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I agree that whenever voters are treated like a herd of cattle instead of people, there definitely need to be major changes, whatever that may need to be. Arizonans should be angry.
The Governor, the Phoenix Mayor and all of Arizona's leadership should most assuredly be demanding an investigation.
Keep presidential primary but open it to independent voters: Absolutely! There should be no limits on independents being allowed to vote in any election in America, as long as they are registered voters.
I'm all for whatever can be done to simplify and make the voter process more efficient, especially in major elections.
Especially since the primaries are funded by all taxpayers, not by just registered Republicans and Democrats. The independents are paying for something they can't participate in. It's very frustrating. And last time I checked almost half or so of Arizonans are registered Independents. That says something...
I didn't experience any problem personally up here in Verde Valley. Took about a minute to vote with no line. These stories are way more than just Democrats' sour grapes. There should be an investigation immediately. Oh and, it must be chilly in hell today as I find myself in agreement with Ducey on something. OPEN PRIMARIES!
That's how I feel. Sharing an opinion with DOUCHEY... What??
Do you guys think if this didn't happen and we had open primaries would the results be any different? Assuming there is an investigation and a revote, even if the results didn't change I would be happy knowing it was at least done correctly. I think Bernie and Trump might even have more voters. There are rumors that it was rigged for Hillary and I don't know if I would believe that. I've heard that Arizona might be one of the biggest players in the primaries this election, especially for the Dems.
There is a difference when I hear voter fraud instead of election fraud. Maricopa elections office has created election fraud, in my opinion. And yes there MUST be an investigation of this county department. It’s the 3rd election in a row for the last six years that there has been a major screw up from errors printed on ballots that were sent out to now this reduction of polling locations. It’s crazy and unacceptable!
Yeah it was pretty stupid that I had to switch to a party from Independent in order to vote in a primary...although I do see the point where the Primaries were for members of their respective parties to nominate their candidate, hence if you were not a member of the Democratic party, you didn't have a say in who their candidate was. If you are registered as an Independent, i.e. you are not beholden to a political party, why would you want to be able to vote in a Primary election for a particular parties' candidate?
Yeah it was pretty stupid that I had to switch to a party from Independent in order to vote in a primary...although I do see the point where the Primaries were for members of their respective parties to nominate their candidate, hence if you were not a member of the Democratic party, you didn't have a say in who their candidate was. If you are registered as an Independent, i.e. you are not beholden to a political party, why would you want to be able to vote in a Primary election for a particular parties' candidate?
I'm an independent that leans Democratic.
I'm a registered Republican though because the Republicans have almost total control of this state.
In a lot of ways, the Republican primaries are more important than the general election.
Yeah it was pretty stupid that I had to switch to a party from Independent in order to vote in a primary...although I do see the point where the Primaries were for members of their respective parties to nominate their candidate, hence if you were not a member of the Democratic party, you didn't have a say in who their candidate was. If you are registered as an Independent, i.e. you are not beholden to a political party, why would you want to be able to vote in a Primary election for a particular parties' candidate?
I think Independents have a right to say who our potential presidents can be. We all live in this country and I think many citizens, especially this election, have an opinion on who they want. Why not help that candidate succeed? Especially if you are for one that is not winning right now.
My main issue with the closed primaries is that we all pay for it. Independent, Democrat, or Republican, or not registered at all. So why exclude the Independents here? If I pay for taxes for something I suspect it to be either A) accessible to me and/or B) benefit a good majority of the community. Independents are the biggest registered voting block in our state. Having closed presidential primaries excludes the state's largest voting block, which eliminates the category of B for me and if I was a registered Independent that would eliminate A as well. Two strikes...
I have heard your argument as well. But it excludes the majority of the state by doing that which sort of ruins the point at the same time. If the majority of Arizonans are not able to vote because of banning Independents from the presidential primaries (and even registered Dems by changing the system to Ind, Rep, or Libertarian so that's an additional amount, and vice versa for Republicans) then what good is having the primary? How is that representative of what two party candidates do Arizonans want running for the next POTUS, when the majority are excluded?
I was a volunteer working the elections this for the first time this year in Pinal County. While we didn't have the huge delays experienced in Maricopa and other areas we did have an abnormally high number of provisional ballots cast that delayed the normal voting process.
The reason behind this from the viewpoint of our Precinct Inspector (person in charge at the precincts) was the new AZ driver's license. This is how the polls determine a person's political party for elections. It just piggy backs off an already existing public record instead of creating another one which would increase taxpayer cost. They imagine that there were two possible causes for this mistake. Either the voter didn't specify party preference when obtaining a new license and it defaults to a no party designation. Or there was an internal gaff and the DMV clerks weren't marking the correct party selection in the computer. Not all new driver's licensed voters had problems but a all of the provisional voters that had party designation problems had new driver's license.
To answer your other concerns;
Precincts are always shrunk during non-presidential elections because there is always poor turnout. I cant' argue that the reduction of polls from 200 to 60 isn't absurd but there is always a reduction. We reduced our polling stations by about 40% and weren't busy at all in Casa Grande.
Provisional ballots are never locked until the end of night because they aren't official. They only exist to allow the voter to vote. But once they get back to headquarters they are screened as to why the voter wasn't allowed to vote normally (i.e. in the system). This is to ensure that people are voting only once and not jumping around to different precincts. Because of all the work that it takes to make sure that a person only voted once these are never counted unless the results of the election are in doubt much like the absentee ballot fiasco of past elections. If a candidate has a 10,000 count lead then it makes no sense to count 8,000 provisional votes. The number of provisional votes is recorded and documented but the results of that vote isn't always tallied. I'll also point out that this was across the board. It wasn't party specific. Democrats and Republicans had the same problem with party designation.
