The Northeast: The Worst Place to Vote Today?

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Despite high profile vote-counting controversies in Ohio in 2004, provisional ballot data from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission shows that the worst place to vote that year was the Northeast: the region had the second highest percentage of provisional ballots cast as a percentage of voter registration, 1.34, but reported the lowest rate of counting those ballots, 42.8 percent. The worst state was New York, with a whopping 2.21 percent of registered voters casting provisional ballots, yet only 40 percent of those ballots being counted. That means the percentage of people who were denied a vote in New York was .88 percent—or more than the .79 percent margin that decided the presidential election that year in New Mexico.

Provisional ballots, which were required for the first time in 2004 by the Help America Vote Act, aren’t the only measures of election fairness, but a large number of provisional ballots cast and then invalidated most likely means: 1) Voters are uneducated about registration rules, or 2) Elections officials are excluding people who should be eligible—neither of which is good news.

So how are things going this year in the Empire State? The Albany Times-Union reports on phone calls, some automated and some allegedly made by people who live nowhere near New York, that are raising complaints on both sides of the aisle of unfair campaign tactics: “Republicans claimed Democrats were misdirecting voters to the wrong polling places — an allegation Democrats chalked up to honest errors.”

Among New York residents to hit a snag: Chelsea Clinton

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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