Liberal Repercussion

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/11/03/1520249

We speak with investigative reporter Greg Palast and Barbara Arnwine of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law about voting problems in Florida, Ohio and New Mexico. [includes rush transcript] President Bush won Florida along with its 27 electoral votes four years after the Supreme Court stopped the recount and put him in the White House.

With 99% of precincts reporting, Bush won 52 percent of the votes and John Kerry 47 percent. Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader won less than 1 percent.

Hundreds of thousands of people across the state took advantage of early voting, which started 15 days ago. By the time the polls opened on Nov. 2nd, more than 2 million voters had cast ballots. But in heavily Democratic Broward County, thousands of voters never received their absentee ballots in time.

Broward elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes came under fire over the weekend for losing track of as many as 58,000 ballots that were allegedly given to the Postal Service earlier in the month.

County officials moved to get the ballots sent out in time for voters to return them by November 2nd as required by state election rules. According to the U.S. Postal Service, after mail carriers had left on Saturday, both Broward County and Palm Beach County dropped off more than 8,000 absentee ballots for mailing. Many of the ballots arrived unsealed, forcing postal employees to take the time to seal envelopes. In a video press release from the US Postal Service, spokesperson Gerald McKiernan described the situation.

* Gerald McKiernan, U.S. Postal Service Spokesman speaking in Broward County, FL on October 30.

US Postal Service, spokesperson Gerald McKiernan. The American Civil Liberties Union has now filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Glenda Hood and elections supervisors in Miami-Dade and Broward counties, asking that completed absentee ballots mailed in the U.S. be subject to the same Nov. 12 deadline as overseas votes. State law required those ballots to reach county offices by Tuesday night. As the ACLU was preparing to file the suit, Glenda Hood addressed the issue to reporters.

posted by Rei Toei @ 11:06 a.m.