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Skriven 2006-08-09 08:23:27 av John Hull (1:123/789.0)
Ärende: McKinney Cries Foul!
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Gee, what a surprise!
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McKinney alleges voting irregularities

By Carlos Campos | Tuesday, August 8, 2006, 08:17 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Shortly after the polls opened on Tuesday, allegations of voting irregularities
began appearing on U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney’s campaign Web site.

At 8:14 a.m., the first complaint appeared: “Less than an hour into voting,
McKinney’s name is not on ballot, opponent’s is,ö read an item on her blog.

Other similar allegations would follow throughout the day as 4th Congressional
District voters decided whether to send McKinney back to Congress, or give the
Democratic nomination to runoff opponent, Hank Johnson, a lawyer and former
DeKalb County commissioner.

The McKinney Web site noted voting machines not working or mysteriously casting
incorrect ballots, “insecureö voting equipment, police harassment, and poll
workers refusing to hand out Democratic ballots.

At one campaign stop Tuesday, McKinney said, “We also had a problem at Midway
[elementary school polling place], where my name was not on the ballot,ö
McKinney said.

“My opponent’s name was on the ballot. … We are disappointed that the secretary
of state’s office has not dealt adequately with these electronic voting
machines and the deficiencties. Also, polling places have opened up and some of
the machines were not zero-counted out. … And that is a problem. That is a
serious problem.ö

Dana Elder, the precinct manager at the school, said there was a power failure
around 2:20 p.m. affecting one machine that lists registered voters in the
precinct, but it posed no problem because there was another backup machine. The
broken machine was fixed within 10 minutes and did not affect the actual voting
machines, Elder said.

“It was really nothing,ö Elder said.

The Georgia Secretary of State’s Office kept an eye on the elections, with 15
roving monitors on the ground in the 4th District, said spokeswoman Kara
Sinkule.

Sinkule noted that the complaints were only coming from the McKinney campaign.
“We are not having voters saying we are having equipment malfunctions,ö Sinkule
said.

McKinney has always held a distrust of the state’s new touch-screen voting
machines. She has appeared at events promoted by activists opposed to
electronic voting in Georgia. One of her congressional aides, Richard Searcy,
was one of the most outspoken critics of Georgia’s electronic voting platform
before taking a job in McKinney’s office.

When McKinney beat out five opponents in the Democratic primary in 2004 to
re-claim her congressional seat, she did not question the voting machines’
accuracy or the results. On Tuesday, she was anything but silent on the issue.

“Voters should be able to go into the precinct with the assurance that their
vote is actually going to be cast, first of all, and counted,ö McKinney said
Tuesday. “But at this point we have had voters to tell us the voting machines
took several tries before they would actually even cast the correct ballots.ö

McKinney made other claims about voting problems but did not elaborate or take
questions before disappearing into a truck.

Both local and state elections officials said they are taking McKinney’s
allegations seriously. But they were also quick to say many of the complaints
were unwarranted.

The DeKalb County elections office released a statement addressing complaints
from the McKinney campaign.

In answer to an allegation that a voter tried to vote for McKinney, but the
machine popped up a vote for Johnson, the office said:

“Upon investigation by the manager, it was determined while the one
candidates’s name was touched by the ball of the finger, the fingernail hit the
name,ö the statement read. “We do not expect voters to cut their nails to vote,
but we are cautioning everyone to make certain they are satisfied with their
choices before they hit the ‘cast ballot’ button.ö

“We don’t have a problem addressing any claims that they have,ö said Linda
Lattimore, head of elections for DeKalb County, where much of the 4th
Congressional District lies. “We’ll investigate and respond to each claim.ö

The statement from Lattimore’s office addressed other issues raised by the
McKinney campaign, claiming they were immediately rectified when brought to
officials’ attention.

Some voters who wanted to vote in the runoff did not realize congressional
lines were redrawn by the state Legislature in 2005, Lattimore said. So some
voters accustomed to voting in the 4th District were perplexed at not being
able to do so.

Lattimore said some voters who were told to wait while a poll worker
investigated a problem misinterpreted it as being turned away from the polls.
“We ask a voter to wait a second and suddenly [they think] we turn them away.ö

Staff writers Jeremy Redmon and Julie Turkewitz contributed to this article.

Complete election returns coverage
U.S. House - District 4 - Dem Runoff
Georgia 167 of 167 Precincts Reporting - 100.00%

Name 	                Votes 	Pct
Johnson, Hank 	        41,178 	58.82
McKinney, Cynthia (i) 	28,832 	41.18

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