They argued that people have a right to know who is funding a count. They struck me as odd, because a count is a count, no matter who pays for it. Ballots are all counted publicly by county officials in such a "recount". But making it harder for citizen oversight -- particularly so that only rich people can afford "recounts" -- seemed insane to me, and the folks in the Election Integrity community seemed to agree.

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My guest today is Brad Friedman of Brad Blog. Welcome back to OpEdNews, Brad.

Always great to chat with you, Joan.

The current law in the State of California regarding "recounts" is far from perfect. Voters requesting a "recount" can be forced to pay huge sums for the privilege.

They can, but it's not so much the "huge sums", as it is that County Registrars can set any charge they like, and they can do it after the recount is requested. That has allowed Registrars and County Clerks to arbitrarily and capriciously charge voters trying to oversee their own elections huge amounts in one county, while the one next door charges a reasonable amount. (Eg. San Diego tried to charge a voter about $1.00/ballot for an attempted "recount" a few years back, while neighboring Orange County was charging about .15/ballot.) That has left the perception that some Registrars are purposely trying to stop recounts, as we saw, for example, in Fresno County during the attempted "recount" of Prop 37, a statewide GMO labeling initiative that the computer tabulators reported to have been rejected by voters.

Even so, I understand that law is far more liberal than in many other states.

True. It allows any voter to request a post-election hand-count in any election, in any county and in any precincts they like, so long as they are willing to pay for it -- though they receive the money back if the count reverses the result of the election.

Recently, however there was a move to curtail "recounts" even more. You're from California, Brad. Tell us about the legislation that was recently proposed to replace what's currently in place.

It was pretty amazing actually. A Republican state legislator filed a bill that would require such recounts be paid for "from the voter's own personal funds". That would mean that only wealthy individuals could even afford to ask for such counts, since even the appropriately priced counts can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars. It would have disallowed voters pooling their funds, or fundraising to pay for "recounts" when a group of citizens wanted to oversee their own elections to make sure that the frequently inaccurate electronic tabulators tallied the results correctly.

Even more amazing, the Democrats in the state Assembly went along with it! It passed out of that chamber 66 to 7, before moving on to the state Senate.

What am I missing here, Brad? Why would anyone think that was a good idea?

That's exactly what I was trying to figure out when I saw this bill moving through the Assembly. It was authored by Republican Assemblyman Curt Hagman. When I spoke with his office, they told me it was needed for the sake of "transparency". They argued that people have a right to know who is funding a count. That struck me as odd, because a count is a count, no matter who pays for it. Ballots are all counted publicly by county officials in such a "recount", so it doesn't really seem to me that it matters who pays for it. But making it harder for citizen oversight -- particularly so that only rich people can afford "recounts" -- seemed insane to me, and the folks in the Election Integrity community seemed to agree.

After I wrote my expose on this bill, which nobody else had covered, the California EI folks jumped in and started writing letters to the state Senate to object to the bill.

First of all, thanks so much for writing that expose. You started a bandwagon. I guess I'm not surprised by the Republicans' sponsorship of the bill. That actually makes sense from their corporatist agenda point of view. But why were Democrats flocking to the bill as well? I hope they aren't really as clueless as they appear.

Well, if it smells like a Dem and votes like a Dem... :-) In truth, state Democrats in Sacramento have been on a bit of tear lately, passing good bills in response to Citizens United and other "dark money" issues. So, I suspect they saw Hagman's calls for "transparency" and figured, "Yeah, we like transparency!" But I can't imagine they thought it through. The Dems have been, uh, less than great in the CA state legislature when it comes to issues of voting and elections (other than the work on "dark money" disclosure stuff.)

That's dispiriting. Something as important as that - you'd think that they'd at least read the bills and figure out what they're all about.

Yeah, well, you'd think. But even when they had all kinds of world class computer science and security experts and Election Integrity advocates explaining why Internet Voting is a terrible idea, they still passed an Internet Voting bill out of committee last year, before it was thankfully killed by a different committee. I couldn't believe it. Had an article all good to go at the time with the headline: "Democratic Science Deniers in the CA Statehouse", or some such. Happily, before I could publish, they ended up killing the bill...though, sadly, I suspect I'll be saving that headline for another not too distant day...

Scary! So, after you wrote the expose and started the ball rolling and their constituents started protesting, what happened?

Pretty amazingly, Hagman struck the ENTIRE section of the bill that would have required voters to pay for post-election counts "from their own personal funds". That doesn't leave much left in the bill, frankly (CA lawmakers love to pass TONS of really short bills...and I mean TONS), begging the question as to why he didn't simply withdraw it entirely. But I guess he's saving face or something. That's fine by me. What's left is largely entirely harmless, as far as I can tell, and the voters have won one for a change in Sacramento. I'll take it! :-)

That does seem a little weird. I may sound paranoid, but are we sure there isn't a poison pill or something embedded in what remains of the bill?

