Alaska voting issues

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Election and registration information

Voting machines

2008 election

For the 2008 election Alaska used the following voting machines in addition to hand-counted paper ballots in some counties. For a county-by-county list of the specific machines (and the source for this section) see Verified Votings' Verifier tool.

Main article: Voting machines

Direct-Recording Electronic (DRE) machines with a paper trail:

Optical scan machines:

Governmental election authorities

Alaska Division of Elections

Director: Gail Fenumiai

  • Physical Address:
Division of Elections, Court Plaza Building, 240 Main Street, 4th Floor, Juneau, AK 99801
  • Mailing Address:
Division of Elections, PO Box 110017, Juneau, AK 99811-0017
  • Director's Office:
Phone (907) 465-4611
Toll-Free (866) 952-8683
Fax (907) 465-3203

Election threats

Vote tabulation procedures

  • Nov 18, 2008. Counting has been completed in the Alaska general election. With only 2,500 overseas ballots remaining to be counted, challenger Mark Begich has defeated long-time Senator Ted Stevens by a margin of 3,724 votes[1], well outside the range which would allow Stevens to request a state-funded recount.
  • Nov 12, 2008. Over 30% of the state's ballots remain uncounted, according to tallies released by the Alaska Division of Elections.[2] Over 90,000 absentee, early, and "question" ballots have been held pending verification, and more continue to arrive; absentee ballots sent by mail have up to 15 days after election day (if mailed from overseas) to arrive.[2] Several extremely close races cannot be called due to the large number of outstanding ballots, including the closely-watched race between Senator Ted Stevens and challenger Mark Begich. Currently Stevens leads Begich by 3,257 votes.[2] According to Gail Fenumiai, Director of the Division of Elections, the majority of the ballots will be counted today, with the remainder completed before the state deadline of November 19.[3] Alaska is one of the few states where all votes are counted on the state, rather than county, level. [3]
  • Nov 10, 2008. More than 50,000 votes which were not included in the original election-day tallies in Alaska will be counted on Wednesday, according to election officials. [4] No absentee or early votes, which make up a substantial portion of Alaska's vote tallies, have yet been counted; Alaska officials cross-check all ballots against election day's precinct voter lists to ensure that no one has voted twice before beginning the count.[4]
  • For an extensive log of voting machine problems, see the VotersUnite! report on election incidents.[5]

State and local non-governmental election organizations

League of Women Voters, Alaska; Marianne Mills, President

Regional Offices

Articles and resources

See also


References

  1. Sean Cockerham,Begich defeats Stevens in Senate race,Anchorage Daily News, Nov 18, 2008.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Dan Joling, 30 percent of Alaska ballots waiting to be counted, Associated Press, November 11, 2008.
  3. 3.0 3.1 Rena Delbridge, One week later, more than one-quarter of Alaska votes still haven’t been counted. Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, November 11, 2008.
  4. 4.0 4.1 Lisa Desjardins,Alaska to Count 50,000 more votes Wednesday, CNN Political Ticker, gathered November 11, 2008.
  5. See the VotersUnite! Election Problem Log.

External resources

Poll location

Election Protection hotlines

Voting information

Voting rights

Voting requirements

Election officials, election reform groups, and elected officials

Absentee voting

Disabled voters

Student voting rights

State ballot

  • See how organizations you trust recommend you vote on ballot measures and other statewide contests at TransparentDemocracy.

Languages

  • Help in other languages from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. 中文, 日本語, 한국어, Tagalog, Tiếng Việt, Español

Voting machines

Election law


External articles