May 27, 2012 update: According to The Associated Press, Kurt Schrader, the centrist incumbent in Oregon’s 5th Congressional District lost the Democratic primary defeat to Jamie McLeod Skinner, his progressive opponent.
President Biden had supported Schrader.
According to the AP, Lori Chavez DeRemer won the Republican primary.
Original story:
A misprint ballot caused delays in the election of primaries in an Oregon congressional district that is highly competitive.
Because of smudged barcodes that made them difficult to read by tabulating machines, more than half the Oregon’s third-most populous counties have had to be reprocessed. This has left Oregon’s 5th Congressional District without a Democratic primary.
The centrist incumbent Rep. Kurt Schrader trails Jamie McLeod Skinner, his progressive opponent, in that race. According to The Associated Press, McLeod–Skinner led Schrader 58% to 42% as of Thursday afternoon. (On the GOP side Lori Chavez DeRemer declared victory. The AP has not called the race.
If McLeod Skinner wins, it would be the first time that party-affiliated voters have defeated a sitting member in a primary election in Oregon in 42 years.
The county administrators have transferred 200 employees from other departments to assist in the time-consuming process of manually copying votes from flawed ballots onto new, more error-free ballots. Two people must be involved in each ballot’s hand-copying. They should come from different political parties. Officials from the county provide nightly updates on new vote totals, but they do not expect to finalize results until nearer certification day, which is expected to be June 13 aEUR” weeks after May 17’s primary.
The public is allowed to view the ballot reprocessing process through plate-glass windows. This observation can be made from a long corridor that overlooks the workers. To identify their political parties, workers wear colored lanyards.
Renel Murr (a volunteer organizer for the local Republican Party) explained from the hallway that she came to the election building to watch over the ballot workers.
Murr stated that “we are just being observers on this portion of the electoral process in order to ensure that everything is running smoothly and prevent any nefarious activities from happening.” “So, we’re just keeping them on their toes.”
Murr and other voters feel that the misprinted ballot fiasco has increased their fears that the ballot-counting systems aren’t reliable. This belief is rooted in the false theory of a rigged 2020 general election against President Donald Trump.
This week, a small group of protesters gathered in front the county elections building to protest the lackluster results. They blamed the state’s mail in voting system, counting machines, and multi-day voting, as well as other conspiracies planted by Trump supporters.
Some Republicans have become obsessed with hand-counting election results. In fact, some GOP legislators and officials from states across the country are pushing for the removal of the ballot-tabulation machines. Experts in election counted that going back to hand counting ballots would prove costly and time-consuming. Also, the possibility of human error would reduce the accuracy of election results.
Some voters have distrusted the Clackamas County election officials, with Sherry Hall, the independent elected clerk of the county, at the centre of many criticisms. Shemia Fagan (Democratic Secretary of State), has criticised Hall for several alleged mistakes, including failing to act quickly when she learned about the misprinted ballots. Hall later admitted that she should have done more sooner but didn’t elaborate on why.
Hall stated, “I just didn’t.” Hall stated, “I don’t have any other reasons than to say that I didn’t.”
Hall aEUR”, whose Facebook page “likes”, several far-right pages, one of which promotes Trump’s false claim about the election being stolen aEUR”, was also caught lying to reporters. She claimed that her office did not know how Schrader’s campaign got early access to count ballots. The county released video footage of her talking with an employee before allowing the campaign representative into the building. McLeod Skinner called for an investigation into the incident and Fagan called the footage “outrageous”. Hall has not commented on the video footage.
Some voters are now speculating if the mistakes were made intentionally, which has only added to their already-existing distrust of the electoral system.
That’s what brought Jim Arn, a local voter, to the hallway of election observers the day after Election Day. Arn stated that he does not trust the ballot counting machines.
“You don’t know. Arn stated that it’s going into a black box. “I would like someone to look into those machines and find out what they contain.”
Arn stated that he believed in Trump’s false accusations that the 2020 election had been stolen. He also said that he fears that Trump will be able to use this mistake with the local elections office.
“It’s really convenient, right?” Arn agreed.
