[EL] "Parry" votes

Fri Aug 19 15:44:36 PDT 2011

To answer Larry's question, I think there is a pretty good case that California's new practice is not constitutional.  A state may constitutionally either allow or prohibit write-in votes under most if not all circumstances, but setting up a trap for the unwary, in which voters believe they are casting a valid write-in vote but the state will actually automatically discard all such votes, is something quite different, and it raises different constitutional concerns.  I have more to say about a closely related set of questions here:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1861446

Joey

On Aug 19, 2011, at 9:21 AM, Richard Winger wrote:

> Former California State Senator Steve Peace, whose attorneys had drafted the proposed initiative on which Prop. 14 and SB 6 were based, told me that if write-ins were to be counted in November, that "would make mischief."  I think what he meant is that if there were 2 Democrats placing first and second in a district that was not that overwhelmingly Democratic, in November a single Republican write-in candidate might be able to win against a divided Democratic field.
> 
> But that doesn't explain why the drafters didn't take the trouble to amend the existing California law that says write-in space must be on the ballot in all California elections.  So I don't understand how it came to be.
> 
> --- On Thu, 8/18/11, Larry Levine <larrylevine at earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
> From: Larry Levine <larrylevine at earthlink.net>
> Subject: RE: [EL] "Parry" votes
> To: richardwinger at yahoo.com, "'law-election at UCI.EDU'" <law-election at uci.edu>, "'Michael McDonald'" <mmcdon at gmu.edu>
> Date: Thursday, August 18, 2011, 9:58 PM
> 
> So tell me, what purpose did the drafters have in mind in setting up this situation in which people will be invited to cast ballots that won’t be counted. It couldn’t have been a drafting error. It had to be intentional.
> 
> Larry
> 
>  
> From: Richard Winger [mailto:richardwinger at yahoo.com] 
> Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 9:36 PM
> To: 'law-election at UCI.EDU'; 'Michael McDonald'; Larry Levine
> Subject: RE: [EL] "Parry" votes
> 
>  
> There is a difference between a state removing write-in space from the ballot, and what California does.  The California ballot invites people to cast a write-in vote and the ballot never tells the voter that any write-ins cannot be counted.  There has never been any other state that printed write-in space on the ballot but said write-ins could never be counted.  Not even the number of write-ins can be released.
> 
> --- On Thu, 8/18/11, Larry Levine <larrylevine at earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> From: Larry Levine <larrylevine at earthlink.net>
> Subject: RE: [EL] "Parry" votes
> To: richardwinger at yahoo.com, "'law-election at UCI.EDU'" <law-election at uci.edu>, "'Michael McDonald'" <mmcdon at gmu.edu>
> Date: Thursday, August 18, 2011, 8:50 PM
> 
> Can someone explain why that’s even constitutional. I guess if term limits can prevent me from voting for the candidate of my choice because he or she can’t be a candidate then the logic would apply to not being able to write in the name of my candidate and have it count.
> Larry
>  
> From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Richard Winger
> Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 8:12 PM
> To: 'law-election at UCI.EDU'; Michael McDonald
> Subject: Re: [EL] "Parry" votes
>  
> Sort of like California's new "top-two" law, which retains write-in space on the November ballot for congress and state office, but which says that under no circumstances are any of the write-ins to be counted.
> 
> --- On Thu, 8/18/11, Michael McDonald <mmcdon at gmu.edu> wrote:
> 
> From: Michael McDonald <mmcdon at gmu.edu>
> Subject: Re: [EL] "Parry" votes
> To: "'law-election at UCI.EDU'" <law-election at uci.edu>
> Date: Thursday, August 18, 2011, 7:18 PM
> 
> I'm partial to Rick Purry -- he gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling.
> 
> From how I understand the straw poll works, it is primarily a fund raiser from the candidates, who buy thousands of tickets and hand them out to their supporters. However, there is no obligation that someone actually cast a ballot for the person that gave them the ticket. I've seen blogs where people report taking a ballot from a candidate and casting it for Parry. Someone may know how many votes Parry got, but the public will likely never know. 
> 
> Kind of makes you wonder about the potential for "fraud" when the organization running the election will not release the total ballots cast and vote counts for individual candidates. If they are willing to control the message on candidate vote totals by withholding information, how far are they willing to go to control that message?
> 
> ============
> Dr. Michael P. McDonald
> Associate Professor, George Mason University 
> Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
> 
>                              Mailing address:
> (o) 703-993-4191             George Mason University
> (f) 703-993-1399             Dept. of Public and International Affairs
> mmcdon at gmu.edu               4400 University Drive - 3F4
> http://elections.gmu.edu     Fairfax, VA 22030-4444
> 
> From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Aaron Blake
> Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2011 9:49 PM
> To: Rick Hasen
> Cc: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu; law-election at UCI.EDU
> Subject: Re: [EL] "Parry" votes
> 
> I can verify that the state party did not release write-in votes for anybody that got less than 1 percent and wasn't on the ballot. That was the stated reason, at least. I suspect they didn't want to give Colbert the satisfaction (but that's complete speculation). 
> 
> Reports at the time also indicated that, depending on the vote-counter, "Parry" votes could have been counted for Perry. It was based on whatever "vote intent" meant to the vote-counter. 
> 
> Interesting to note, though: They also didn't say how many write-ins that Sarah Palin got. That means that she fell below 1 percent and also could have lost to Rick Parry. (Because why wouldn't they report her total if it beat Parry) 
> 
> 
> Aaron Blake
> The Washington Post
> The Fix
> www.PostPolitics.com
> blakea at washpost.com
> twitter.com/FixAaron
> 202.503.4669
> 
> 
> 
> 
> From:        Rick Hasen <rhasen at law.uci.edu> 
> To:        Lorraine Minnite <lminnite at gmail.com> 
> Cc:        "law-election at UCI.EDU" <law-election at uci.edu> 
> Date:        08/18/2011 09:33 PM 
> Subject:        Re: [EL] "Parry" votes 
> Sent by:        law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu 
> ________________________________________
> 
> 
> 
> I tweeted about this and a response I got back was that Colbert announced on his show earlier this week that the Iowa Republicans would not release the information.  (I have not verified this.)  Perry was credited with 718 write-in votes.  I believe it cost $30 to cast a vote, so I don't know how many protest/Colbert votes there would have been at that price.
> 
> 
> On 8/18/2011 6:30 PM, Lorraine Minnite wrote: 
> Does anyone have any information about how many "Rick Parry" write-ins were cast in the Iowa straw poll?  I realize "Parrys" may have been counted as "Perrys," and that given what people had to do to cast ballots, it's unlikely they went to all that trouble and misspelled the name, but I'm curious.  Any suggestions for how I can find out - are the full results a matter of public record in Iowa? 
> 
> Thanks. 
> 
> Lori Minnite  
> “Colbert’s ads advocate Rick ‘Parry’ write-in, create a straw-poll mess” 
> Posted on August 13, 2011 by Rick Hasen 
> This item appeared at the Daily Caller before the results of the Ames straw poll were announced.  (I am quoted in the article discussing Colbert as performance art.)  This report by The Fix says “Rick Perry” received 718 (write-in) in votes.  I’ve seen no accounting yet of how many Rick PArry votes, if any, were cast. 
> 
> Posted in chicanery, voting | Comments Off 
> 
> -- 
> Rick Hasen
> Professor of Law and Political Science
> UC Irvine School of Law
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