Harper's Magazine Forum: "What Went Wrong in Ohio?"

From harpers.org:

What Went Wrong in Ohio?

Posted on Monday, July 25, 2005. A forum on voting rights in the 2004 federal elections.

On July 21, 2005 Harper's Magazine hosted a forum on voter rights as they related to the 2004 federal election. The forum was held at the U.S. Capitol, and was moderated by Harper's Publisher Rick MacArthur. The panelists were John Conyers, Jr., Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Sherrod Brown, Eleanor Clift, and Mark Crispin Miller. Miller's piece “None Dare Call it Stolen” appears in the August 2005 issue of Harper's Magazine.

Download the audio from this forum. (32.6 Mb MP3 file)

About the Forum

The forum was held to discuss a fundamental aspect of the people's business—that of voting rights in the 2004 federal elections and the rather substantial evidence that these Constitutionally guaranteed rights were extensively violated in the state of Ohio—indeed, systematically violated and on a grand enough scale that the election may have been corruptly swung in favor of President Bush and against Senator John Kerry.

Ohio, as things turned out, was the key battleground state. Had Senator Kerry won Ohio he would have won the electoral college and would now be president of the United States. The Secretary of State's office in Ohio initially declared a 118,601 margin of victory for Bush over Kerry; after a county-by-county recount marred by highly inconsistent and evidently illegal procedures, the official victory margin for Bush was reduced by 144 votes. For the record, the Green Party lawsuit challenging the integrity of the recount in federal court has still not been heard—the Greens claim that state's recount was not conducted using random selection of precincts in 86 of the 88 counties, as required by state law.

The principal evidence for voting irregularities in Ohio is contained in the Conyers Report on the 2004 Presidential Election, prepared by the Democratic staff of the House Judiciary Committee, and now published as this book, also entitled What Went Wrong in Ohio. This investigation was initiated and supervised by Representative John Conyers Jr. of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary committee. The Republican majority on the Judiciary Committee declined to participate in the Conyers inquiry, so we do not have the benefit of their insights. This is unfortunate, given that one of the principal subjects of the Conyers investigation is an Ohio Republican, Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, who was also co-chairman of the Ohio Bush re-election campaign. Nevertheless, even lacking Republican input, the Conyers report is an altogether remarkable document. It is by far the best and most complete dossier on voter disenfranchisement and possible vote fraud in Ohio, and it has more than enough hard information to justify a public conversation.

There's a second question raised by the Conyers Report, albeit implicitly, which I hope we will have time to explore today. For as remarkable as the information in the Conyers report may be, the near total media silence that greeted it when it first appeared—as well as the scant coverage of the formal objection to the Ohio electoral vote count filed by Representative Stephanie Tubb Jones—is, to my mind, just as remarkable. So remarkable, in fact, that Harper's Magazine has devoted its August cover story to summarizing and explicating the Conyers report and to asking why it wasn't considered more newsworthy by the national media. Even though eight months have passed since the election, the material compiled here seems to us fresh and scandalous in large part because it has gone almost entirely unreported in the press. As William Raspberry wrote in the Washington Post, "political reporters, mainstream editors and most of Congress seemed utterly unalarmed" by the reports of election chicanery in Ohio. The Conyers report, orginally titled, "Preserving Democracy: What Went Wrong in Ohio," was released on January 5 of this year—and our search on Google and Lexis Nexis turned up very little in the way of coverage.

Given the stakes and given the well-reported disenfranchisement of African-American voters in Florida in the 2000 election, this seems to be a scandal every bit as important as the election irregularities in Ohio.

The Panelists

Rick MacArthur, publisher of Harper's Magazine.

John Conyers, Jr., Democrat of Michigan, is the ranking Democratic member of the House Judiciary Committee. Elected to the House in 1964, Representative Conyers is the second most senior member of this body and his personal political parallels the history of the civil rights and voting rights, movements in this country. He was, notably, the driving force behind the Help America Vote Act of 2002.

Stephanie Tubbs Jones is a four-term Democratic congresswoman representing the 11th District of Ohio. A lifelong resident of Cleveland, Representative Tubbs Jones was a prosecutor and a judge in Ohio before she came to Washington. She currently sits on the House Ways and Means Committee, the first African American woman to do so. It was Congresswoman Tubbs Jones who, partly on the strength of the Conyers investigation, formally objected to the certification of the Ohio electoral count last January.

