this post was submitted on 31 Oct 2024
71 points (98.6% liked)

politics

19222 readers
2639 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

To be fair this is a reasonable request. Already parts of the process allow for "challengers" from parties to observe. He just thinks there's a gap missing and an additional part of the process should be covered.

I don't know the candidate at all, but from the referenced St Louse Post Dispatch ( https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/government-politics/early-voting-to-continue-thursday-in-st-charles-county-official-says-despite-court-order/article_676c7a2c-971b-11ef-bab2-436acacb7089.html / https://archive.is/Mo5WA ) it sounds like he's actually quite reasonable. After all,

He told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that he has no suspicion of wrongdoing and simply wants to be able to observe.

The only thing is that I wish he had done so earlier, say a year and a half ago. Then there would have been enough time then to fix this and get things approved without needing to stop anyone from early voting as the injunction he requests requires.

[–] reddig33 16 points 1 month ago (2 children)

It’s neither fair nor reasonable unless he is placed behind a two way mirror so that voters cannot see him and keeps to himself. Otherwise it’s politicking and intimidation. States have rules about having to stay certain amount of feet from polling places with political signs, t-shirts, etc. The candidate is nothing but a living breathing “vote for me” billboard if they’re allowed to sit in a polling place.

If he’s really concerned about it, he should hire someone to observe who meets neutral observer qualifications (doesn’t talk to voters, sits a certain distance from the public, wears neutral clothing, etc.).

[–] AbidanYre 5 points 1 month ago

behind a two way mirror so that voters cannot see him

Letting him secretly watch people vote somehow seems even worse to me.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I've not seen anything to suggest that the candidate wants to personally observe things.

Rather, as per the St Louis Post,

Travis Allen Heins, of St. Peters, filed for the injunction on Wednesday, saying that official "watchers" or "challengers" were wrongly being kept from observing inside polling places during early voting in St. Charles County.
His suit requests that early voting not be allowed to continue without watchers or challengers. Such observers had been disallowed by Bahr, because he said they're only allowed in when ballots are being prepared for counting, or being counted, on election day.

I.e. he's fine with meeting all the requirements you list, but he wants the observers to be able to observe the early voting tabulation on the days of early voting, not just the checks or tabulation that happens only starting on election day.

[–] reddig33 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

The story and headline are confusing because they repeatedly say HE should be allowed to observe. Not that he should be allowed to hire observers (even though that’s probably what’s being discussed).

[–] mkwt 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

To be fair, I think it's more typical for these kinds of partisan poll observers to operate on a volunteer basis.

Here's a nice YouTube that describes one experience representing the interests of Count Binface in the recent UK election.

[–] 7112 5 points 1 month ago

The ones I've dealt with in the US in past elections were volunteers. 99% were great, but one was a former candidate and caused all kinds of problems. The clerk ended up removing him in the end.

Also in most states challengers/poll watches are not allowed to speak to voters. If they have concerns they need to talk to the actual poll workers