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Off topic since this is about senators, but to nip a possible related thread in the bud, an important reason why remote voting for citizens is a bad idea is tha
by natch 7y ago
Off topic since this is about senators, but to nip a possible related thread in the bud, an important reason why remote voting for citizens is a bad idea is that it can enable massive scale vote manipulation through schemes to buy or otherwise influence votes.
In the privacy of one's home, outside a controlled voting booth, the problem is exacerbated, counterintuitively. A voter at home or in another uncontrolled setting could follow instructions for how to vote and then use a camera, or witnesses who are in on the scheme, to prove that they had voted a certain way, at the behest of others. In a traditional voting booth situation, where nobody else can see or verify how you voted, this kind of manipulation is not so easy to do on a mass scale.
- karatestomp 7y agoHas this happened with members of the military or in states that already allow vote-by-mail? If not, why not?
- malandrew 7y agoProbably not, but mainly due to scale. The number of people who vote remotely is so few that the amount of fraud you can get through without being detected makes it not worth the effort.
- runako 7y agoColorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington and Utah conduct their elections entirely by mail. This covers perhaps 10+ million registered voters. At what level would you consider the scale sufficient for these effects to appear?
- malandrew 7y agoThree of those four state are reliably blue. The real reward is for swing states.
- wool_gather 7y ago(I assume you were picking OR, HI, WA, and CO, not UT.) EDIT: parent has been edited since I posted to say "Three of those four state are..." rather than "Four states that are..." Half of Colorado's Congressional delegation is Republican and Clinton won the state in 2016 only by a bare plurality (48% to 43%). (UT of course is quite solidly Republican.)
- breischl 7y agoColorado at least is _not_ entirely by mail. It's an option, and a good one, and I personally use it, but it's not mandatory. To my sibling comment - "reliably blue" lol. Only in the last 3 presidential elections, and the House & Senate are split evenly. https://www.270towin.com/states/Colorado https://www.270towin.com/states/Colorado https://www.270towin.com/elected-officials/colorado https://www.270towin.com/elected-officials/colorado
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- natch 7y agoIt all depends on the cultural context. In a place where people fiercely guard and take pride in their right to a secret ballot (such as many parts of the US) it’s not likely to be a problem. In fledgling democracies it’s more likely. So it would be foolish to pin it down to a single level.
- breischl 7y agoCouldn't easily find numbers on vote-by-mail as a percentage of all votes, but this is suggestive that it's enough to swing most elections already. >In 2014 Colorado (72 percent) and Oregon (71 percent) led the nation in voter turnout of active registered voters – both states 20+ points above the national average of 48% Yet still doesn't seem to be happening. source: https://www.nonprofitvote.org/get-ballot-home-2-weeks-election-day/ https://www.nonprofitvote.org/get-ballot-home-2-weeks-electi...
- natch 7y agoIt’s hard to know. And that’s pretty much the problem.
- karatestomp 7y agoSurely investigations or monitoring have been conducted, I'd expect, in some cases, by folks belonging to A Certain Party that tends to oppose making voting easier and so would have strong motivations to turn up problems and, particularly, actual voter fraud, then make those findings very well and widely known. Have the officials performing those complained of inadequate tools or transparency to spot voter fraud? I'd very much expect so, if it is hard to know and that's pretty much the problem. So perhaps they have.
- djtriptych 7y agoThis is a complete strawman. Has this ever been an actual problem with actual remote voting? Could someone do this at scale _without detection_? No.
- 12xo 7y agoCite the data, cite the source of this outrageous assertion.
- downerending 7y agoVoting has been secret pretty much everywhere during modern history, and we all know why.
- akvadrako 7y agoThe secret ballot has been a prominent element of democracy since it was invented. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot
- throwaway9899 7y agoAs someone who lives in a single party state with zero hope of my vote ever mattering in a federal election my vote would definitely be for sale if voting from home was the norm, not that anyone with a brain would buy it.
- akvadrako 7y agoI agree - I don't think votes are worth much and would be willing to sell mine for $100 or so. I'm sure many people would do it for less.
- djtriptych 7y agoNo you wouldn't. You'd go to jail.