Sherrod Brown has represented Ohio's 13th District as a Democrat since 1993 and served as Ohio's Secretary of State for two terms, from 1982 to 1990. He is the author of Myths of Free Trade, Why American Trade Policy has Failed.

Eleanor Clift is a contributing editor for Newsweek Magazine and a familiar face on television public affairs programs. She has covered the White House, presidential campaigns and Congress and is the author, with her late husband Tom Brazaitis, of two books, most recently Madam President: Shattering the Last Glass Ceiling. She contributed to Newsweek's instant book on the 2004 election, and she has contributed to Harper's Magazine.

Mark Crispin Miller is a professor of media studies at New York University and the author of several books, most recently Cruel and Unusual, Bush/Cheney's New World Order. Professor Miller wrote the cover story for the August issue of Harper's Magazine.

This is What Went Wrong in Ohio?, published Monday, July 25, 2005. It is part of Features, which is part of Harpers.org.

Permanent URL
http://harpers.org/WhatWentWrongInOhio.html

The Battle of Ohio: How A New Yorker Wound Up in the Middle of the Fight for Democracy in the Battleground State

Blog-a-thon tag:
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Photo by:

Pittsburgh Independent Media Center

This post was prepared for the Electronic Frontier Foundation's "Blog-A-Thon", celebrating the contribution bloggers have made to the fight for truth.

As of September, 2004, I didn't really understand what a blog was. I thought it was just for people who had their own web sites, and I thought it was just being used by teenagers and people in their early twenties as a way of keeping in touch with their friends.

In late September, 2004, I attended a panel discussion at which I learned more about the whole spectrum of blogging, that there were web sites where one could set up a blog for free, that blogs were as much for adults as kids, that there was a great diversity of content among blogs, and that much important writing was going on in the blogosphere.

So I went back to my office, and in about 5 minutes had started a blog on blogger.com which I'd entitled "Fairness".

During late September and the month of October I posted 7 or 8 general items there, about my political views.

From October 30, 2004, through Election Day, November 2, 2004, I served as a telephone 'election protection' hotline volunteer in Columbus, Ohio. In that capacity I learned of massive fraud, suppression, and disenfranchisement of Democratic voters throughout Ohio, and of very valiant voters waiting on line for as long as 11 hours, so as not to permit their precious right to vote to be taken away from them.

The next day, November 3rd, while driving home to New York City, I learned that (a) John Kerry, had, incredibly, conceded the election, and (b) the major media were actually MISREPRESENTING what had happened in Ohio.

The next morning, I knew that 15 or 20 friends would be asking me "So what happened in Ohio?" I decided that, instead of repeating the same thing 15 or 20 times, I would send those 15 or 20 people an email giving them my "Basic Report from Columbus". Then, if they had questions, I would answer them. A few coworkers did stop by my office before I'd had a chance to finish the email, and I told them "I"m sending you an email. Read that first, then I'll answer any further questions you might have".

As I was about to send the email to those 15 or 20 people, I figured that -- since the media wasn't reporting it -- I might as well add another 30 or so friends to the recipient list, who might be interested in what had happened in Ohio.

At that point I figured my involvement with the state of Ohio and the 2004 election was about over. Little did I know what lay in store.

An hour or two later I discovered that my email had been broadcasted and rebroadcasted, and rebroadcasted again, and was all over the internet. I was receiving inquiries from people I'd never heard of, who'd received the email from people I'd never heard of. And I saw that various websites were quoting it.

So I figured I might as well put my "report" up on my own little blog.

The next thing I knew people were sending me information about the movement to set aside the fraudulent Ohio election results, and I decided to lend my blog to supporting the grassroots movement taking place all across the country to apply the rule of law to the Ohio election.

I renamed my blog "Ohio Election Fraud (Formerly "Fairness")". And it became a central repository for information about protests, teach-ins, legal challenges, and the growing mountain of evidence of chicanery in the 2004 Ohio election.

One highlight of my experience was visiting Washington DC on January 6, 2005, the date the Senate was meeting to accept -- or not accept -- the illegally appointed Ohio electors. I attended some of the protests taking place, marched in the streets, and got to actually meet, in person, some of the beautiful activists and patriots whose work I had been supporting on my blog.

Another highlight for me was the day I came across a photograph on the web site of the Portland Independent Media Center of a handwritten protest sign, from one of the nationwide protests that had taken place in December, 2004, saying "Corporate Media is Complicit and Selling You Lies. www.fairnessbybeckerman.blogspot.com ":

Photo by
Portland Independent Media Center

-Ray Beckerman

Federal Law Suit to Reform Ohio Elections Commenced Today!!!

