Whats Wrong With the Election System

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Whats Wrong With the Election System?

• David Kimball
• University of Missouri-St. Louis December 5, 2002

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Outline

• Impetus for an examination of voting methods in
  the United States
• Research findings
• Recommendations for election reforms and issues
  for future elections

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Sunshine State in 2000
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2000 Presidential ElectionA Perfect Storm

• Florida Official Results
• George W. Bush 2,912,790 votes
• Al Gore 2,912,253 votes
• Bush wins Florida by 537 votes.
• Approximately 180,000 ballots in Florida failed
  to record a vote for president (roughly 3 of
  ballots cast).
• Nationally, about 2 million unrecorded votes in
  the presidential election of 2000.

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How Can You Fail to Cast a Vote?

• Overvote Selecting too many candidates
• Undervote Not selecting any candidates

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NORC/Media Consortium Review of Florida Ballots

• Most unrecorded votes in Florida were overvotes
  (68).
• Half of the undervotes in Florida were failed
  attempts to vote for a single candidate.
• Half of the undervotes Florida were genuine
  (blank).
• Almost 25,000 of the unrecorded votes in Florida
  could have been counted.

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NORC Review Both Candidates Pursued Losing
Recount Strategies

• Gore only wanted to recount votes in four
  Democratic-leaning counties, and Gore only wanted
  a recount to examine undervotes.
• If that had happened, Bush still would have won.
• A statewide recount of all votes (undervotes and
  overvotes) potentially would have put Gore over
  the top.
• Bush argued that overvotes should be included in
  a recount.
• Overvotes included a slew of uncounted votes for
  Gore.

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Overvote in Florida
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Overvote in Florida
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Undervote in Florida
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Undervote in Florida
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Undervote in Florida
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Undervote in Florida
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Whats Happened Since Florida?

• Each state and county has asked Could Florida
  happen here?
• Federal legislation the Help America Vote Act
  of 2002
• State legislation Missouri included
• Research to examine the correlates of unrecorded
  votes and find out what works and what does not.

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Research on Unrecorded Votes

• Examined election returns from counties in 2000
• Examined precinct returns in Florida and Illinois
• Primarily a cross-sectional analysis
• Other studies, including multiple elections
  (Caltech/MIT Voting Project, groups at Maryland,
  Berkeley, Harvard)

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Factors Examined

• Voting technology
• Ballot features and design
• Election features
• Demographics
• Socio-economic disparity in unrecorded votes.

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Local Control of Elections

• Election administration is primarily a matter of
  local (county) control.
• This creates a lot of variation in voting methods
  across the country.
• Great for researchers
• Headaches for election reformers
• Voting technology is a prime example

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Votomatic Punch Card
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Paper Ballot
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Lever Voting Machine
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Electronic Voting Machine (DRE)
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Electronic Voting Machine (DRE)
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Optical Scan Ballot
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(No Transcript)
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Voting Technology Results

• Votomatic punch card ballots clearly produce the
  highest rate of unrecorded votes in contests at
  the top of the ballot.
• Newer voting technology that allows voters to
  discover and correct mistakes reduce the number
  of unrecorded votes, especially in low-income or
  minority precincts.
• DRE
• Precinct-count optical scan

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(No Transcript)
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Ballot Design

• Ballot design has been largely overlooked as a
  cause of unrecorded votes.
• Several ballot features are important
• Number of columns
• Straight-party option
• None of the above option

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Butterfly Ballot
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(No Transcript)
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Straight-Party Punch
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Percentage of Unrecorded Votes in the 2000
Presidential Election (Counties)
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Nevada Ballot
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Ballot Layout
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Ballot Instructions
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Voter Education
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Recommendations

• If cost and staffing is no object, replace punch
  card voting systems and adopt ballot features
  that reduce the number of unrecorded votes.
• Switching to new voting technology is costly.
  Making ballot design improvements is relatively
  inexpensive.
• Consider uniform voting systems at the state
  level?
• A potential concern is the growing use of
  absentee and mail-in voting.