destroying sorting machines, e.g.

With Destruction of Hundreds Of Mail Sorting Machi...

This latest insult to the electoral system may well be weathered by an experienced mail ballot state like Colorado, but what about the less experienced states only now gearing up for an absentee-mail ballot avalanche? In her complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Denver, Ms. Griswold wrote (ibid.):

"This attempt at voter suppression violates the United States Constitution and federal statutes and must be stopped immediately".

In addition, Griswold filed a motion for a temporary restraining order to block the postal service from sending out the misleading mailers. A postal service spokesman (David Rupert) admitted to the Post thousands of the mailers had already been sent out last Thursday and Friday and "the rest are to be sent out next week." That means over 2 million Colorado voters will receive the defective cards. Will it mislead them or get them to do the wrong thing? Only time will tell, and one hopes voters are aware of what's going on, but that assumes they read the papers.

Rupert in his Post interview claimed the mailers were innocuous and only meant to "inform voters of the importance of planning ahead if they plan to vote by mail."

He added: "Some of it applies to everyone and some doesn't."

In other words, rather than design each mailer for each state, i.e. to meet its own regs for mail ballots, the USPS basically (and lazily) just designed one and sent it out to voters in all states, irrespective of differing rules. The effect will be that the information is wrong for most voters in most states.

For example, the mailer sent to Colorado voters incorrectly asks that they request a mail ballot 15 days before the election and return the ballots by mail at least 7 days before the election. But as Ms. Griswold notes (ibid.):

"In Colorado every registered voter is sent ballot without having to make a request and voters are urged to return ballots sooner than 7 days before the election." Indeed, in this election - given the chaos at the USPS thanks to DeJoy - Colorado voters are better served by using drop boxes.

DeJoy again at the center of this mess? Of course. Griswold notified the Post that secretaries of state had asked DeJoy (as Postmaster General) to review the draft of election information on the mailers, but he refused. This review was intended to ensure the mailers were accurate before sending to voters. Hence, we may conclude DeJoy wanted to release deliberately erroneous mailers to add to the chaos already sown by destroying hundreds of mail sorting machines.

Other states, namely Washington and California, have also expressed concern over their voters getting the wrong information on the postcards. As Ms. Griswold told the Post:

"These false statements on these mailers will disenfranchise Colorado voters, including its uniform military and overseas voters, by misleading them about Colorado's election processes. It also infringes Colorado's constitutional rights to conduct its elections while interfering with the Secretary of State's ability to oversee Colorado's elections.

"These false statements will confuse Colorado's voters, likely causing otherwise eligible voters to wrongly believe they may not participate in the upcoming election."

On the plus side, Colorado voters - at least two thirds of us - have voted by mail since 2013 and know our way 'around the block'. It is the new be's who just moved here not long ago who might be fooled. So it is critical for the Secretary of State to get the correct information out, a task rendered much more difficult with DeJoy's stunt.

Meanwhile, what we have gleaned so far is this Postmaster General is not a friend or ally of voters. He is an impediment. Indeed, he emerges as a de facto mail voting saboteur appointed by Trump to wreck the coming elections. This will make it easier for Hitler Jr. to claim - as he said again on Saturday (to cheering supporters at a rally in Nevada). “I am going to start by saying that the Democrats are trying to rig this election because it’s the only way they are going to win.”

In truth saying such rubbish and repeating it is HIS only way to try to sneak in, by sowing lies, chaos and disruption. Just as his lapdog Michael Caputo has assisted him by spreading malicious lies about "left wing hit squads" taking to the streets. Trump knows in his feral, orange heart he's on a losing trajectory irrespective of just about anything he pulls. He knows this because he knows at least a plurality of voters have figured out this wretch who claims he will "save" them -- from whatever threat (e.g. "Antifa") - will do nothing of the sort. As one guest on Real Time on Friday night put it: "They know he's the arsonist as well as the fireman."