OHIO VOTERS FILE HISTORIC LAWSUIT
AGAINST STATE CHARGING
UNCONSTITUTIONAL ADMINISTRATION OF ELECTIONS

Non-Partisan Lawsuit Seeks to Redress Decades-Old Constitutional Defects in the Way Ohio Conducts Federal Elections July 28, 2005

(Toledo, OH) – Seeking to redress decades-old Constitutional defects in the way Ohio conducts federal elections, the League of Women Voters of Ohio, the League of Women Voters of Toledo-Lucas County, and more than a dozen Ohio citizens today filed a historic, non-partisan lawsuit against the State of Ohio.

The lawsuit alleges that Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, Governor Bob Taft, and their predecessors have failed to protect the fundamental rights of eligible Ohio voters to cast a meaningful ballot, as required by the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. In addition, the complaint contends that Ohio has not met its obligations under the Help America Vote Act.

The lawsuit does not challenge the results of any past elections, but instead seeks to bring about changes necessary to protect the rights of Ohio voters in future elections. Filed in federal court in Toledo, the complaint chronicles deficiencies over more than three decades, including widespread problems with the voter registration system, the absentee and provisional ballot processes, the training of poll workers, the organization of polling places and precincts, and the allocation of voting machines. The lawsuit seeks to compel the state to uphold its constitutional obligation to provide for the voting-related needs of its citizens in time for the November 2006 general election. The relief sought would require the state to repair the problems at all stages of the electoral process that have disenfranchised and overly burdened Ohio voters and made the ability to vote and be counted vary widely from county to county. “This lawsuit is not about overturning election results, it’s about fixing a broken election system that is preventing people from having their vote counted,” said Peg Hull Smith, spokesperson for the League of Women Voters of Toledo-Lucas County.

Linda Lalley, Co-President of the League of Women Voters of Ohio said, “This is a very important day for the voters of Ohio. Through its nonpartisan, good-government activities, the League of Women Voters of Ohio has been working for 85 years to guarantee that the voices of all eligible Ohioans are heard when they go to the polls. This lawsuit will bring us much closer to that goal. We are excited to join with voters from all over Ohio to help bring an end to the inadequate system of elections provided by the state.” “We are proud to represent this dedicated group of Ohio voters. This lawsuit will begin the process of restoring the infrastructure of democracy so we can honor the promise that the Constitution provides for every Ohioan,” said Jon Greenbaum, part of the plaintiffs’ legal team and Director of the Lawyers’ Committee’s Voting Rights Project. “Regardless of your political affiliation or county of residence, the right to vote is precious and we must have a system that guarantees and protects that right.”

“Long lines, inadequate facilities for voting, registrations that are not processed on time, and absentee ballots that never arrive have deprived far too many Ohioans of the right to vote for far too long. The system needs reform now,” said Brenda Wright, Managing Director of the National Voting Rights Institute and one of the attorneys for the plaintiffs. “This lawsuit seeks to remedy what is not working in Ohio’s election system,” said Elliot Mincberg, Vice President and Legal Director of People for the American Way Foundation. “We know that voters’ rights are being violated, and we want to stop it. Every eligible voter must be able to cast a vote that is counted. Fixing Ohio’s election system can help restore trust in the democratic process.”

“There is nothing more fundamental to ensuring a fair process than making sure that every person who is eligible and wants to vote is able to do so,” said Caroline Press, attorney at Proskauer Rose LLP, which is representing the plaintiffs in the complaint. “Unfortunately, for the people we are representing here today and too many others like them across the state, the system has failed. That should not happen.” Robert Rubin, Legal Director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, stated: “The disregard for voters’ rights shown by Ohio’s election
officials was as effective a method of suppressing the vote as the more blatant poll taxes of the past. These barriers impede, delay, and deny the right to vote; they must be removed.”

