2008 Pre-Election Voter Registration Mess Continues

Who said that Chicago politics was boring (vote early, vote often, and bring out yer dead)? Six Alabama counties voter rolls exceed populations. How exactly is that possible?

Six Alabama counties have more people registered to vote than adults of voting age.

The Birmingham News compared the state's voter registration numbers with the Census Bureau's population estimates and found more registered voters than voting-age adults in Conecuh, Greene, Lowndes, Perry, Washington and Wilcox counties.

Statewide, the voter registration rolls equal 85% of Alabama's voting age population.

The News reported that the biggest variations were in Greene and Perry counties.

Greene County had 7,540 people on its voter rolls at the end of September, but the Census Bureau estimates its adult population at 6,834.

It's a mystery. At least the local papers there are trying to track down what's going on, and doing what the state election officials haven't - checking to see whether the numbers make sense. The Birmingham Press has an interesting observation:

The counties with 100 percent registration are some of Alabama's least populous, so an error in the population estimate or a few extra voters on the rolls would have a bigger impact statistically than in larger counties.

And that spells potential trouble.

Rinse and repeat around the nation and you get the idea of just how badly the election officials and politicians have failed voters since 2000. All of their claims that they would fix the broken system are empty promises - they've fixed the problem alright.

Ohio's Secretary of State managed to avoid statutory obligations to check voter rolls to ensure that they are valid because the Ohio GOP didn't have standing to sue. The Supreme Court ruling didn't address the question of whether Ohio's Secretary of State was fulfilling her obligations under the federal law because they adduced that only the Attorney General can bring suit (which begs the question as to why no one at the Justice Department has taken action).

The New York Times claims that six states, including Colorado, are not complying with that federal law - the 2002 HAVA, by trimming voter rolls within 90 days of the election.

States have been trying to follow the Help America Vote Act of 2002 and remove the names of voters who should no longer be listed; but for every voter added to the rolls in the past two months in some states, election officials have removed two, a review of the records shows.

The six states seem to be in violation of federal law in two ways. Some are removing voters from the rolls within 90 days of a federal election, which is not allowed except when voters die, notify the authorities that they have moved out of state, or have been declared unfit to vote.

Some of the states are improperly using Social Security data to verify registration applications for new voters.

In addition to the six swing states, three more states appear to be violating federal law. Alabama and Georgia seem to be improperly using Social Security information to screen registration applications from new voters. And Louisiana appears to have removed thousands of voters after the federal deadline for taking such action.

Under federal law, election officials are supposed to use the Social Security database to check a registration application only as a last resort, if no record of the applicant is found on state databases, like those for driver's licenses or identification cards.

The requirement exists because using the federal database is less reliable than the state lists, and is more likely to incorrectly flag applications as invalid. Many state officials seem to be using the Social Security lists first.

It's rather telling that even federal law admits that the Social Security lists are inaccurate. What does that say about the federal program when you can't rely on its databases? Did anyone consider that the state databases are themselves a source of concern and inaccuracy and may be no more accurate than the federal databases?

This is a mess of huge proportions, and the Times is more concerned about states who are actively trying to cull the rolls of those who are disallowed from voting (dead, felons, illegal aliens, etc.) than the efforts of groups like ACORN who put such individuals on voter registrations overwhelming election officials who have to put time and effort into sorting through registrations.

As I previously noted, all the problems open up ample opportunities for fraud, as in New Jersey, where if you are not on the voter rolls, you can not only get a provisional ballot, but you can insist on getting a judge to allow you to cast a ballot directly (with no way to check after the fact whether the person was actually legally able to vote).