Elections

In Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Institute the Supreme Court will decide whether federal law allows states and local governments to remove people from the voter rolls if the state or local government sends them a confirmation notice after they haven’t voted for two years, they don’t respond to the notice, and then they don’t vote in the next four years.

While Ohio is being sued in this case twelve other states use a similar process. The State and Local Legal Center (SLLC) filed an amicus brief in this case supporting Ohio.

Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Defense’s Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) released its 2016 Post-Election Report to Congress.

Recently in Las Vegas, the 25^th Annual DEF CON took place July 27-30. DEF CON, short for “Defense Condition,” is one of the oldest and largest hacking conferences. To many in the election field, one of DEF CON’s Hacking Villages this year drew their attention – the Voting Machine Hacking Village.

Earlier this month, the state of Colorado announced that it will become the first state to implement risk-limiting audits to ensure votes are counted efficiently and accurately in elections. The unexpected election results in a few of the “swing” states in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election prompted the demand of recounts to be sure the results accurately portrayed how the voters casted their ballots. In the wake of the Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania recounts, digital security specialists and computer scientists argued that recounts could be all together eliminated by implementing risk-limiting audits. Currently only New Mexico and Colorado have the capability of doing so, and Colorado has been launched into the spotlight as an example for other states to follow.

This week kicks off National Disability Voter Registration Week with events and roundtable discussions throughout the country to call attention and collate efforts on local, state, and national levels to make the disability vote more influential.

Community involvement is not a new concept for professional sports teams, as many of our favorite athletes volunteer in their teams’ communities by playing with kids, helping rebuild in neighborhoods, etc. The Miami Dolphins, however, have stepped into a new realm of community involvement – civic engagement. The Dolphins have set a team goal to have their entire team roster registered to vote by National Voter Registration Day on September 26. If the Dolphins are successful in registering every player on the team, then they will be the first professional team in American history to do so.

Kansas City, Missouri like many other jurisdictions across the nation, have found themselves in need of new voting equipment to enhance customer service for voters during the election process.

While election processes are administered in the counties of most states, Wisconsin municipalities handle elections. Instead of 50-150 voter jurisdictions, Wisconsin voters must figure out which of the 1,852 municipalities to register and cast their votes. Wisconsin has recently launched initiatives to assist all voters, but particularly those voting absentee as military and overseas voters.