Voting deficiencies outlined in the complaint chronicling voting problems in Ohio from the 1970s to the present, include:

• Thousands of Ohioans unable to vote in November 2004 because lines in many precincts were more than two hours – and up to nine hours – long

• Thousands of voters casting provisional ballots in 2004, only to have them thrown out when poll workers failed to advise that the voter was standing in the wrong precinct line

• More than one third of precincts in Miami County running out of ballots in the November 2001 election

• 3,556 Cuyahoga County votes in the November 2000 election that were processed twice, causing a computer to throw them out

• Thousands of Cincinnati and Franklin County voters arriving at their regular polling places during the 2000 election, only to find they were no longer polling places or no longer their polling places

• Registered voters in Franklin County in 2000 who were not able to vote because their names had been purged from voting lists or because the Bureau of Motor Vehicles had failed to process their registration cards

• Dozens of precincts in Cuyahoga County running out of Republican ballots during the March 2000 primary, forcing them to turn registered voters away

• Franklin County’s registration rolls containing tens of thousands of erroneous entries in 1999

• In 1998 and 1996, the registration rolls in Cuyahoga County containing tens of thousands of duplicate and inaccurate entries

• Thousands of legitimate votes in Franklin County in 1998 that were counted for the wrong candidate due to wrongly programmed electronic voting machines

• The fundamental failure to adequately hire and train election workers since at least 1994, resulting in unfilled positions and untrained, first-time workers at polling places

• Identical breakdowns in elections in 1971 and 1972 in Hamilton and Cuyahoga counties that included disenfranchisement of thousands of voters because dozens of precincts never opened or opened late; failure to deliver an adequate number of voting machines to precincts; misprogramming of voting machines; distribution of incorrect ballots; lack of adequate staffing;
and failure to train poll workers.

The plaintiffs are represented by the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the law firms of Proskauer Rose LLP, Arnold & Porter LLP, and Connelly, Jackson & Collier LLP, along with the People for the American Way Foundation, the National Voting Rights Institute, and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Copy of the Complaint in League of Women Voters of Ohio, et al, v. J. Kenneth Blackwell, etc., et al05CV7309 USDC ND Ohio

Copy also posted at http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/docs/ohio/lwv-complaint5.pdf

Probe focuses on donation to GOP: Election official says he was offered $10,000 -Plain Dealer

Probe focuses on donation to GOP

Election official says he was offered $10,000

Saturday, July 16, 2005

Julie Carr Smyth

Plain Dealer Bureau

Columbus - A member of the Franklin County election board said Friday [July 15th] that prosecutors are investigating whether a GOP political consultant tried to bribe the board's director to buy voting equipment made by his client, Diebold Inc.

The director, Matthew Damschroder, has told prosecutors that the consultant, Pat Gallina, came to his office in early 2004, offering him $10,000.

"Pat Gallina came into my office at the Board of Elections and said, 'I'm here to give you $10,000. Who should I direct it to?' " Damschroder recalled. "I said, 'Certainly not to me. But I'm sure the Franklin County Republican Party would appreciate a voluntary donation. That was my first mistake."

Full text of article

Columbus Ohio Demonstrations - Sat. July 23rd & Sun. July 24th

ACTIVISTS DEMONSTRATE AT THE DEMOCRATIC LEADERSHIP COUNCIL

SATURDAY JULY 23 and SUNDAY JULY 24

Activists ask for a voice at the table in the National Conversation

This weekend the Democratic Leadership Council meets in Columbus, Ohio at the Renaissance Hotel for a three-day National Conversation.
Join GrassRoots Advocates for Democracy (GRADs), the Ohio Backbone Campaign, progressive people of faith, and local peace activists as they engage in a Community Conversation at Ohio Honest Elections 341 S Third Street, Columbus Ohio, 614/224-6954.

* End illegal occupations; Investigate the Downing Street Memos

* Clean up Ohio’s political corruption

* Restore honest elections

Schedule of Events:

Meet with Sherole Eaton, Hocking County Board of Elections whistle blower from 1 PM- 3 PM.

Sign in for demonstrations on Saturday and Sunday, July 23 and 24, 2005 from 11 am till 3 pm.

Demonstration at the Renaissance Hotel, 50 N. 3rd Street, daily 4-8 pm.

For Further Information Contact: Connie Harris, connieharrispeace@yahoo.com


614.224.6954 or 614.291.7698

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Benjamin Franklin

Temporary Restraining Order in Hocking County Litigation Extended for 1 Month While Parties Proceed to Mediation

Agreement has been reached in the Hocking County Litigation, brought by The Alliamce for Democracy to bar Hocking County's board of elections from taking further proceedings to remove Sherole Eaton in violation of the Public Meetings Law, to extend the temporary restraining order to August 15th, while the parties proceed to seek mediation of the dispute.
http://www.ohiohonestelections.org/

'Criminal Complaint Filed in Hocking Co Against BOE Director Lisa Schwartze for Shredding Up To 10,000 Registration Documents' -Columbus Free Press

According to a report in the Columbus Free Press, a criminal complaint has been filed in Hocking County against Lisa Schwartze, the Director of the Hocking County Board of Elections, over her alleged shredding of up to 10,000 registration documents:

"Ten Thousand Voter Registration Documents May Have Been Shredded in Hocking County, Ohio

"July 13, 2005

"Members of the Progressive Ohio Backbone Campaign ... on Monday morning, July 11, ... filed criminal charges with the Hocking County Sheriff’s Department against the county’s Board of Elections (BOE) Director Lisa Schwartze.