See Also:

The GOP Is Staging Chaos On the Way To A Coup

by David Atkins | September 14, 2020 - 7:14am | permalink

— from Washington Monthly

And:

Vote Early. Vote Now! By Hand. On Paper. Be a Poll Worker and Protect This Election!

by Harvey Wasserman | September 14, 2020 - 6:04am | permalink

— from Reader Supported News

Friday, August 21, 2020

How Colorado Achieved The Gold Standard In Mail Voting - And Why Every State Needs To Emulate It

Elections board assistant works with other officials to perform a ballot audit from the June primary election at the clerk's office on July 10th. Safeguards such as internal ballot audits ensure there is no fraud with mail ballots such as Donald Dotard claims.

Let's now take time to examine mail voting, given the level of sabotage against the Postal Service, and Trump's bombastic lying about mail ballots (despite his filling out such a ballot two days ago, e.g.

https://www.npr.org/2020/08/19/903886567/trump-while-attacking-mail-voting-casts-mail-ballot-again

But done properly and in a coordinated fashion there are few methods as secure and foolproof as mail voting - despite what the Dotard would have you believe. Thus, it is instructive to see how one state (Colorado) has perfected the method so that other states now considering it can do just as well. Here are the details of our process:

- A central core of guidelines - no 'freelancing' by counties. Each of the state's 64 county clerks runs elections according to guidelines set out by Secretary of State Jena Griswold. There are a few minor differences, i.e. in some of the specific wording, but by and large the system is the same statewide.

- Voter Registry and Upkeep. One of the most important security features of Colorado's election system is the voter registry and its diligent upkeep. The Secretary of State's office checks with the post office, the Colorado Dept. of Public Health & Environment, and the Department of Corrections monthly to ensure that if anyone moves out of state, dies or is imprisoned they will be removed from the registry and no longer receive a ballot. The frequency of these checks always increases before an election.

-- Timeliness. All eligible voters receive their ballots about three weeks before a given election. They can then complete their ballots and either return the ballots in the mail (up to 8 days before election day) or they can submit them in a drop box.

- Collection. Bipartisan teams collect ballots from Denver's 37 drop boxes , for example, locking the ballots containing them and labeling them by location before delivering them downtown. The same procedure happens in other counties and note here ALL drop boxes are under mandated 24- hour video surveillance to prevent any tampering. Once we fill out our own Colorado mail ballots we plan to deposit them into secure drop boxes. (Note: the current cases in Montana and Pennsylvania to stop the use of drop boxes is pure vote suppression, nothing more.)

- Signatures check. One of the things the bellicose buffoon Trump was recently heard bellowing - like a stuck pig - is: "And all those signatures! Who signs those ballots?" In Colorado the process is straightforward, there's no hocus pocus or playing fast and loose.

Incoming ballots are fed through a machine that checks the signatures on the envelope against each voter' on file signature. (That original signature is captured - collected when people first register to vote.) The machine kicks out envelopes if the signatures aren't close enough to those on file. A bipartisan team of judges then steps in to examine the signatures further. Ballots with mismatched signatures not resolved via voter inquiry are turned over to district attorneys to investigate further. (In the June 30 primary, of the 211, 626 ballots cast by mail only 3, 862 were rejected because of a mismatch. Even then the reasons for mismatch are mostly prosaic, i.e. people forgetting to sign, or printing their names rather than signing, or absent-mindedly signing their spouse's ballot instead of their own.)

- Coding, Counting & Tabulating: In the next phase, ballots are imprinted with a unique and random 10-digit number and fed through another machine that tabulates the votes. Until the polls close these ballots can be counted but not tabulated. That means that the judges enter the votes into the counting machine but the results aren't applied to any given race, i.e.local school board officer. At all stages equal numbers of Democratic and Republican judges review the process. And note, the atmosphere bears no resemblance to the current toxic, political climate engendered by the Dotard.

Tabulation itself doesn't require differential calculus or ESP. As long as judges can clearly see how a person intended to vote the results are tabulated accordingly. (The judges work through batches of about 800 and it is estimated that between 5 and 10% have to be adjudicated.) Finished ballots are filed into boxes, dated and stored securely.

