City OK'd 1,305 Flawed Voter Cards
People were allowed to cast ballots, despite filling out same-day registrations with wrong information
By GREG J. BOROWSKI
Jan. 27, 2005
Milwaukee officials said Thursday that 1,305 same-day voter registration cards from the Nov. 2 election couldn’t be processed, including more than 500 cases where voters listed no address & dozens more where no name was written on the card. But the revelation of the actual number of cards that couldn't be processed, far lower than previous estimates of 8,300 or more, raised new concerns, because it leaves a clear gap of more than 7,000 people who voted on Nov. 2 & can't be accounted for in city records.
The problematic same-day registration cards, the number of which was revealed in response to a Journal Sentinel open records request, could quickly become the focus of a major investigation launched Wednesday into potential voter fraud in the city of Milwaukee.
That effort comes after the newspaper's report finding more than 1,200 votes listed as being cast from invalid addresses. Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann and U.S. Attorney Steve Biskupic are overseeing the probe with help from the Milwaukee Police Department & the FBI. While the framework of the joint investigation is still being developed, James Finch, the special agent in charge of the FBI's local office, said Thursday that the bureau's first task will be to look at questionable voter registration cards.
The city's own breakdown of the 1,305 cards that couldn't be processed showed 548 people were given ballots without listing an address on the cards & another 48 didn't provide a name.
Ballots were given to people that didn't list an address? Ballots were given to people who "didn't provide a name"? HELLO! Shouldn't a ton of red flags have gone up at that point? If this an indication of the quality of Milwaukee's election officials, then they'd better totally revamp their office. Let's hope it isn't an indicator but it ain't looking good for the home team.
And among many other problems, 141 gave addresses later found to not be in the city. One of the cards provided to the newspaper shows a voter clearly listing "Wauwatosa" as her city of residence. Nevertheless, she received a ballot & voted in Milwaukee. It's possible she filled out the card wrong, listing a Wauwatosa address where her Milwaukee address should have been. The woman, whose phone is disconnected, couldn't be reached Thursday night.
She can't be reached? Shocking, I tell you, just shocking. Her phone's disconnected? I wonder why.
Widespread failure
The new information shocked critics of the state's election laws & of how Milwaukee ran its election. Democrat John Kerry topped President Bush in Wisconsin by 11,384 votes, one of the narrowest margins in the nation. "The system is obviously failing in a major way," said state Rep. Jeff Stone (R-Greendale), who with nine other Republican lawmakers has also asked state auditors to review the Milwaukee election. "If the card isn't complete, they shouldn't be handed a ballot."
Mr. Stone is right on the money. It's only common sense, a surefire sign of a Republican. Lord knows common sense isn't in overabundance in the Democratic Party.
In addition to the cards that couldn't be processed, city officials have had nearly 2,800 verification cards, out of 73,079 sent out, returned as undeliverable. State law requires those be submitted to the district attorney's office. That number is higher than the 1,200 invalid addresses found by the Journal Sentinel, because the newspaper's review didn't cover apartment buildings, due to problems in how the addresses appear in data bases.
Here's another shocking statistic: Almost 4 percent of the voter cards sent out "returned as undeliverable." Let's hope they catch the people who perpetrated this fraud. They deserve to lose their right to vote & be thrown into prison for a decade at minimum. People that work to tilt an election are positively evil & deserve to pay dearly for this act of evil. Voting is one of the most precious of our rights as Americans.
Furthermore, Milwaukee officials must radically reform the voter registration process or else they need to be shown the door.
Lisa Artison, executive director of the city's Election Commission, said "layer upon layer" of human error likely is to blame for the problems, which came as election workers faced a crush of voters, tens of thousands of whom registered at the polls. "Obviously, our goal is to serve the voters as effectively as possible," Artison said. "With an election of this magnitude, there are going to be mistakes, & we're working to correct them." Mayor Tom Barrett reiterated his confidence in Artison & pledged that the process will be improved.
Ms. Artison, we appreciate your working to correct your mistakes but wouldn't it be better if you didn't make the mistakes in the first place? Mr. Barrett, what do you base your confidence in Ms. Artison? Or are you just trying to not pile on?
"We will look at all options to see what we can do," said Barrett, who was elected in April. "Obviously, it's a system I inherited." Barrett said the problems didn't shake his belief that voters shouldn't face a requirement to show a photo identification card at the polls before getting a ballot. He said the requirement would be a burden on some voters, particularly the elderly.
It's a burden to show a photo identification that you are who you are? Mr. Barrett better get things figured out. How else will we ever have elections of integrity?
Stone & Sen. Joe Leibham (R-Sheboygan) soon are expected to introduce a photo ID bill, something Gov. Jim Doyle opposes & likely would veto.
I don't know much about Gov. Doyle but if he'd veto common sense legislation like that, then Wisconsin had better vote him out in 2006 & do it resoundingly. Let's hope that Wisconsin's Republicans force this sensitive issue.
Such a requirement may not have prevented the problems surrounding Milwaukee's registration cards, all of which, if current law was followed, should've come from people who provided identification. Nevertheless, the 1,305 cards that couldn't be processed suggest a major breakdown in the system, which is meant to capture names & addresses of everyone who votes.
For instance, 236 cards had missing or incomplete dates of birth, so the person can't be identified fully. In nearly two dozen cases, the cards were deemed illegible. On 155 of the cards, the voter got a ballot even though the card didn't list a voter number, a key step in reconciling poll-site logs to the number of votes cast.
That 236 voter cards either didn't have a date of birth on it or had an incomplete date of birth is beyond troubling. It's time that tighter controls are established, not just in Wisconsin but nation-wide. Washington state might benefit from tighter controls, too. The bottom line, though, is having honest people in the positions of accountability.
Unexplained gap
Indeed, the release of the actual number of cards that couldn't be processed in many ways deepened concerns about the gap between ballots and voters. In Milwaukee, 277,535 ballots were cast in the Nov. 2 election. The city's own election records show only 269,212 people as having voted, however. That gap of about 8,300 appeared to represent the number of same-day registration cards that couldn't be processed. The number originally had been put at more than 10,000, based on estimates the city sent to the state. If only about 1,300 cards couldn't be processed, that still leaves a gap of about 7,000.
When will these people learn that making it easy for people to vote is equivalent to making it easy to commit voter fraud? The "Count every vote" mantra must end & end soon. If that mantra isn't defeated soundly & soon, then elections won't mean anything. That'd be a great tragedy.
In reality, though, the gap is larger. The newspaper has found hundreds of cases where the same person is listed as voting twice, something officials attribute to a computer "glitch" when their information was entered into the city's computer system. Asked what could account for the remaining gap, Artison said there are many possibilities. Among them: Clerks who, after the election, scanned voter log books from the city's 312 wards may have missed some bar codes that are used to track each voter.
"There's a huge window for human error," said Artison. "They might miss a page. They might miss several pages. And there's a margin for human error at the polling places."
Milwaukee Ald. Mike D'Amato said, despite the recent criticism, he thought the city election was conducted well.
He noted the 1,200 votes from invalid addresses found by the newspaper represented about 0.4% of the total votes cast. D'Amato said the investigation by McCann & Biskupic was prompted by partisan complaints. "The problems are a function of the openness of our system & exist statewide," he said. "Yet they continue to attack Milwaukee."
Alderman D'Amato thinks that this investigation is only about "partisan complaints"? Might it be because McCann & Biskupic think this might be a grave matter because it's about the attempted theft of our most precious civil right? Might they be trying to improve a hopelessly flawed system?
In response to the newspaper's request to see the cards, the city provided what it termed a random sample of 50 of them,& has agreed to provide copies of the rest. Of the 50, 20 had no address listed for the voter who received a ballot. It's possible the person provided ID but did not completely fill out the card. However, the lack of address makes it difficult to verify if the voter was eligible.
I know that it was just a random sampling of voter registration cards but 20 out of 50 cards having errors isn't just significant, it's alarming.
Nine of the cards showed addresses outside the city. It's possible a person's identification card shows a "Milwaukee" address, even if the address is in the suburbs. The address would then have been rejected when entered into the computers, which kick out those outside the "address range" for the city. It's unclear whether these people voted in other communities in addition to Milwaukee.
Milwaukee election officials should look into that. It's yet another example of just how flawed their election system is. It's embarassing to think this system is this flawed.
Journal Sentinel reporters Tom Kertscher & Gina Barton contributed to this report.
