Alaska ignores rule of law, counts write-in votes using dubious "voter intent" standard

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Alaska state officials said Tuesday they plan to proceed with this week’s count of write-in ballots in the Senate contest after Republican Joe Miller sued the state’s lieutenant governor and Division of Elections in federal court to try stop the state’s plan for counting write-in ballots that misspell the name of his rival Sen. Lisa Murkowski.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, said that the ... state Division of Election’s plan to consider “voter intent” when reading ballots ... is ... unlawful.

...

Division of Elections Director Gail Fenumiai has previously pointed to Alaska cases in which voter intent was considered.

Thomas Van Flein, Joe Miller’s attorney, said Mr. Miller decided to filed suit after the Division of Elections published guidelines for counting names on write-in ballots, which noted that some misspellings could be counted in Ms. Murkowski’s favor.

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2010/11/10/miller-sues-alaska-still-counts-misspelled-murkowski/

[one...two...tree 2,762]

So what state law is Miller referring to?

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So what state law is Miller referring to?

He is saying that because state law makes no reference to voter intent, voter intent can not be used.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Both sides will try whatever. Murkowski has been playing hardball. Hardball is the game.

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Both sides will try whatever. Murkowski has been playing hardball. Hardball is the game.

Murkowski's form of hardball ensures that the voters had an additional choice - they could vote for her and many likely did.

Miller's hardball is quite the opposite. It is about removing choice. It is about disregarding voter intent. I'm not sure how that is ethically justified, although it likely is perfectly legal.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

so some jerk off resident election official gets to decide how the voter 'felt' at the poll?

That's a bit absurd.... lol

[one...two...tree 2,762]

He is saying that because state law makes no reference to voter intent, voter intent can not be used.

Ah, the logic of RWN's.

[The_Dude 1,142]

so some jerk off resident election official gets to decide how the voter 'felt' at the poll?

That's a bit absurd.... lol

No, what is absurd is discounting a write in vote because someone got a letter or two spelled incorrectly when submitting a ballot for Lisa Murkowski. It's not like you could mistake a mispelled vote for Murkowski for a Joe Miller vote.....

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Murkowski's form of hardball ensures that the voters had an additional choice - they could vote for her and many likely did.

Miller's hardball is quite the opposite. It is about removing choice. It is about disregarding voter intent. I'm not sure how that is ethically justified, although it likely is perfectly legal.

Voter's intent? After losing the Republican primary to Miller, and not bowing out of the general?

Republican's are turning out to be bigger whiners than the Democrats.

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This is good.

The essence of Miller's claim is that the State of Alaska may only accept write-in ballots for Sen. Lisa Murkowski if her name is spelled correctly, letter for letter. The State of Alaska is arguing for a somewhat looser 'voter intent' standard for judging the write-in ballots.

...

But Miller's lawyer has another argument. Namely, that ballots with mispellings of Murkowski's name should be interpreted not as votes for her but rather as protest votes against her.

The suit reads ...

the new policy makes no provision for the many voters who cast protest votes.

Prior to the election, people commented on radio stations and in the comment sections in blogs and newspaper stories that they would deliberately incorrectly write-in a variation of "Murkowski" as a protest.

They did so knowing that Murkowski was spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a "spelling bee" campaign, replete with wrist bands, pencils and tattoos, all to educate the voters on proper spelling. Why was this done? Because even Murkowski had read the law and knew that it required proper spelling -- "No exceptions." So protest voters were trying to send a message to the candidate.

The state has failed to create any guideline or standard that would account for the intent of the voter who intentionally cast a protest vote.

To the contrary, the state is indicating that it will now count a protest vote, deliberately cast with a misspelling as a vote for Murkowski.

This effectively nullifies the protest and falsely inflates the vote for the write-in candidate. In short, the state has become a super-voter and will override voter intent and recast the votes for the candidate the state chooses. This is at core a fraudulent abuse of the electoral process and severely undermines our democratic process. It makes a mockery of the voting process -- allowing voters to believe they cast a protest vote, but then overriding that vote by state fiat.

Voter's intent? After losing the Republican primary to Miller ...

Republican primary voters are a subset of general election voters. Even you must know this.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

No, what is absurd is discounting a write in vote because someone got a letter or two spelled incorrectly when submitting a ballot for Lisa Murkowski. It's not like you could mistake a mispelled vote for Murkowski for a Joe Miller vote.....

was she not on the ballot to begin with?

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was she not on the ballot to begin with?

she was registered as a write-in

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Oh.....my.....Gawd...

What a silly, frivolous lawsuit.

[The_Dude 1,142]

Voter's intent? After losing the Republican primary to Miller, and not bowing out of the general?

Republican's are turning out to be bigger whiners than the Democrats.

Ahh, so when Liebermann does it, he's giving the people of connecticut more options, but when Murkowski does it, she's being obstinate? Joe lost the general election and now is arguing petty semantics. It's desperate and pathetic.

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Oh.....my.....Gawd...

What a silly, frivolous lawsuit.

If even a single voter out there did put in a 'protest vote' by writing in Leesa Marcowskee, it wouldn't be correct to count that vote as a vote for Murkowski, would it? I think the court should decide this in Miller's favor, ballots that aren't open-and-shut and clear as day will get thrown out.