If you were told to go to another precinct that is because that's where your home of residence on your license says. You make a good point though I'm sure most college students don't bother going through the process of changing their address on a license in college. This could be an area of improvement. But again this is to eliminate the need to create another system of tracking voters because it would increase taxpayer cost.
Media reporting is nothing more than speculation from exit polls and electronic polling. It has proven to be a very effective way of predicting election results. The vote isn't tallied and official until Friday.
So from my experience no I don't think voter fraud happened. I think this being an election with unorthodox candidates happened which exponentially exposed minor flaws in the system. I would however echo your advice for people to become more proactive in the voting process. Volunteer to participate in your precinct especially if you are an early ballot voter. Do not only educate yourself but participate in the system if you want to really affect change and progression. Me and my girlfriend were the youngest volunteers present and we are in our late 30s. Everyone else was at least 20+years our senior.
I was a volunteer working the elections this for the first time this year in Pinal County. While we didn't have the huge delays experienced in Maricopa and other areas we did have an abnormally high number of provisional ballots cast that delayed the normal voting process.
The reason behind this from the viewpoint of our Precinct Inspector (person in charge at the precincts) was the new AZ driver's license. This is how the polls determine a person's political party for elections. It just piggy backs off an already existing public record instead of creating another one which would increase taxpayer cost. They imagine that there were two possible causes for this mistake. Either the voter didn't specify party preference when obtaining a new license and it defaults to a no party designation. Or there was an internal gaff and the DMV clerks weren't marking the correct party selection in the computer. Not all new driver's licensed voters had problems but a all of the provisional voters that had party designation problems had new driver's license.
To answer your other concerns;
Precincts are always shrunk during non-presidential elections because there is always poor turnout. I cant' argue that the reduction of polls from 200 to 60 isn't absurd but there is always a reduction. We reduced our polling stations by about 40% and weren't busy at all in Casa Grande.
Provisional ballots are never locked until the end of night because they aren't official. They only exist to allow the voter to vote. But once they get back to headquarters they are screened as to why the voter wasn't allowed to vote normally (i.e. in the system). This is to ensure that people are voting only once and not jumping around to different precincts. Because of all the work that it takes to make sure that a person only voted once these are never counted unless the results of the election are in doubt much like the absentee ballot fiasco of past elections. If a candidate has a 10,000 count lead then it makes no sense to count 8,000 provisional votes. The number of provisional votes is recorded and documented but the results of that vote isn't always tallied. I'll also point out that this was across the board. It wasn't party specific. Democrats and Republicans had the same problem with party designation.
If you were told to go to another precinct that is because that's where your home of residence on your license says. You make a good point though I'm sure most college students don't bother going through the process of changing their address on a license in college. This could be an area of improvement. But again this is to eliminate the need to create another system of tracking voters because it would increase taxpayer cost.
Media reporting is nothing more than speculation from exit polls and electronic polling. It has proven to be a very effective way of predicting election results. The vote isn't tallied and official until Friday.
So from my experience no I don't think voter fraud happened. I think this being an election with unorthodox candidates happened which exponentially exposed minor flaws in the system. I would however echo your advice for people to become more proactive in the voting process. Volunteer to participate in your precinct especially if you are an early ballot voter. Do not only educate yourself but participate in the system if you want to really affect change and progression. Me and my girlfriend were the youngest volunteers present and we are in our late 30s. Everyone else was at least 20+years our senior.
Thank you for your insight. I know no body that volunteered this time around, only in 2012 when things were quite a bit different.
We went from roughly 300,000 voters in the last presidential primaries with 200+ polling places in 2012 to roughly 800,000 in this year's presidential primaries with 60 polling places in Maricopa County. I think everyone knows that presidential elections gets more attention from voters. Not sure about Pinal County's stats, but you could probably find it if you desired.
With college students it's difficult. If I were to change my mailing address like I was supposed to, I would have to change it three times a year. Most of that would just be reverting back to my home address in Glendale during the long breaks. I have always moved to a new apartment for each school year as the student apartments down here love to raise the rents. I personally think it would be a nuisance to do that, especially with licenses that can take forever to be mailed to you. I turned 21 this year so I had to get a new one, I kept my license address with my Glendale address because I will be moving out of this apartment in July. Then to another one in August, all in Tucson but Glendale is my permanent address, as I can always have mail sent there sent back down here if it's important. It's unfortunate that in my particular case, I'm a couple hour drive from home, and I had to work my internship the day of primaries, not to mention classes the next day. So I couldn't drive home and I attempted to vote in Pima County. Arizona has a large college population who are not only A) inexperienced with voting but B) moving around a lot, which makes the county registration a nuisance.
The flaws are concerning to me. Many Arizonans are just now voting for the first time partially because of the unorthodox candidates (mainly Trump and Sanders) who believe since they are so different than the parties they are running with, that it can truly create the change they desire and find it worthwhile to vote instead of "my vote doesn't matter" or "picking the lesser evil/nothing will change regardless who I vote for".
The media exposure should put the spotlight on how Maricopa County in particular handles the voting process. As I'm not familiar with what goes on behind the scenes for the voting process here, the ones who are familiar can work on ironing out the wrinkles as the media sort of forces them to do it. This should also be a lesson to Arizonans on the voting process here as many are transplants and states have different ways of handling this, so they may be unfamiliar with ours in general.
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