Michigan's Online Ballot Spurs New Strategies for Democrats

NY Times ^ | January 10, 2004 | KATHARINE Q. SEELYE

[neverdem]

DETROIT, Jan. 7 — The virtual ballot box has arrived in Michigan. Democrats in this state are the only voters in the country who have the option of voting online in the presidential primaries this year.

Since New Year's Day, voters have been allowed to apply for ballots and vote by mail or Internet in advance of the Feb. 7 caucuses. Or, on Feb. 7, they can go to one of 576 caucus sites and vote the old-fashioned way. By Thursday night, 11,000 people had applied for ballots, three-fourths of them over the Internet, according to the Michigan Democratic Party. About 100 people had voted so far, 90 of them online.

Mark Brewer, executive chairman of the party, said he had promoted the Internet option as a way to make voting easier and increase turnout. "Polls show that this is very popular, particularly with young people, and they have one of the worst rates of participation," Mr. Brewer said. "If this helps them, that's terrific."

When Mr. Brewer proposed online voting last year, none of the candidates objected. But when Howard Dean started climbing in the polls, they had a change of heart, fearing that his Web-surfing followers would have an inherent advantage.

Seven of the nine candidates — all but Dr. Dean and Gen. Wesley K. Clark — joined a challenge to the process initiated by Joel Ferguson, a Lansing businessman and member of the Democratic National Committee. Their brief, filed with the national committee, which oversees the rules for states, said that major security problems had not been resolved and that online voting discriminated against low-income blacks and Hispanics, less likely than whites to be computer-literate.

But the national party agreed to the Michigan proposal, and now, with the rules set, the candidates have embraced the process, devising innovative ways to track their supporters and prompt them to vote online.

Dr. Dean's campaign, for one, is not relying just on supporters who are Internet-savvy. Its union backers are taking laptop computers into workplaces to help members apply for ballots and vote. They also make house calls. Some of the unions backing Representative Richard A. Gephardt are doing the same.

General Clark's campaign is using the Internet to encourage rural voters in northern and western Michigan to vote online.

"A lot of those places don't even have movie theaters, and the Internet is their way to connect and be part of the world on a real-time basis," said Jonathan Beeton, a spokesman for General Clark's Michigan campaign. "With the Internet, it's much easier for us to mobilize a field operation without devoting a huge staff and resources to cover vast areas of the state."

Senator John Kerry's supporters are flooding college campuses with newspaper advertisements encouraging students to vote online. Almost all the candidates have links on their Web sites to allow Michigan voters to apply online for ballots. Voting is a two-step process: applying for a ballot, then either returning it by mail or using a password to vote via the Internet.

But the effort to extend Internet voting beyond the young and affluent is transforming Michigan into a state that is more reliant on organization than it has been in the past. In this respect, it is more like Iowa than anyplace else, because candidates need deep networks to get supporters to the caucuses..

Dr. Dean's campaign is perhaps the most advanced in bringing the virtual ballot box to voters.

Local 79 of the Service Employees International Union, which has endorsed Dr. Dean, bought 20 laptop computers and this week began carrying them into the work sites of its 17,000 members in Detroit. The local has more than 1,200 members at the Detroit Medical Center, which allowed organizers in to help members apply for ballots on Wednesday.

The organizers sent out word that union members could drop by during their lunch breaks. Alicia Robertson, 29, a dietary aide, was one of several who requested a ballot, with John Switalski, an organizer, guiding her on the keyboard.

"Sure," she said of the next step, voting via the Internet, "if all I've got to do is what he just showed me."

Patsy Bell, 54, a janitor, stopped by before lunch and applied for a ballot. Ms. Bell has a computer at home and said she was comfortable voting online. "It won't take but a second," she said.

Others were not ready to make the leap. Chris Butler, 62, a cook, said she would probably vote by mail, though she applied online for a ballot.

"With the Internet, they have so many problems," Ms. Butler said. "I don't want to take a chance. I'll probably do it by mail because I like to take my time."

In any case, they all planned to vote for Dr. Dean. "I trust him," Ms. Butler said. "I like what he's offering, especially the health care."

Jerry Morrison, directing the union's online effort, said the Internet option combined with the five-week time period for voting offered tremendous advantages for campaign organizers.

"Instead of having one day and one way to deliver all your votes, we've got five weeks and three ways to vote," Mr. Morrison said, and that is likely to increase turnout.

(Page 2 of 2)

But those who challenged the process said it was unfair. Their brief to the Democratic National Committee noted that the digital divide involved not just race but also income, age and education. In households earning less than $25,000 a year, only 39 percent have Internet access, while in households earning more than $75,000 a year, 94 percent are wired. The federal Department of Commerce reported that 55.6 percent of Michigan homes had Web access in 2001, slightly above the national average.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, a Democratic candidate for president, called Internet voting "a high-tech poll tax." "If someone can vote in the warmth of their living room, but a grandmother has to go down four flights of stairs and out into the cold, that's not an even playing field," Mr. Sharpton said in an interview.

That is not the only concern. Because the caucuses are run by the party and not state officials, the ballots are not secret. They have a personal identification number to make sure voters do not vote more than once. Beyond that, party rules allow unions and other special interests to help people use the Internet, raising the possibility of influence or coercion.

The Democratic National Committee overrode such objections and allowed the Michigan Democrats to proceed with Internet voting, as long as the party also offered mail and in-person voting and increased the number of caucus sites.

Mr. Brewer, of the state party, asserted that voting online was no less secure than voting by absentee ballot. As long as the party offers other methods of voting, he said, he sees no problem with allowing those who want to vote online to do so. As for the lack of secrecy, there is no pretense to secrecy, he said, though as a matter of practice no one bothers to check to see how people vote.

Many analysts say that Internet voting is the wave of the future and that Michigan is taking an important step. It follows an online voting project in the Democratic presidential primary in Arizona in 2000. But that was not a competitive race, and the voting was limited. Arizona Democrats are not using it this year.

The Defense Department is preparing pilot projects in which people from 51 counties in seven states can vote online in November if they are United States citizens who are overseas. Polli Brunelli, director of the Federal Voting Assistance Program, which is running the pilot projects, said the Pentagon had developed an elaborate encrypted system to guard against fraud, but she said of Michigan, "You're trying to enfranchise as many people as possible, so you have to start somewhere."

[neverdem]

It's going to be interesting to see if there is significant fraud with folks voting by Internet.

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[j_tull]

OMG, where to start on this article? I guess I'll start without a quote, and merely say..."The Dims are pointing their fingers at one another saying. " this ain't fair." BWWAHHAAHHAAA!