Jackson Free Press

Attn: USM students registered to vote on campus tomorrow for the presidential election:
Ballots being shipped to the campus were not delivered, and most likely, will not be delivered.
A protest is being organized for tomorrow for all disenfranchised students. please call Kim Dixon at 601-266-3385 for more information. [...]

I got through to Kim finally. Apparently there was a SNAFU at city hall. If a resident wanting to vote on campus did not write down what dorm they were in, their application was rejected. Residents were never given notification of this with the powers that be giving the excuse of "not having enough manpower"

This apparently affects several hundred residents on campus who never received notice that their applications were rejected. The Mayor is trying to work something out. Students may be able to vote by affidavit tomorrow--but with several hundred being in the same predicament, there is likely to be lots of confusion and some may still be unable to vote.

The protest will be downtown outside the couthouse all day for students to voice their thoughts and opinions.

Anyone with info, please update this thread.

Previous Comments

ID

137292

Comment

The ACLU of Mississippi, the Mississippi Democratic Party and the Mississippi Center for Justice is on this... More when I know more..

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T09:38:39-06:00

ID

137293

Comment

Why the heck is the Hattiesburg American not reporting this on their site? Seems like they'd have at least given it a blurb.

Author

kaust

Date

2004-11-02T09:40:22-06:00

ID

137294

Comment

There is an ongoing protest as we speak at the Circuit Clerk's office... More when I know more...

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T09:42:23-06:00

ID

137295

Comment

CNN notified

Author

MrBill

Date

2004-11-02T10:04:43-06:00

ID

137296

Comment

Complaint has been filed with the Secretary of State's office..

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T10:10:59-06:00

ID

137297

Comment

Just call a call from the Kerry office in Hattiesburg.. The lady said there is no precinct on campus so she's confused about this issue. She even implied that it's possible the person making the PA announcement was a Replublican! lmao She said it was true that applications without a dorm name would be rejected but that students should have been notified... More when I know more..

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T10:21:45-06:00

ID

137298

Comment

All USM students who "aren't registered" are to vote via affidavit ballot. Those ballots will then be matched against names on applications and if ballots and applications match, the vote will be counted. For ballots that don't match an application, because the application has already been discarded, aka thrown in the trash.. the ballots will be useful in a lawsuit that will be filed this week. If you're a USM student and you were denied your right to vote because of some excuse about not putting your dorm name on your application, go back and vote and tell them to use an affidvait ballot. If they refuse to give you the ballot, demand they call the elections supervisor.

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T10:48:20-06:00

ID

137299

Comment

Correction: not affidavit ballots... request a provisional ballot.. provisional ballots are something new in all states this year.

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-02T10:59:39-06:00

ID

137300

Comment

Good work all of you. Thank you, Jody, in particular. Everyone else, keep the info coming in. We've got to protect the integrity of voting in Mississippi. Too many people to give us all the right. Screw the rain. Get to the polls. Get everyone you know to the polls. This can be our year to have our voices heard.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2004-11-02T11:01:23-06:00

ID

137301

Comment

From CNN--on Provisional Ballots Other major concerns were over provisional ballots, new this presidential election and a potential source of delayed counts, and whether poll workers were adequate and sufficiently trained. "To a certain extent, provisional ballots are second-class votes," said Spencer Overton, a law professor at George Washington University. "You can cast a provisional ballot but we don't know if officials will count it."

Author

MrBill

Date

2004-11-02T11:36:54-06:00

ID

137302

Comment

MrBill, that's the last thing I wanted to hear... :-( I couldn't help but feel that way this morning though my votes did go into the actual machine. I'm not sure on the technical aspects but I'm curious how the machine differentiates when calculating totals.

Author

kaust

Date

2004-11-02T11:38:34-06:00

ID

137303

Comment

Just got this from a Southern student: Any of you who have been to the polls in Hattiesburg and been turned away or seen anyone turned away for wearing generic USM apparel need to contact the Secretary of State's office NOW. Any poll worker who turns away a voter for this reason is violating Miss. Code 23-15-895 -- the provision prohibiting campaigning within 150 feet of the polls. The wording of the statute doesn't even approach what these poll workers are doing -- it prohibits passing out of literature or the presence of "uniformed representatives" of a campaign. Anything that specifically advocates the bond issue is, of course, impermissible, but general USM apparel is NOT. This may be a thinly veiled attempt to steal an election by stretching a regulation far beyond its actual scope, lying to voters, and hoping they don't check the law. Don't let that happen. The Secretary of State's election hotline is 800-829-6786. If this has happened to you, or you have seen it happen, call this number and report it. Also, if you have any contact with the administration, make sure they know about this as well. (I'm sure they do, but just to be safe.) "Vote or die, mother****er, vote or die / Can't run from a .38, go ahead and try / Voting's something that we all gotta do / So go vote, mother****er, or I'll mother****in' kill you." -- Puffy

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2004-11-02T13:29:43-06:00

ID

137304

Comment

The USM bond issue and all other Hattiesburg election results were not close at all. So people who did not specify where to deliver their ballot to would not have changed anything. The USM Bond issue needed 60% to win. It got 40 something percent. It was a pain in the but to have to go to 2 different locations to vote yesterday though. In order to vote for the USM bond issue I had to go to a different location. I got a card in the mail days ago telling me I would have to vote on the bond issue there but it took alot of time to go to both locations.

Author

herman

Date

2004-11-03T07:36:39-06:00

ID

137305

Comment

Regardless of whether or not the votes would have changed anything, the Forrest County Circuit Clerk violated law by not sending notifications to USM studens and Hattiesburg residents that their voter registrations were rejected. People lost their right to vote because the circuit clerk's office was lazy and didn't care. The fact that people were told they couldn't vote because they had on USM clothing, supposedly because that was campaigning for the USM bond issue, was also a violation of law.

Author

Jo-D

Date

2004-11-03T07:48:58-06:00

ID

137306

Comment

It's my understanding that you must be registered in order to vote in this state. Only a hand full of states let you register and vote the same day, I believe. I like the idea of being able to. I think people should be able to register when they get their driver's license. Is there a law that says you have to be able to vote between when you turn in the registration form and when you get a registration card? You aren't registered until you are approved. You should be sent acceptence or rejection of form. If accepted you get a registration card in the mail that they can ask you for to vote, right? What is the policy/law in terms of how people are notified that they have been rejected? If a person fills out the form before the registration cut-off, what time period do they have to notify you one way or the other? Not being able to vote because you have on USM clothing is crazy. I agree.

Author

herman

Date

2004-11-03T12:53:24-06:00