The process can continue for days depending on how many ballots are cast and how many arrive on the final day. This is, of course, why people must keep their senses about them on Nov. 3rd and not let Trump distract them with babble about a "rigged" election because final results are not yet forthcoming. The nature of mail balloting is it takes time and it is quite possible we may have to wait days or even weeks for the final outcome. If that is the case, so be it, we wait patiently. We do not succumb to Trump's hollering, barking and anti-mail ballot "fraud" bull shit. Nor do we let emotions rule our heads or lapse into premature expectations!

- Redundancy. The voting and mail ballot tabulation process for most states (e.g. Washington, Utah) contains built in redundancies and safeguards but Colorado officials have built in at least two additional ones:

i) A risk-limiting audit that takes place about 2 weeks after each election. In this process county clerks are mandated (by the Secretary of State) to find a specific number of ballots and to check those paper results against the votes tabulated by the computer. The purpose is to make sure they match and that the machine read them properly.

ii) State law requires county clerks to keep the ballots and envelopes stored and secured for 25 months. Just in case, i.e. there is any litigation or question arising from the results. Say if blowhard Trump wants a recount because the fool believes something was amiss.

As one Denver clerk (Paul Lopez) summed up the process ('The Colorado Gold Standard Mail Voting Process', Denver Post, Sunday, Aug. 16, p. 1A):

"It's safe. It's secure, it's transparent, it has been tested. It's tried, it's true and it's pandemic proof."

If only Donnie Dotard could process that instead of flinging lies and disinformation all around like he flings his turds when critics - like Obama - lance his fat ego.

See Also:

https://www.factcheck.org/2020/04/trumps-latest-voter-fraud-misinformation/

Sunday, August 16, 2020

If Trump's Reign Of Terror On The Postal Service Succeeds You Can Kiss The Rest Of This Country Goodbye Too

"Victory at any cost! Even if it means burning the whole country and all its institutions down!"

"The Post Office is an earnest, all-American, beloved, practical part of our lives. You mess with it and you are messing with a lot of Americans - who apparently are in the mood to push back... The U.S. Postal Service is more American than apple pie. And I mean that in a very specific sense. Apple pie does not have its own line in the Constitution. The Post Office does. It is a necessity, it is uncontroversial, it is integrated into the fabric of our lives." - Rachel Maddow, Friday night, MSNBC

As Trump's reign of terror and sabotage against the coming election and the U.S. Postal Service ramps up it is clear we are in a state of national emergency. The problem is few are aware of the extent of the pillage already done. Before it goes beyond salvaging we need millions taking to the streets in protests as loud and energetic as those protesting George Floyd's death at the hands of Minneapolis police.

Exaggeration? Hell no, not when mail boxes have been carted away in dozens of cities and only a last minute public outcry stopped it - temporarily at least. But nothing has of yet stopped the removal and destruction of hundreds of bulk sorting machines - all designed to clog up the mail so voting by mail becomes a herculean task if not impossible. That means tens of millions of Americans potentially being disenfranchised. As Mika Brzezinski observed last week Friday on 'Morning Joe', at no other time in our history has such blatant sabotage been carried out against a department enshrined in the Constitution.

In addition, the US Postal Service, in letters to 46 states, and the District of Columbia, warned that it could not guarantee all ballots cast by mail for the November election will arrive in time to be counted. Such a fiasco could possibly affect tens of millions of votes across almost the whole country - especially including key battleground states like Pennsylvania. The news was reported first in the Washington Post.

But the malicious destruction of sorting machines, which can process up to 36,000 pieces of mail per hour and cost nearly a quarter million bucks each, uncovers a whole new dimension of Trump's sabotage. This was reported by Vice News, e.g.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/n7wk9z/the-post-office-is-deactivating-mail-sorting-machines-ahead-of-the-election

Excerpt:

"Most of the machines being dismantled in the facilities Motherboard identified are delivery bar code sorters (DBCS), into which letters, postcards and similarly sized mail (but not magazines and large envelopes, which are categorized as “flats” and sorted differently) are fed. The DBCS sorts the mail into one of hundreds of “stackers,” a slot about a foot long. Each slot is for a different destination, be it another post office or distribution facility.

