Suchergebnisse

Election Reform and Voter Registration -- Gaps in Voter Registration: Ongoing Pressures to Expand the Electorate -- Federal and State Legislative Responses to Voter Registration -- How are Americans Registering to Vote? Beyond the Institutional Supply -- The Impact of Local-level Factors on Voter Registration Success -- Registered, but Not Quite: Processing Pending and Incomplete Registrations -- Opportunities and Challenges for Voter Registration Reform.

Whose voter registration requires further verification and why? And why are some prospective registrants left out from voter records? These questions can uncover challenges in the voter registration process, and potential implementation issues with federal and state law. In this article, I analyze "on hold" voter registration applications processed between November 2007 and September 2008 in Florida's Hillsborough and Miami-Dade Counties. I evaluate why individuals were left out of the voter rolls, by matching their records to snapshots of the counties' voter records from December 2008. I find that "on hold" applicants face persistent challenges in successfully registering to vote, particularly depending on when they attempt to register and what type of information they omit from a voter registration application.

Accurate voter lists facilitate access to the electoral process, indicate efficient voter list maintenance, and reinforce electoral integrity. Errors in voter records often result from variation in practices that are difficult to avoid given the decentralized structure of election administration in the United States. In many states, localities lack capacity to efficiently complete voter list maintenance, especially when pressured to keep "clean" voter rolls. I argue that local challenges remain when maintaining voters' registration and voting history information, which undermines the quality of voter lists and the integrity of the electoral process. I analyze Mississippi's Statewide Election Management System (SEMS) records and find that voter registration and voting history errors are linked to the county's active and inactive registered voter rates and demographic characteristics. These findings confirm that local variation in voter list maintenance can impact voters depending on their voter registration status and can result in premature voter list removal.

During every election cycle, election administrators validate voter registration applications submitted at different times and through various sources, with a notable peak in the demand for voter registration as Election Day approaches. The process of registering to vote, however, is error-prone and may depend on the voter's capacity to fill a form correctly, or the election administrator's capacity to successfully process applications as the voter registration window closes. Such errors can limit a prospective, and eligible, voter's ability to cast a valid ballot. This study assesses the impact of time and registration source on the rates of rejected voter registration applications by analyzing monthly county-level voter registration reports during the 2012 election cycle in Florida. I find that there is a dynamic relationship between administrative and seasonal factors at the county level, which condition the rates of rejected voter registrations as the registration deadline approaches. These findings suggest complications in not only the process of registering to vote that may stem from differences in voter engagement but also the variation in administrative oversight throughout the election cycle.

Provisional ballots constitute a failsafe for voters who have their registration or voter identification questioned by poll workers. Scholars have yet to examine who is more likely to cast a provisional ballot, and more importantly, why some provisional ballots are rejected. We suggest that beyond individual-level factors, there are administrative reasons why some prospective voters are more likely to be required to cast provisional ballots than others, and why some provisional ballots are rejected. Drawing on county data collected by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission's (EAC) biennial Election Administration and Voting Surveys (EAVS) from 2012 to 2016, and individual records of provisional ballots cast in the 2016 Presidential Election in North Carolina, we examine aggregate- and individual-level reasons to explain who casts provisional ballots and why some are rejected. Our findings raise normative questions concerning whether voters casting provisional ballots are treated equally under the law.

ObjectiveSome scholars report that the partisanship of local election administrators affects which voters will cast provisional ballots and which ballots will be rejected, raising serious questions about voting rights and the application of uniform election laws within the American states. Our goal is to demonstrate that casting a provisional ballot and rejecting a provisional ballot are separate processes, the discrete dynamics of which have not been adequately assessed empirically.MethodsDrawing on a county‐level data set spanning three general elections in the battleground state of Florida, we look beyond the partisanship of local elections administrators, focusing instead on how voter registration issues in local election jurisdictions may condition both the casting and rejection of provisional ballots.ResultsOur findings suggest that voter registration maintenance issues in a county affect the number of provisional ballots cast and rejected. Most importantly, we find that counties with greater numbers of voters who register after the registration cutoff date prior to a general election (and who are thus ineligible to vote) tend to have greater numbers of provisional ballots cast and rejected.ConclusionsProvisional ballots are the stepchildren of local election administration. Voters deemed by poll workers to be ineligible to vote a regular ballot are permitted to cast provisional ballots; these ballots are verified by local canvassing boards after the election results are tabulated and the unofficial winners declared. We find that the partisan leanings of local elections officials play a minimal role in the number of provisional ballots cast and rejected, which we hope will encourage scholars to scrutinize other local factors that might cause disparities in these votes of last resort.

AbstractPresidential elections are conducted in two stages. The November general election is proceeded by a series of contests where delegates are selected to national party conventions, which is where the parties select their candidates for the fall election. These nominating contests' political environments vary: the rules regarding who can participate; the levels of electoral competition, which are related to when they are held; and that other offices present on the ballot, if any. We explore the effects of these conditions on voter participation in recent presidential contests and generally find turnout highest in competitive and inclusive contests where other offices are on the ballot. Examining the 2008 American National Election Panel Study, we find primary voters are more ideologically extreme than general election voters, but there is little difference between voters in closed and open primary states. We suggest primary type has little effect on the ideological composition of the electorate because modern nomination contests are low turnout elections that draw only the most politically interested.