Here’s some cool news for those of you who voted this week on Long Island—the voting machines in which your historic lever-pushing took place could very well have been the same machine your grandmother used to vote for Kennedy back in 1960. Oh, wait, that’s not so cool.
But the antiquated machines were not the biggest problems at some polling sites. People were.
Besides a self-defeating attempt to avoid lines by showing up at 6 a.m.— before the polling place officially opened— and ending up on…a long line, there were many other problems that popped up throughout the day at the polls.
While working as an election inspector for Islip’s 10th Election District (ED), my first sign of things to come occurred before noon. One poll watcher at Islip Middle School, where I was assigned, was accused by security guards of passing out campaign flyers too close to the polls—otherwise known as electioneering, an illegal practice—a charge the poll watcher denied. That’s aside from two accusations of voter fraud made amid the massive voter turnout this reporter witnessed.
Among the tiniest slivers of political boundaries possible, yet the largest district at this polling place, the 10th ED is a heavily Republican chunk of the South Shore hamlet that—like many polling places nationwide—saw an estimated 80 percent turnout, not including absentee ballots.
“This is the craziest I’ve seen it and I’ve been doing this a long time,” says one election worker who has staffed the polls on and off since the ’60s but declined to be identified for fear of not being rehired. And yes, while some national figures for the youth vote turnout were smaller than anticipated, the kids were out in force here, as were voters from all walks of life that veteran inspectors say they never see.
It was an easy gig to get. After a call to the Board of Elections and filling out the application, there was a three-hour, paid training seminar. Upon passing the short quiz, I learned where I would be working. My job was filling out Voter Participation Reports, which lists name, party and number for each voter as they sign in.
The staff, predominantly retirees—folks who said they’d splurge on the $200-plus payday—fielded the onslaught of questions from inexperienced voters who often confused a school district with an election district and didn’t realize that each polling place has multiple EDs. And there were firsts on both sides of the table: For example, a voter arrived with a court order in hand allowing him to vote on the machines, which was a judicial remedy to a registration irregularity that threatened to prevent him from exercising his civic duty. Then, in a sign of how wacky things had become, a neighboring ED discovered that one voter, displeased with the presidential candidates, wrote in his own name.
After cameos by a local politician and cable news reporter who cast their ballots, the big challenge consisted of staying focused during the 17-hour shift. After processing 400-something voters, everyone starts to look the same.
But there were standout moments: First, the names of two women—with the same name in the same ED—were mixed up on the sign-in sheet (the error was later corrected). Next, a voter realized that someone else had signed in and voted in his name. Only first-time voters were asked for identification, with the rest being verified through signature comparisons.
“The inspectors don’t necessarily know everybody and you’re not hired to be a handwriting expert when you compare these things,” says Tom Noble, assistant to Republican Elections Commissioner Cathy Richter Geier at the Suffolk County Board of Elections. Unless a formal challenge is filed, no investigation can be conducted. He adds, “We’re not seeing those challenges,” but there have been many “sloppy registrations.”
Attempts to contact the voter, who made a scene over his “stolen” vote, were unsuccessful.
The rumored switch to electronic voting machines next year, a proposition that has been doubtful for years, won’t avoid such mix-ups. Nor will it erase the need for poll watchers like Jonathan Grindell, the man detained by security guards. “That was the only site where I had any problems,” says Grindell, calling it “kind of wild.”
And to think this group of inspectors was first shocked at the 10th voter, who lashed out at those at the table because he had to wait on line before the polls opened. At the surprisingly quiet closing time (everyone had apparently hurried to beat the lines, so there were no last-second voters to be had), cheers echoed through the main lobby.
Finally, the inspector team opened the back of the aging, sea-foam green machines, tallying the numbers on the back, possibly for the last time. But at 10 minutes before 10 p.m., after results were called in to the election board’s Yaphank headquarters, it was too late to get nostalgic.