Kansas Senate testimony about disturbing problems at polling place during November election

A few Kansans will vote today in local elections for city and school officials in many areas. Turnout will likely be light and few problems are expected.

Kansans last went to the polls statewide in Nov 2008 during the presidential election. Few problems were reported and few, if any, prosecutions have occurred from any voting irregularities.

However, testimony at a Kansas Senate hearing on March 4 from Kathy Perry from Sedgwick County revealed possible problems that could affect the integrity of our elections in Kansas and this received no attention from the press.

The following is the statement made by Kathy Perry to the Kansas Senate Ethics and Elections Committee on March 4, 2009:

Thank you for allowing me the time to come before you today and share some of the activities that I witnessed as a provisional ballot judge for the Nov 4, 2008 presidential election. In my remarks I will refer to “we” — meaning myself and the supervising judge, Deanne Dickerson, with whom I worked that day. Deanne is available to verify these events that I am sharing with you today. She also signed my original typed notes as a witness.

As … provisional ballot judges we encountered many voters that were not registered in the state of Kansas. Our job was to assist these voters in finding their polling districts or with any other voter problems. We were told to let anyone vote and to not ask [for] ID from anyone unless they were first time voters. We were instructed to allow everyone to vote, even people without any ID, as first time voters. Providing the proper identification would have helped the poll workers determine the proper ballot for these voters in a timely manner; without the identification we had to refer to a map to try to determine where the voters lived. All voters who could not determine where they lived from the maps were given a provisional ballot — which allowed them to cast a vote for the presidential and federal level contests. The votes of these individuals who voted out of the proper district were not counted for their local races.

The following are examples of incidents that we encountered that day:

A lady with a thick foreign accent told us that she resided in Tulsa, OK, and Wichita, KS — asked to vote. She voted provisionally in district 0527 , at 6:50 PM. After we sealed her ballot, she asked if it was OK to vote in two states, and told us that she had driven from Tulsa where she voted earlier that day. I documented this on the envelope of the provisional ballot — she did, however vote a second time in Kansas.

Two men who spoke very broken English told us that they were not sure if they were US citizens, we flagged their ballot — no identification was given. We were told kindly by election officials not to ask for identification, but that state law allowed anyone to vote.

A lady came in with a state ballot, not a sample ballot, and she asked if she could put her completed ballot into the ballot counter. I asked her where she lived. She said that she did not know. I asked her what side of town she lived on. She did not know. I asked her where she received her official ballot. She said she found stacks of them that were being given out. I asked her where, and she told me she could not remember. We told her that she [would] have to vote provisionally.

A man who was not in the registration book was told to fill out the provisional ballot and seal it in an envelope. He filled out his optical scan ballot, but would not put it into the sealed envelope. As I was assisting the next voter in line, the man rushed the M-100 scanner machine and inserted his ballot. He left the poll site without completing the envelope information.

Another man who voted in the general election told us that he “advanced voted” in Nebraska, and had just voted at his old Kansas address. He asked us if it was OK to vote twice if his name was not removed from the registry.

A lady that voted [a] computer ballot said as she was leaving, “IN CHICAGO WE HAVE A SAYING, ‘VOTE EARLY and VOTE OFTEN, BYE.’” Yes it was that blatant.

This final example is documented in the poll registry from the precinct where I worked. Every poll worker was aware of this situation. A lady had three similar first names registered at the same address. [For example Chris, Christine, Christy Fox]. She had three registrations and wanted to have three ballots. She was given one, and voted in the general election. She would have easily returned and voted under the other two registered names. She admitted that she was the same person as the other two on the list.

Here are examples of the types of questions I received from people routinely throughout the day after they voted:

What happens if you vote at different places?

Can I try and go vote again at my old place that I used to live?

Can I vote for my father that is now dead if we did not tell?

Can you look up for me and see if I am registered to vote anywhere else?

Do you get arrested if you are caught voting more than once?

Can I vote all the places I have lived before and in other states too?

What happens if a person gets caught let’s say voting five times?

This was a very sad day for the election workers. Often disenfranchised voters throughout the day asked if their votes counted since the media accounts showed individuals voting multiple times in other states. Some were asking if there was a point to voting any more. One elderly couple stopped to talk to me and told me that this would be their last election. They drove all the way from Attica, KS to vote in Wichita and felt that it was pointless to vote if others were being allowed to vote multiple times. Many honest voters asked why we did not request identification from them. Many would pass their identification to me without being asked, and comment that everyone should have to show their identification in order to have a fair voting process. They felt very disenfranchised by the unfair identification laws that allow people to vote multiple times without having to identify themselves. One woman commented that we should have our elections at Wal-Mart if we are not going to monitor how many times people vote.

I have learned that the current Kansas laws state that I could not ask voters for identification unless I wanted “lawyers crawling all over the place”. I learned that this outdated system needs to be changed to protect the people, the candidates, and our democracy. Why do we throw our democracy into the hands of people who are trying to vote over and over again without getting caught? Are they the people we want deciding who our next elected officials are? Our process depends on the honesty and credibility of the voters, and yet it does not ask for any credible representation of who they are.

Laws that affect the voting process must prove that they are not hindering legally eligible citizens from voting, as well as catching ineligible voters, or those voting multiple times.

We must offer identification to cash checks, to get prescriptions, to rent DVDs, and even to purchase a can of aerosol paint. If the law does not change, people will continue to cheat the system, vote early and often, and compromise all we hold dear. Currently in eighteen states there are laws requiring identification of all voters. In Mexico, voters are required to provide a photo ID, a signature, and a thumbprint in order to vote. These measures to stop voter fraud were instrumental in the fair election of Vincente Fox in the year 2000. I am in support of Senate Bill 267, and urge you to pass this bill to protect the voting process in our great state.

Kathy Perry

An E-mail request was sent to Kathy Perry for additional comments, but there was no reply.

On March 16 I sent an E-mail to five of the members of the Senate Ethics and Elections Committee asking for any reactions they had to Perry’s testimony. I sent my question to Senator Faust-Goudea, Senator Kultala, Senator Schmidt, Senator Wagle, and Senator Wysong.

Senator Oletha Faust-Goudeau sent a generic response to acknowledge my E-mail.

Senator Vicki Schmidt, chair of the committee, sent a brief response: “We passed SB 267 out of committee and it is headed to the full Senate for debate.”

[Updated 4/7] Only Senator Susan Wagle provided any reaction to Kathy Perry’s testimony:

Kathy’s testimony was very compelling. She was from Wichita. I asked her several questions and I told her I also had calls from poll workers with similar complaints the week after the general election. As it turned out, Kathy worked in West Wichita and the complaints I received came from my district in East Wichita.

The text of Senate Bill No. 267 can be read online. A supplemental note provides additional informatoin about the bill.

The online “Track a Bill” search only shows this:

S 0267
Bill by Ways and Means
Elections; voters; voter identification changes. Effective date: Statute Bk.
02/12/2009 S Introduced -SJ 148
02/13/2009 S Referred to Ethics and Elections -SJ 177
03/16/2009 S CR: Be passed as am. by Ethics and Elections -SJ 329

The last line is consistent with the E-mail from Senator Schmidt, but I cannot find any news report, or even a Tweet from those who live-Tweet from the Kansas Senate, about this being debated by the Senate yet.

An informed source told me today: