January 28, 2005

1305 People Shouldn't Have Voted

We now know how easy it was to commit vote fraud on Election Day in Milwaukee. Greg Borowski strikes again.

Milwaukee officials said Thursday that 1,305 same-day voter registration cards from the Nov. 2 election could not be processed, including more than 500 cases where voters listed no address and dozens more where no name was written on the card.

But the revelation of the actual number of cards that couldn't be processed, far lower than previous estimates of 8,300 or more, raised new concerns, because it leaves a clear gap of more than 7,000 people who voted on Nov. 2 and cannot be accounted for in city records.

Why were some of the registration cards invalid? Borowski continues:

The city's own breakdown of the 1,305 cards that could not be processed showed 548 people were given ballots without listing an address on the cards and another 48 did not provide a name.

And among many other problems, 141 gave addresses later found to not be in the city. One of the cards provided to the newspaper shows a voter clearly listing "Wauwatosa" as her city of residence. Nevertheless, she received a ballot and voted in Milwaukee.

The woman from Wauwatosa couldn't be found. Her "phone is disconnected." That assumes she even exists.

Here's an example of one improper form. A Randal Jarosch didn't put an address on his form. Yet it was signed by a precinct worker. The number in the bottom right-hand corner of the form is the voter number. That means Jarosch was given a ballot.

It gets worse.

In addition to the cards that could not be processed, city officials have had nearly 2,800 verification cards - out of 73,079 sent out - returned as undeliverable. State law requires those be submitted to the district attorney's office.

That number is higher than the 1,200 invalid addresses found by the Journal Sentinel, because the newspaper's review did not cover apartment buildings, due to problems in how the addresses appear in data bases.

1305 plus 2800 equals 4105. That's over one-third of the way to John Kerry's 11,384 vote win over President Bush in Wisconsin. This is just Milwaukee. We still have to deeply look into places like Racine and Madison.

Milwaukee elections chief Lisa Artison continues to blame human error and the huge numbers of people that voted. Artison just has to look in the mirror to find out who's responsible for such poor training of poll workers. Both she and Mayor Tom Barrett refuse to even consider the possibility that vote fraud occured.

There is a problem with Borowski's story. He writes (emphasis mine),

Barrett said the problems did not shake his belief that voters shouldn't face a requirement to show a photo identification card at the polls before getting a ballot. He said the requirement would be a burden on some voters, particularly the elderly.

Stone and Sen. Joe Leibham (R-Sheboygan) soon are expected to introduce a photo ID bill, something Gov. Jim Doyle opposes and likely would veto.

Such a requirement may not have prevented the problems surrounding Milwaukee's registration cards - all of which, if current law was followed, should have come from people who provided identification.

Borowski fails to tell readers that another voter can vouch for a new registrant if he doesn't have any identification. Identification isn't needed.

"City OK'd 1,305 Flawed Voter Cards"