A DBCS typically requires two workers to operate: one to feed the mail into the machine, and the other to collect the mail from the stackers and put them in the appropriate bins for transport. Running at peak efficiency, the machines can sort about 35,000 pieces of mail per hour,"

Trump has openly admitted (on FOX Business Network Thursday) to his deliberate sabotage to prevent mail voting, and hence cheating to try to keep power, e.g

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/m7jkxq/trump-just-admitted-hes-sabotaging-the-usps-to-screw-up-the-election

Excerpt:

"They need that money in order to make the Post Office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots, But if they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting, because they’re not equipped to have it.”

In other words, the traitorous rat swine will try to destroy the post office in a desperate effort to rubber stamp his fascist authoritarianism. We also have learned (ibid.)

"This week, House and Senate Democrats sent separate letters to (Louis) DeJoy laying the blame for the recent mail delays at his feet, writing:

“The House is seriously concerned that you are implementing policies that accelerate the crisis at the Postal Service, including directing Post Offices to no longer treat all election mail as First Class. If implemented now, as the election approaches, this policy will cause further delays to election mail that will disenfranchise voters and put significant financial pressure on election jurisdictions.”

But make no mistake, this letter is inadequate given the nature of the emergency and its impact on an election in less than 80 days. Not to mention the impact on the tens of millions who depend on mail deliveries, from bills to be paid, to packages expected - including prescription meds. As columnist Margaret Sullivan has written in The Washington Post Saturday, quoting journalist Elizabeth Spiers:

"Supporting the continued existence of the USPS, which is guaranteed in the Constitution, should be the most straightforward non-political bipartisan effort in existence. Everyone uses it and needs it, and the irony is older rural Trump supporters need it *more*.”

So what we really need, as Rep. Ayanna Presley pointed out, is an emergency reconvening of the House from its summer break and a serious interrogation of Trump Toady DeJoy by the Oversight Committee.

That and tens of millions protesting in the streets - including in front of DeJoy's home - just might sway the Senate Republicans to end the insanity and support the postal service which is admired and loved by all political tribes.

As for the very act of mail voting now under siege by Trump, we have had that over the past ten years here in Colorado. The fraud rate? Estimated by the Brennan Center for Justice at a whopping 0.0000001%. Or 1 in ten million. About the same probability as being struck twice in the same location by lightning. As our Secretary of State Jena Griswold has put it (Denver Post, Aug, 14, p 1A):

"It's voter suppression to undermine the safest method to vote during a pandemic and force Americans to risk their lives to vote."

Even more blunt are these words from Biden campaign spokesperson Andrew Bates:

"The president of the United States is sabotaging a basic service that hundreds of millions of people rely upon, cutting a critical lifeline for rural economies. That includes cutting off delivery of medicines because he wants to deprive Americans of their fundamental right to vote safely. "

There is no question that this story -- until the Postal service is re-established whole, as it was - must be the Number 1, Number 2, Number 3 and Number 100 story until the election is over. Every media source must be on it 24/7 without letup. As the WaPo's Sullivan notes:

"But if journalists don’t keep the pressure on Postal Service problems, they will be abdicating their duty. There’s very little that matters more than the Nov. 3 vote. Anything that threatens the integrity of the vote needs to be treated as one of the biggest stories out there — even if it’s not the sexiest."

Ms. Sullivan then quotes Dan Gillmor, co-founder of the News Co/Lab at Arizona State University’s journalism school:

"Some stories demand collaboration, and this one is a plain example. The nation’s newsrooms — working together and, crucially, with the help of the public in communities around the nation — could find out and explain what is going on, at the macro and micro level,”

And meanwhile, citizens can mount massive protests to garner needed media attention, as the House Oversight Committee reconvenes in emergency session to grill DeJoy and his trolls. This is too important an issue for anyone to slack off and worst of all, not pay attention.

See Also: