Update (4:48 p.m.): Election Protection lawyers say that as of 4 p.m. they've fielded more than 72,000 calls from concerned voters around the country, including 5,096 fromCalifornia. Los Angeles County continues to be the problem child in the state; 43 precincts are either running "very, very low" on ballots or have already run out, Neubauer said. Students at USC and UCLA have had trouble casting ballots because their names don't appear on out-of-date precinct lists, she said. Election Protection has several hundred volunteer lawyers staffing six call centers around the state.
It’s finally Election Day, but don’t plan on getting all your election results tonight.
Polling place troubles have already surfaced in Los Angeles County — home of the February primary “double-bubble” ballot trouble — according to leaders of Election Protection, a nonpartisan election watchdog group that includes 20 legal organizations.
Provisionally problematic polling, after the jump.
The main problem seems to be precinct voter lists that don’t match up with updated county registration rolls, said Elisabeth Neubauer, an Election Protection volunteer and a litigation associate at Munger, Tolles & Olson. Voters whose names don’t show up on precinct rolls are being told to cast provisional ballots. Election workers will have to confirm those voters’ registration status before their votes can be tallied — a process that can take days, especially if the registrar is swamped with provisionals.
“In some places there have been reports that as many as 50 percent of the voters showing up at the polls have been forced to vote provisionally,” Neubauer said.
If the number of provisional ballots cast is indeed huge, that could have a big impact on the timeliness of election results, especially in close races. Think of Proposition 8. Urban Los Angeles County is expected to provide a lot of California’s “no” votes. But it may take weeks to know how many if the registrar is sifting through stacks of provisionals.
And if you really want to be pessimistic, consider what might happen if the Prop 8 race looks unbelievably close after tonight. Would lawyers for both sides start challenging provisional voters’ registrations? Hello, Florida?
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Election Protection volunteers say they’ve had no reports of major problems in Northern California polling places. Back in Southern California, the problems — besides the inconsistent voter lists — have been fairly typical for a general election: long lines, not enough ballots and polls opening late.
And in one reported case, a Glendale poll worker may have gone too far in psyching himself up for the busy day since he “appeared intoxicated,” Neubauer said.
Happy voting!
— Cheryl Miller
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