Turns out the ballot shortages that kept 14 polls open till 10pm in California’s Alameda County, affected at least four of the state’s largest counties. Election officials in Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo, and Santa Clara were all scrambling to accommodate crossover Independent voters who could vote in the Democratic contest. The “provisional measures” taken included printing new ballots and asking voters to hand in their sample ballots (their scratch paper, really). Still others had to fill out “blank paper ballots,” whatever that means. In Santa Clara County the heavy turnout resulted in a mad rush to photocopy and distribute about 6,000 ballots. (Kinkos is loving the ill-prepared machine that is our voting system.)
Anyone miss Diebold?
