Montana voting system shut down after Kamala Harris left off ballot

MicroWave@lemmy.world to politics @lemmy.world – 605 points – Montana voting system shut down after Kamala Harris left off ballot
newsweek.com

Montana's election season has gotten off to a rocky start after absentee voters realized Kamala Harris was not a listed candidate on their ballot.

The state was forced to shut down its electronic absentee voter system after it went live on September 20 when a voter reported that there was no option to vote for the vice president.

Max Himsl, a Montana voter living in the UK, reported the issue when trying to fill out his ballot online, according to the Daily Inter Lake, a local newspaper. He reported it right away to the Flathead County Election Department on Friday, September 20.

As a precaution the Secretary of State's office, run by Republican Christi Jacobson, took down the electronic absentee system for troubleshooting, although it insisted that very few voters had been affected by this issue.

šŸ—³ļø Register to vote: https://vote.gov/

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Why does the Left keep on getting away with this blatant election fraud!

To be fair, in this case it's election fraud, but your question is no less valid because of it.

GOP is nothing but a bunch of con men these days.

These days? Ronald Reagan was a decent actor. Maybe not as decent as Richard Nixon.

Next, they say that all ballots that were already submitted have to be counted as-is. Then later, it's revealed that there were Kamala Harris write-ins submitted during this time, but rather than being counted, they were discarded as invalid

In Montana, I believe, write-ins for president are always invalid

Why allow them at all if they're guaranteed not to win?

They're not "guaranteed" not to win. Technically, 100 million people could spontaneously wake up and decide that they all want to vote for Tom Hanks as President of the United States. So long as Tom Hanks meets the qualifications for President, he wins.

Of course, I have a better chance of winning the lottery every day until Christmas, and get blown by every NFL cheerleader in alphabetical order than of that ever happening. but our constitution does allow for the possibility.

This is the chaos the GOP has been planting in different states so that they can delegitimize their states voting to justify sending "alternate" electors.

Hey, you may need a break! We don't need to write the fanfic for the other side, that's usually a sign of burnout.

You should rest up then get back to it when you can be less defeatist. We need you.

People are downvoting you but I could definitely see myself needing a reality check like this in the next weeks, or probably days.

Talk about you had one job. It's a fucking two party dualopoly and you still f'd it up. Wreaks of intent.

Also way to go Montana for having online voting though. How many states have this now?

I'm going to give you "dualopoly," it's usually duopoly but I like yours.

But the omission "reeks" of evil intent, as in we smell a rat. It will "wreak" (cause with terrible consequences) havoc on the election.

Obviously it doesn't really matter in Lemmy comments, but in case you want to use the words in a more formal situation, the more you know šŸŒˆ.

Look, it's a one-party system, be realistic. Before running an obvious spoiler you should focus on winning the Republican primary and getting more people in the state legislature.

although it insisted that very few voters had been affected by this issue.

Sus

Even if a dozen voters were affected, that's practically the entire resident population of Montana!

in case you're having trouble understanding the population of Montana, I'll post a quote from Wikipedia below.

Montana, also. has not politically been absolutely Red or Blue. I'm not familiar with the politics of the state, but it is not historically Red or Blue, though I'm pretty sure it's voted for Trump, and it's previous Gov was a two-term Democrat. Current Gov is GOP Gianforte. Also sitting U.S. Montana Senator Jon Tester is a Dem.

People have been living in Montana for thousands of years. Ask them about immigrants. And I don't mean just ask the people running casinos.

The United States Census Bureau states that the population of Montana was 1,132,812 on July 1, 2023, a 4.5% increase since the 2020 census.[191] The 2020 census put Montana's population at 1,084,225. During the first decade of the new century, growth was mainly concentrated in Montana's seven largest counties, with the highest percentage growth in Gallatin County, which had a 32.9% increase in its population from 2010 to 2020. The city having the largest percentage growth was Kalispell, with 40.1%, and the city with the largest increase in actual residents was Billings, with an increase in population of 12,946 from 2010 to 2020. >>

People have been living in Montana for thousands of years. Ask them about immigrants.

The ones who've been living there for thousands of years, or rather the very few that are left, probably aren't too fond of it.

Or did you mean to write hundreds?

sure. the indigenous people were just genocided, i guess, forced out or killed, I don't even know. hopefully the headline in question doesn't mean someone is trying to throw all elections in the state into question. it's early still.

And so it begins, GOP election officials are gonna be getting up to all sorts of shit this cycle. I really hope we can turn out enough to make their efforts fruitless.

Overwhelming numbers. Polls and national stories need to be ignored and we just need to get every single person we can to vote.

Has anyone done a systematic study on ballot bullshit like this to determine if it is ever in the other direction, or is it always, without exception, done to harm Democrats?

electronic absentee voter system

the Secretary of Stateā€™s office, run by Republican Christi Jacobson

All you need to know right there.

Didnā€™t SCOTUS say it wasnā€™t legal for Colorado to do that to Trump?

Colorado was trying to do it on purpose using the legal system. This at least sounds like a mistake.

ā€œMistakeā€

ā€œWhoopsie daisy, I forgot to add 1 of the 2 candidates to the voting system, Iā€™m such a silly gooseā€

I mean, absentee votes in Montana are not a very good target if it was intentional.

If youā€™re trying to sow doubt in the election process from the ground up, itā€™s a great place to start.

ā€œLook Montana had an issue with absentee votes, where else do we have issuesā€

Becomes

ā€œMontana had absentee voting issues, we canā€™t trust anything from absentee votes at all, they donā€™t countā€

Uhm, every vote counts.

Surely. But if your purpose it to affect the ultimate outcome with the electoral college in mind, then this is not a good choice. It's not exactly a swing state. Far from it.

At this point the GOP will just keep trying crap like this and people will just allow it all ..... until eventually, the right just gets tired of playing around and just takes power out right because they know no one will stop them

If you really feel this way, you're too tired and need a break. Others can and will spell you.

You should take some time to recover and avoid posting defeatist stuff like this.

Hope you feel better!

I also feel this way, I would like that break you're talking about. When can I expect my check for 12-48 months worth of living expenses and the ticket to a country that isn't one election away from fascism?

That's awesome, America is up there with Zimbabwe for rigging elections

Ahh once again doing the same thing orbƔn did in hungary. They had very few places to do absentee voting so there were 10+ hour queues at the stands. They knew that like 95% of voters outside hungary would vote opposition. The one place that had enough voter stands and proper support was romania where they had a huge voter base(after they gave out a bunch of hungarian passports because historically it was hungarian land).

Easy, mark all ballots already filled out as invalid because the choices weren't properly given. Less R ballots to count.

Trump is 21 points ahead in Montana anyway. Harris never had a hope of winning there

Right - so easy win for Republicans, why mess with it? I'm guessing to try to reduce the disparity of the popular vote. Bad form.