Can never be sure, of course. If anybody spots any concerns, I'm happy to hear about it. The latest text of the bill, AB 2369, can be found here, The EI folks I've talked to seem okay with it now, in any case. But I'm always skeptical of everything, so happy to hear from folks if they have concerns.

Your expose accomplished what it needed to. Eternal vigilance and all that... Before we wrap this up, would you like to speak a little more in detail about the good news about legislation passed this session?

Well, a bit of good news this week is that the shadowy rightwingers who were trying to put a Photo ID voting restriction initiative on the ballot this November failed to get the needed signatures. So CA voters are safe on that score, at least, for now.

Hooray!

Beyond that, in the legislature, having done something to require disclosure of "dark money" spent in California elections, should help a lot. In this state anyway. The legislation came about after discovering that the Koch Brothers had used a circuitous route to funnel millions of dollars into a couple of ballot initiatives recently, through their networks, out of state, then back into the elections without disclosing it. The groups were fined a few million dollars (and the good news is that the Prop they supported had lost, and the one they were against had won), but that was after the damage had been done. So the new bill should seal that up a bit more, since D.C. is broken -- I should say, the Republicans have broken D.C. -- and the only way to accomplish anything these days is through state and local legislatures.

Also, last week, the state Senate passed a resolution calling for an Article 5 Constitutional Convention "for the sole purpose of proposing an amendment to the United States Constitution that would limit corporate personhood for purposes of campaign finance and political speech." The resolution also declares "that money does not constitute speech and may be legislatively limited."

Yes, that's a long long road towards a real fix for what the Republicans and the Supreme Court have broken. But the road has to start somewhere. So as much as I'm critical of lots of stuff the Democrats have done lately in Sacramento, I'm happy to see them do the right thing on that score, and hopefully spur other states to do the same.

By the way, as long as we're discussing the importance of elections and counting the vote and citizen oversight of results, etc., let me take this opportunity to reminder your readers that the reason we have Citizens United to contend with in the first place is because John Kerry didn't fight to count the goddamn votes in the state of Ohio as he had said he would prior to the 2004 elections. Because those votes were never publicly counted, we will never know who actually won the 2004 election. Instead, Bush was able to enjoy a second term, in which he installed Justices Roberts and Alito, and now the nation has Citizens United and McCutcheon and all the other outrageous rulings that have allowed billionaires like the Koch Brothers to run rough-shod over everything we thought we held dear in this country.

Yes, I still blame John Kerry for that, and we can all do the same for, likely, generations to come. But it's always a helpful remember as to why ELECTIONS MATTER -- and so does COUNTING THE GODDAMN VOTES!

I couldn't agree with you more. Anything you'd like to add before we wrap this up?

Haven't I caused enough damage already? :-) I just wanted to say thanks to you for your coverage of EI issues over the years. I wish there were many more folks doing the same. It matters. As is, we'll do our best to keep up the fight at BradBlog.com (and on my radio show, etc.) as long as I can. Ya know, I've always consider The BRAD BLOG as the Patron Blog of Lost Causes. But, we keep fighting for what's right anyway. And, at least on the "recounts for the rich" bill, it's nice to win one every now and again.

Amen to that, Brad. Thanks so much for the kind words. I appreciate your efforts on behalf of voters across the country. It was a pleasure talking with you again. I hope we can do this on a more regular basis. It's good to keep OpEdNews readers in the loop and no one covers the territory better than The BRAD BLOG!

Authors Website: http://www.opednews.com/author/author79.html

Authors Bio:

Joan Brunwasser is a co-founder of Citizens for Election Reform (CER) which since 2005 existed for the sole purpose of raising the public awareness of the critical need for election reform. Our goal: to restore fair, accurate, transparent, secure elections where votes are cast in private and counted in public. Because the problems with electronic (computerized) voting systems include a lack of transparency and the ability to accurately check and authenticate the vote cast, these systems can alter election results and therefore are simply antithetical to democratic principles and functioning.



Since the pivotal 2004 Presidential election, Joan has come to see the connection between a broken election system, a dysfunctional, corporate media and a total lack of campaign finance reform. This has led her to enlarge the parameters of her writing to include interviews with whistle-blowers and articulate others who give a view quite different from that presented by the mainstream media. She also turns the spotlight on activists and ordinary folks who are striving to make a difference, to clean up and improve their corner of the world. By focusing on these intrepid individuals, she gives hope and inspiration to those who might otherwise be turned off and alienated. She also interviews people in the arts in all their variations - authors, journalists, filmmakers, actors, playwrights, and artists. Why? The bottom line: without art and inspiration, we lose one of the best parts of ourselves. And we're all in this together. If Joan can keep even one of her fellow citizens going another day, she considers her job well done.


When Joan hit one million page views, OEN Managing Editor, Meryl Ann Butler interviewed her, turning interviewer briefly into interviewee. Read the interview here.

While the news is often quite depressing, Joan nevertheless strives to maintain her mantra: "Grab life now in an exuberant embrace!"


Joan has been Election Integrity Editor for OpEdNews since December, 2005. Her articles also appear at Huffington Post, RepublicMedia.TV and Scoop.co.nz.