electionline Weekly

In Focus This Week

Director’s Note
Longtime Kansas Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh resigns

By Doug Chapin

On Monday, February 15, Kansas Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh – who had already indicated he would not seek re-election to the post he first won in 1994 – resigned to take a job in the private sector.

I’ll leave it to the Sunflower State’s media and political community to analyze what his departure means for the 2010 campaign, but I did want to say just a few (hundred) words here to express my appreciation for his friendship and guidance throughout the life and times of electionline.org and Pew’s Election Initiatives.

I first met Ron as I was trying to get my new Pew project off the ground during 2001. At that time, many policymakers in the field were wary of election reform projects – remember this was immediately post-2000 when so much of the field was dominated by ongoing partisan warfare stemming from the Florida presidential recount and Bush v. Gore – but Ron was instantly both encouraging and enthusiastic about our work. I came to rely upon his encouragement and enthusiasm – and his considerable expertise – as my little one-man startup acquired a handful of colleagues and became a going concern

Ron was a member of electionline’s initial advisory board and offered considerable advice and guidance about how our work should proceed – blending an election official’s attention to the status quo with a far-reaching interest in going beyond business as usual.

The most lasting memory I have of Ron was at a meeting in 2007 where Pew brought together stakeholders to help us chart the future course of our election work. After a day and a half of incredibly detailed conversations, participants had a chance to offer some closing words.

Ron’s message was very simple: think big. While he acknowledged the need to move deliberately when making changes to the nation’s election system, Ron urged us to look beyond incremental fixes – what he called “lipstick on a pig” – and challenged us to settle for nothing less than transformational change in the way in which we approach voting in America. That spirit continues to animate our work today.

Even better, Ron has never hesitated to put his ideas into action and has as such been a valuable partner as Pew’s election work has expanded. Kansas was one of the initial states to adopt the Voting Information Project, and the state’s Midwest Election Official Conference partnership with Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska provided us with valuable information about the process of using interstate cooperation to improve voter lists.

Over my years at electionline and Pew, I have had the pleasure to meet and get to know hundreds of election officials across the country. To this day, Ron Thornburgh – in many ways, one of my first “friends in the business” – is one of my very favorites.

Don’t be a stranger, Ron.

Election News This Week

The U.S. Justice Department has settled a lawsuit with Riverside County, Calif. which claimed that the county didn’t provide help for Spanish-speaking voters. The settlement will provide a comprehensive language assistance program in Riverside County that includes trained bilingual election officials. Federal officials also will monitor polling places during upcoming election. The federal agency sued Riverside County, alleging that the county failed to help Spanish-speaking voters in recent elections. The Voting Rights Act requires municipalities that have a sizable minority population to provide voting materials and assistance in that language as well as English.

Legislative bodies in Minnesota and Vermont both made strides this week to alter the timing of their September primaries in order to comply with the federal MOVE Act. In Minnesota, the Senate voted to move the primary to the second Tuesday in August in each even-numbered year. If approved by the House and signed by the governor, the Minnesota law would move the 2010 election from Sept. 14 to Aug. 10. After wrestling with the issue for five weeks, the Vermont House Government Operations Committee voted unanimously to support moving the state’s primary to the fourth Tuesday in August, which would move the election from September 14 to August 24. While the legislation seems poised for approval in Minnesota, the future of Vermont’s proposal remains rocky as partisan bickering continues over the proposal approved by the bipartisan committee and one submitted by Governor Jim Douglas (R).

The American Civil Liberties Union thinks hundreds of South Dakotans were illegally denied the right to vote during the 2008 presidential election. Convicted felons sentenced to only probation have the right to vote in South Dakota, but the names of several such felons were improperly purged from voter rolls in 2008 because poll workers had a limited understanding of voting rights, the ACLU says. In an amended lawsuit filed this past week in federal court, the ACLU contends that a large number of affected voters were Native Americans because felony cases on the reservation are tried in federal court and not within the state judicial system. Secretary of State Chris Nelson doubts that an entire class of felons has been denied voting rights. County auditors are trained in voter registration rules before every national election. “We cover voter registration and voter lists,” Nelson told the Argus Leader. “It’s all a part of the training.” The ACLU’s initial lawsuit was filed one year ago on behalf of two women from Pine Ridge.

