Dirty Tricks? Thousands Of GOP Ballot Requests In Georgia Don't Have Signatures

Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

A Republican-generated effort to get out the vote for the Dec. 2 runoff election has hit a snag as thousands of requests for absentee ballots have been denied because the applications were not signed.

County elections officials are contacting voters by mail, directing them to print applications from county or state election Web sites and fax them in by Wednesday.

Read the whole story: Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Comments

[sociocanuck]

I call shenanigans!

[emmaspeaks]

It figures.

[CaptD]

Don't forget to vote on Dec 2,

+ tell your friends and family that Martin will make Georgia Proud!

BTW: Georgia's Senator's seat is still up for grabs... despite the flood of fake ballot requests..­.
I bet this election will be challenged due to them...

I called from CA before and am still interested in calling next Monday nite.

FYI:Here are my stats for the last calling session I did:

81 calls
48 Pro Martin not counting other supporter that are family members and friends...
18 No or "other"
06 Answering machines, I left a "Pro message"
09 Wrong State, the folks moved since list was made(?), most like Martin!
+
It was inspiring to speak to so many folks that thanked me for reminding them to vote for Martin, after 8 PM their time, I talked to one woman that was over 85, that said she never had the chance to go to any schooling, ("too busy pickin' cotton for our food"). I asked her what she thought of Obama getting elected and she turned the question back to me asking what I thought, I told her, "I had tears in my eyes and I've never been more proud of America". She then said, "Bless You Child, I had tears in my eyes too, I never thought I would live this long, but I'm mighty glad I did..." America is lucky to have so many people with LOVE in their hearts...

"It don't get any better than that..."

[tbone99]

Good thing the Repugs have set the standard on technical election compliance with Fla. They taught us that 4 years can hang on a pencil mark. I say hold them to it!

[unite4change]

Georgia, please come out and vote for Martin. O needs him in the Senate.

[macbabe]

Help Jim Win!
http://www.actblue.com/page/helpjimmartin

Make Calls for Jim Martin
http://my.barackobama.com/call4martin

[the addick]

One thing that does confuse me.
If this is not another little bag of dirty tricks, does this mean they've suddenly come up with a new, previously untapped, source of absentee voters?
Surely if these people had voted before, they would be aware of all regulations regarding balloting, like signing the damn thing?
If they haven't voted before, why not?
Where were they during the General Election?
Did we have an "en masse" coming of age, in the ranks of absentee ballots? A sudden surge of voter elligibilty? A raising of the dead?
Or did we have a sudden mass attack of "The Stoopids", causing people to ignore the bit at the bottom requesting a signature?
Isn't there a regulation excluding the mentally infirm from voting?
(Sorry, after 8 years of George, I should have known better than to pose the last question. I suffered a sudden attack of "The Stoopids", but I'm better now).

[toypiano]

The fact that 44% of the requests were unsigned is a tipoff that something's not right in GA. It could be fraud, or even just poorly designed forms.

My guess is that republican operatives combed the voter rolls and mailed absentee requests for republicans who are registered but didn't vote recently, filling in their names but not signing the requests. They did that FIGURING the election officials would be expansive in allowing the requests to go forward IF, when contacted, these voters wake up and follow through.

From the republican standpoint, the worst that would happen from this effort is that no voters will follow through. The best-case scenario is that a substantial number of them will follow through and end up voting because they didn't have to go too much trouble (someone else sent in the request form, and all they had to do was follow up with a signature in order to get their ballots). Either way, the repubs don't lose anything by trying this tactic.

The problem I have with all this is that it should be considered fraud if someone sends in an absentee ballot request for someone else who doesn't even know it's being done in their name. Because if taken to its logical conclusion, and this kind of thing is kosher, then what's to prevent parties from sending such requests to names on the other party's registration list, and muck up the process with phony addresses, name variations, etc.

[weatherwaxx]

As Newt Gangrene said so many years ago, "Of course we cheat. If we didn't cheat, we couldn't win."

Thank gawd so many of them are too dumb to read the instructions.

[elfish]

One way this could be a dirty trick is if the cards are for Democrats. Here's the trick: Republican operatives fill out a bunch of ballot requests for Democrats with the wrong address and don't sign the card. That causes them to be rejected and clouds the issues about which address is correct. If there was a previous valid request with the correct address, the clerk will probably reject both requests. Since the address on the latest request is wrong, the voter will not receive any mail from the clerk and will be unable to correct the problem. On election day they simply won't receive a ballot. This kind of thing was happening in Colorado on November 4th.

[GoodGuysandBadGuys]

this is ga and the republicans here are CROOKS, so it's no surprise. shenanigans are guaranteed, here.

[JustADumbFireman]

Republicans everywhere are crooks.

[GoodGuysandBadGuys]

well okay you have a point there. but you know it's worse in "red" states.

[norkas]

I mostly know Republican NUT CASES who have very big problems being level headed.

Often they think and talk like a spoiled brat and hate Obama so much they there thinking is contaminated. One of them that does not make close to the $250,000 new tax idea Obama said to me " the hell with the average person the rich needs to tax breaks more because i want them to continue purchasing GUGGI etc. This person is educated but speaks like a wind up IDIOT doll when speaking of Barak Obama.

Now please do not forget many Republicans were disgusted by the extreme right wing rearing its ugly head and voted and supported Barak Obama. But the extreme right wing still has allot of stupid rhertic and at times it is osted here.

[hmmmmmer]

OK, it is time for that army of Democrat lawyers to swoop into Georgia and get this all under control.

[Susanfrom29]

Republicans still haven't learned how to spell competence, have they?

[MissKaren]

Worse, they have no idea how to ACT with it.

[SanityForOnce]

Huh? I thought only Democrats were incapable of filling out a form correctly. This must be a terrible blow to the Republicans' self esteem.

[hildutus]

I think they mean that it's a dirty trick against themselves. Curse those Republicans for making the signature line so difficult to see, thereby disenfranchising Republican voters!

[krocklin]

If there was any Republican hanky panky that affected the election, it was probably in Georgia.

[weatherwaxx]

Georgia still has the Diebold vote-fraud machines. You can bet there was shifty dealing.

[SailawayJane]

When are they ever going to wise up and get rid of Diebold voting machines? Those machines been proven time and again they have problems.

[Tom95134]

Why are county elections officials are contacting voters? Would they be doing the same thing if the requests had come in from registered Democrats?

[RobHughey]

Yes, they would have. It's policy.