The Soldier Voting Scandal

[Terri]

By Robert D. Novak
July 24, 2008

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Rep. Roy Blunt, the House Republican whip, on July 8 introduced a resolution demanding that the Defense Department better enable U.S. military personnel overseas to vote in the November elections. That act was followed by silence. Democrats normally leap on an opportunity to find fault with the Bush Pentagon. But not a single Democrat joined Blunt as a co-sponsor, and an all-Republican proposal cannot pass in the Democratic-controlled House.

Analysis by the federal Election Assistance Commission, rejecting inflated Defense Department voting claims, estimated overseas and absentee military voting for the 2006 midterm elections at a disgracefully low 5.5 percent. The quality of voting statistics is so poor that there is no way to tell how many of the slightly over 330,000 votes actually were sent in by the absentee military voters and their dependents and how many by civilian Americans living abroad -- 6 million all total.

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[MISSL]

This is an absolute disgrace. They are fighting for our freedoms and can't voice their opinions in an election. Disgusting.

[FITCamaro]

Does it surprise you that the Democrats could care less about this issue? Granted the Republicans aren't pulling their weight either.

But Democrats surely fear the 330,000 votes from our troops since I would bet that a lot of them will not be for Obama.

[mimi7]

When will we ever get rid of the democratic controlled House? I know people wanted change but we didn't need this kind of change. Nothing has come out of the House in favor of the people much less our military. I find this act from the House a disgrace and a slap in the face for our men and women fighting to protect our freedom and security. They deserve to vote first in any election.

[Centurion LIV]

This hits really close to home. I have encountered this problem many times since I first registered to vote in 1972.

I recall that about 1976 I was stationed in Washington State and applied for an absentee ballot from my home state of North Carolina. When I received the ballots I had to mark them immediately and send them right back. I had my doubts then that they would get back to N.C. in time.

I applied for an absentee ballot in 1988 when I was stationed in Belgium. By then, I was registered to vote in Rancho Cordova, California. I never did get that one. A year later, I was stationed in Germany but never received absentee ballots nor notification of elections.

In 1992, I was registered to vote in San Angelo, Texas. I was sent to the Middle East for six months and applied for the absentee ballot when I left in August! I "reminded" the registrar of voters in October as I had not yet received the ballots.

Now mind you, where I was in the Middle East was very isolated. Every two weeks, one plane would come, unload, reload, board and go. Meaning; whatever mail would be received, would not be sending out a reply for two weeks short of an extraordinary effort. My ballot kit arrived but the plane was long gone by the time that my mail was handed to me, this was about 4 days before it was due (2 weeks till the next plane, duh). By good fortune, a friend was traveling to the U.S. Embassy the next day. I marked my ballot and gave it to him to post from the Embassy. Whether it was received in time in San Angelo, I will never know.

There is clearly a problem with the absentee ballots being sent to service members. I don't know if the origin of the problem is the pentagon, or local bureaucrats in towns across the country, or a combination.

Here in Oregon, everybody votes by mail. I usually receive my ballot 2-3 weeks before the election, fill it out and mail it in. My only concern about it is voters voting under multiple names or even voting when they should not be, example, "motor voter."

Hopefully, this can be fixed, but it also appears that many in congress don't want it fixed.

Contempt of Congress? This congress is contemptable!

[Luckyme]

This is disgusting and outrageous! Our military is over there fighting for our rights and yet.... they are denied the opportunity to have their votes counted.

We heard a little about it during the 2000 fiasco, but nary a word since. I can't help but feel if the majority of military voted Democrat, the problem would have been solved years ago.

[RW]

Here's what happens to absentee ballots. Unless an election is VERY close, absentee ballots lie in a pile somewhere and NOT OPENED AND COUNTED. In the last POTUS election, where the Dems screamed, "foul," they did NOT want the Florida absentee votes opened and counted, it would have been too much of an humiliation for them, to know that the APO and AFO addresses were pro-Bush. Some precincts opened the absentee ballots, some did not. In that election, Dems hung their hopes on hanging chads.....

[thomas]

"Democratic interest about tackling the problem might be tempered by apprehension that soldiers will cast too many Republican votes."
Yaaaaaa think?
The Old Chief

[MrJLDoug]

Congressional attention to the problem has been scattered and limited mostly to Republicans such as Sen. John Cornyn, who earlier this year decried "a lack of will" at the Pentagon to solve the voting problem. Democratic interest about tackling the problem might be tempered by apprehension that soldiers will cast too many Republican votes

A little off topic, this is my Senator and I want everyone to know what a great job he is trying to do, not only for Texas but for the whole Nation. He is really pushing "Drill here drill now pay less".

[FlaJim]

I well remember the efforts of Algore to toss out absentee ballots - particularly those with a foreign or military address - during the endless recount here in 2000 but thought the problem had been resolved.

The motive behind Dem inaction is completely transparent. Few thinking servicemen support them.