Both sides of the aisle are to blame as two major election proposals – no-fault absentee voting by mail and allowing counties to use vote centers – have hit roadblocks in Indiana. The Democratic-controlled House passed a bill, which contained language opening up mail-in absentee voting to all regardless of reason. But that bill was stripped in the Senate Elections Committee this week. Sen. Connie Lawson, R-Danville – the sponsor of the legislation – said her caucus hasn’t had enough time to review the concept of no-fault absentee voting. Meanwhile, the Republican-controlled Senate passed Senate Bill 241, which included giving all counties the option of moving to a vote center model. If approved, voters could cast their ballots at any one of a small number of vote centers in the county. However, according to the Journal Gazette, Rep. Kreg Battles, D-Vincennes – chairman of the House Elections Committee – is not hearing the vote center bill because he thinks more information is needed.

Hawaii’s Election Commission this week named interim elections chief Scott Nago to the position full time. Nago had been serving as interim chief since Dec. 30, when Kevin Cronin suddenly resigned. Nago will now serve out the rest of Cronin’s term that expires on Feb. 1, 2012, William Marston, chairman of the state Elections Commission told the Honolulu Advertiser. Nago had led the ballot counting section for the state Office of Elections and his appointment to interim chairman was endorsed by the four county clerks. “Scott has proven himself,” Marston said. “He’s a good man. He’s already showed his worth and he has our support 100 percent.”

Research and Report Summaries

electionline provides brief summaries of recent research and reports in the field of election administration. Please e-mail links to research to sgreene@pewtrusts.org.

Voters Win with Same-Day Registration – Demos, January 2010: In championing same-day voter registration (SDR), Demos notes that more than one million Americans used the practice to vote on or before November 2008 presidential election. Voter turnout in SDR states in 2008 was on average seven percentage points higher than the average turnout for non-SDR states. While this higher rate is likely not solely attributable to SDR, other research has shown that at least three to six percentage points of historical increases were directly related to SDR. Other benefits are described including SDR being easier and more cost-effective for election officials in part by greatly reducing the need to issue provisional ballots.

U.S. Election Assistance Commission Annual Report 2009 – EAC, January 2010: No later than January 31 of each year, the EAC is required to submit an annual report to the Committee on House Administration of the House of Representatives and the Committee on Rules and Administration of the Senate. The 2009 report details the commission’s responsibilities and accomplishments for the year covering Help America Vote Act (HAVA) payments and grants, voting system testing and certification, research, clearinghouse activities plus a look ahead to 2010.

Jim Crow in New York – By Erika Wood and Liz Budnitz with Garima Malhotra, The Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, February 2010: The authors examine the history of voter disenfranchisement laws, noting that Jim Crow was not confined to the South but existed in the North as well, specifically New York state. In fact, New York was the only state that required blacks to own real property in order to qualify to vote. The state’s voting qualifications and criminal disenfranchisement laws became more restrictive and when the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments made the state remove its property requirements for African-American voters, New York moved from allowing to requiring the disenfranchisement of those convicted of “infamous crimes.” These criminal disenfranchisement laws have changed little and continue to disenfranchise African Americans and other ethnic minorities, according to the study. The report recommends the state change its law to restore voting rights to people on parole.

2010 Issues in Election Administration: Interstate Compacts – Project Vote, February 2010: This legislative brief summarizes which states are comparing and matching voter registration databases, how these states are using the resulting data, and the potential problems of using the information from the crosschecking process to cancel registrations.

2010 Issues in Election Administration: Voter Intimidation and Caging – Project Vote, February 2010: This legislative brief provides explanations and examples of voter intimidation and voter caging – when targeted populations are sent non-forwardable mailings and the returned mailings are used to challenge voters on the basis of residence. Changes to state law are recommended to strengthen penalties for voter intimidation and to regulate and reduce the risk of voter caging that can lead to partisan abuse.