Jahi Chikwendiu-The Washington Post
McCain sues to force Va. to count military ballots
By BOB LEWIS
Associated Press WriterRepublican John McCain’s presidential campaign sued the Virginia election board Monday, claiming absentee ballots weren’t mailed on time to military members serving overseas.
The complaint asks the U.S. District Court in Richmond to order the state to count absentee ballots postmarked by Tuesday and received by Nov. 14. It contends that thousands of troops’ ballots – many of which would go to McCain – will not be counted.The deadline for ballots to be received is 7 p.m. Election Day, which is Tuesday.
The lawsuit is the second in a week to challenge preparations for the presidential election in Virginia, where Barack Obama hopes to become the first Democrat since 1964 to win the state’s 13 electoral votes. Polls over the past week show him about even with or slightly ahead of McCain.
More than 436,000 new Virginia voters have registered since Jan. 1, and about 500,000 people – a tenth of the state’s electorate- have cast absentee ballots.
The NAACP sued the state last week, alleging it allotted too few voting machines for the enormous number of voters in majority black precincts expected to be drawn by the prospect of electing Obama as the first black president.
U.S. District Judge Richard L. Williams on Monday declined to order longer voting hours and other changes requested by the NAACP. He did order the elections board to publicize the availability of curbside voting for older or disabled voters and the fact that people in line by 7 p.m. will be allowed to vote.
A hearing on McCain’s lawsuit is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Tuesday before Williams.
That lawsuit alleges that ballots for overseas military voters were mailed too late to ensure they are returned by the deadline. Defendants are the chairwoman, vice chairman and executive secretary of the state elections board.
A 1986 federal law requires ballots to be mailed to military voters in foreign countries at least 45 days before the election, which this year would have been Sept. 20. The lawsuit alleges the state didn’t have the ballots printed and sent to local officials by then, meaning they may not have been mailed overseas until October.
Ashley L. Taylor Jr., an attorney for McCain, said tens of thousands of oversees military absentee ballots could be voided unless the deadline is extended.
“The last thing you want is to have a service member in Afghanistan or Iraq who received his ballot too late not being able to vote in this election,” Taylor said.
Board Chairwoman Jean Cunningham said late Monday afternoon the board had not seen the lawsuit and could not comment.
Associated Press Writer Larry O’Dell contributed to this report.
A former fetus, the “wordsmith from nantucket” was born in Phoenix, Arizona in 1968. Adopted at birth, wordsmith grew up a military brat. He achieved his B.A. in English from the University of California, Los Angeles (graduating in the top 97% of his class), where he also competed rings for the UCLA mens gymnastics team. The events of 9/11 woke him from his political slumber and malaise. Currently a personal trainer and gymnastics coach.
The wordsmith has never been to Nantucket.
Al Gore tried a similar trick in 2000.
It stuns me that all Americans can’t recognize that yes, some votes are more important than others; votes from men and women overseas and in uniform.
They must be counted. Whether they are McCain or Obama votes, these votes MUST BE COUNTED
what really sux is many men who are deployed never get ballots at all. My sweetie is a Marine deployed in Iraq and never never got a ballot and neither did anyone else in his whole unit. They are kinda bitter and unhappy about that.
but instead of pitching a fit he just sucks it up and tells me: “I gave up my rights to fight for yours. You better go vote for both of us babe.”
that sad. So thats what i am doing, and happy that its raining here…
@Karagush
Kara This made tears come to my eyes. You tell your sweetie for many of us that we all are voting for him and all his buddies!
We deeply thank him and appreciate all they are doing for us. We can never repay what he and his friends and all the other vets have done for us.
With a special thank you to the ones that gave it all or came back injured.
Our guys and gals are the best in the world. Thank you!
Seems like there ought to be a standard military ballot that should be available at every location where there _are_ military people. Even if it included only president and vice president – give the soldier the option of voting a proper absentee ballot from his/her own state, or the generic ballot for just Pres and VP. That way, at the very least, they’d have a vote for their CIC.
Our military should be able to vote FIRST. It boggles my mind that here we have an entity that has the most secure internet connections in the world and yet our military have to jump through hoops to get their votes to count. They don’t even have to be overseas to have to contort themselves to get their ballots out.
Case in point, my cousin filled out his absentee ballot paperwork before he and his company left for Fort Polk in AUGUST. They’ve bounced around to 2 other training areas and ended up at Fort Stewart before shipping out to Iraq. Long story short, in spite of having a Voting Information Officer on post and having properly filled out all the necessary paperwork, they were not allowed to come in from the field to vote.
My first Presidential vote was absentee, in 1968, from Vietnam. Back then in Georgia an 18 yr old could vote.
Tom
Breaking News on Foxnews >> Federal Judge Orders Virginia to ‘Preserve’ Late-Arriving Military Ballots
Already have it on the ongoing/updated election thread, Craig. Posted as soon as I heard Fox news announce it. No indepth story that I can find yet. But the judge is to “preserve” them, meaning they get held as neither counted nor rejected, until his Nov 10th hearing of the case.
Depending on how many are “preserved” and the total VA tally, it can delay a VA decision.
The sad thing is for those who earn our right to vote, people go out of their way to prevent their input. This is one voter issue that should be federally mandated. In my opinion, Military ballots should not be set aside to be counted with all other absentee ballots for up to ten days after the election and only when a vote is contested or in the case of a tie-breaker.
There were several times that I didn’t get to vote because I never received my requested ballot. Yes I was upset. And on two of those occasions I was overseas during a general election. Even the Internet voting process isn’t fair to military because you often have to register for it in that state in person, when you’re already gone.
Virginia has the largest, or one of the largest percentages of military members to general population of our states. And this become a big problem AFTER the Governorship changed hands from Republican to Democrat. With deployments and carrier groups out, and the closeness of the totals Election night, those votes could have been sufficient to shift that state to a McCain win. And Dems couldn’t let that happen. Not in this election.
The amazing thing is, everywhere we go, our military has computer access to the internet now. Each unit has voting officers assigned. Those officers have the credibility to confirm a voting military member is who they say they are and can check their ID, so why not have the states allow the military authorize Internet voting if it is available? Because that would screw up the Democrat’s ability to screw over our military and shift elections to their advantage. We need a federal military voting rights bill.
The ballots should have been printed and sent via some special arrangement as soon as the VPs were announced. Whoever has computer access should be allowed to vote online. If the government can ship troops and equipment all over the world, they should be able to get ballots out in time.
I heard this morning that Obama’s grandmother’s vote counts even though she passed before the election, good, now count the troop ballots.