Election reform -- or fraud?

(Posted 10 Feb 2006)

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• Maryland: the worst legislature?
• Maryland Moment (Post blog), 10 Feb 2006 (by Ann Marimow).

Maryland's General Assembly is "way out in front" as the worst state legislature in the U.S., according to a columnist for the Wall Street Journal Editorial Page's online OpinionJournal.com. . . . He goes on to explore what he calls Maryland's "hardball history" of voter fraud.

• Voting Early--and Often; Maryland swims against the election-reform current. .
• OpinionJournal (Wall Street Journal), 10 Feb 2006 (by John H. Fund).

It should normally be difficult to pick the worst state legislature in America, but Maryland's is way out in front. . . . Together the election laws would so weaken safeguards against voter fraud as to make Maryland the nation's prime example of Election Day irresponsibility. . . .

• 'Paper Trail' Technology Questioned.
• Post, 10 Feb 2006 (by Matthew Mosk and Ann E. Marimow).

A pair of Maryland professors hired by the State Board of Elections to study vote-verification equipment told legislators yesterday that the technology makes it more difficult to vote, increases the time it takes to participate in elections and decreases the privacy with which votes are cast.
[. . .]
Linda Schade , executive director of TrueVoteMD, said the study was flawed because it did not consider an optical scan system that uses a paper ballot. "Voters in Maryland are tired of voting on an insecure system," she said.

• Elections Official Accused of Bias.
• Post, 10 Feb 2006 (by Matthew Mosk and Ann E. Marimow).

Senate Republicans yesterday accused an official at the nonpartisan State Board of Elections of violating his pledge of impartiality by helping Democrats pass legislation to allow early voting in November.

At a hearing on election bills, senators produced an e-mail from the top aide to the Democratic Senate president asking the deputy administrator of the elections board for advice on how to craft "a rebuttal" to the case for sustaining Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr .'s veto. . . .

• GOP calls for probe on memo.
• Gazette, 10 Feb 2006 (Douglas Tallman).

A memo from an elections official to a legislative aide has prompted two Republican senators to call for an investigation by State Prosecutor Robert A. Rohrbaugh.
[. . .]
Now the memo surfaces, in which Goldstein dissects the commission’s review point by point. Dated Jan. 11, it was sent to Tim Perry, aide to Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Dist. 27) of Chesapeake Beach. The Senate voted to override Ehrlich’s veto on Jan. 12.
[. . .]
In his veto message, Ehrlich noted Maryland’s ‘‘national reputation as a state with a rich history of voter fraud.” . . .

• Elections board officer's e-mails criticized; GOP accuses worker of providing early-voting information to help Democrats overturn vetoes.
• Sun, 10 Feb 2006 (by Kelly Brewington, Sun reporter).

[Comment: Nowhere in these reports do Maryland's legislative leaders deny the underlying charge that they are making it easier for people to vote fraudulently.]

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Filed in: Sen.Miller