".... The charges filed against Schwartze.... pertain to her alleged illegal shredding of election documents, the Free Press has learned.

"Sherole Eaton, the fired Hocking County BOE deputy director and Congressional whistleblower, who swore an affidavit against a Triad company technician for allegedly offering a cheat sheet and replacing the county’s central voting tabulator hard drive during last year’s presidential recount, says that Schwartze may have destroyed up to “ten thousand documents.”

"“I told her that she couldn’t shred and delete the changes of addresses that were coming in from registered voters during the election year, but she wouldn’t listen to me,” Eaton explained, “In order for Lisa to destroy those documents, she’s got to go to the Board of Elections, state officials, and then ask the Ohio Historical Society if they want them. And even then, she can only destroy them according to a public records retention schedule that requires they are kept for four years.”

"Eaton says that all investigators would have to do is ask Schwartze for hard copies of the change of address forms to verify her allegations.

For the complete text of the article go to http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2005/1164

Portland, Oregon, September 30th - October 2, 2005 - National Election Reform Conference

National Election Reform Conference in Portland

Speaker & Agenda Planning

Announcement and Call for Presenters for a National Election Reform Conference

Event Details:

--Dates: Friday, September 30, 2005 through Sunday, October 2, 2005

--Location: Portland, Oregon

--Sponsored by: Oregon Voter Rights Coalition and the Alliance for Democracy

--Hosted by: PSU Campus Pacific Greens, PSU College Democrats, PSU Democracy Matters

Conference Goals:

--To bring together grassroots election reform organizations, legislators, election officials, news media, and the general public to share best practices and innovative solutions for election reform.

--To focus on solutions and empower participants with knowledge and tools to effect real election reform.

--To provide a non-partisan and safe venue for discussing diverse opinions and alternatives for achieving clean elections.

Keynote speakers for the conference will include national leaders in the fight to restore democracy, honesty and accuracy to the American election system. The conference format will include a combination of keynote speakers, session speakers, panel presentations, training workshops, and poster presentations

For further information: http://www.oregonvrc.org

"Open Records" Request Filed in Lucas County on July 7th

An "Open Records" Request has been filed by activists with Lucas County on July 7th. For a copy of the request go to http://ohioelection2004.com/WordHost/lucascountyopenrecordsrequest_2005july7.doc

Battle in Hocking County over Sneak Meeting by Board of Elections

88 South Market Street

Logan, Ohio

11:00 am.

Progressive Ohio Backbone Campaign members will travel to Hocking County this morning to be part of complaints being filed by Hocking County Democrats against the Hocking County Board of Elections (BOE) and it's director Lisa Schwartze.

A complaint against the entire board relates to the board calling today's meeting without adequate public notification. Legal matters are the topic of today's hastily called meeting.

Last Tuesday, at a public BOE meeting, Progressive Ohio Backbone Campaign members and others from the Columbus area, witnessed the director of the BOE admit she used the BOE office for Republican Party fund-raising.

Three of these witnesses intend to join Hocking Democrats today to file affidavits with county prosecutor Larry Beal regarding complaints against BOE Director Lisa Schwartze.

In addition, the witnesses intend to take part in complaints being filed against Schwartze with the Ohio Secretary of State and federal officials.

Progressive Ohio Backbone Campaign member Ed Sisson will accompany the witnesses to document proceedings. However, all are encouraged to bring recorders and cameras, etc.

For further information contact

Clifford Arnebeck - Alliance for Democracy - (614) 224-8771

Alex Rodriguez - Ohio Honest Elections Campaign (917) 697-7922

Susan Truitt - Citizens Alliance for Secure Elections (614) 224-6734

Bob Fitrakis - Columbus Institute for Contemporary Journalism (614) 224-6593

Harvey Wasserman - Columbus Institute for Contemporary Journalism (614) 224-8021