"Military Overseas Voting: Help may be on the way
Our most basic charge as service member is to defend the country and its way of life. No action exemplifies the core principles of freedom more than the simple act of voting. It is our most basic right and one that we have had to fight for throughout our history. One would think that for those charged with its defense, casting a vote would be simple. Sadly, this is not the case. Many service members vote not in the district in which they are stationed, but in their home of record. The transitory lifestyle of the military makes this a common and necessary practice, and local municipalities generally have effective procedures in place to accommodate its constituents serving around the country. However, for those serving overseas the process is difficult, and for those deployed overseas, the process is practically impossible to navigate without the help and support of the DOD.
In 2000, I was deployed to Bosnia during the Presidential Primary Elections. Knowing beforehand that I would be deployed, I applied for an absentee ballot. As I did not know where I would be stationed, I had it sent to my parents thinking that they would be able to send it to me, and I could return it in time. As you can imagine, this was not the case. The ballot took two weeks to get to me at Camp Tuzla, another two weeks for it to return to California, and it missed the deadline. For all of us who have been deployed, we all know and accept the realities of the Military postal system. By and large, the system works pretty well, but it is near impossible to deal with anything time sensitive. In Bosnia, the system was unpredictable. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the system is functional, but chaotic. Clearly, there needs to be a special emphasis and assistance from the DOD in order to ensure that those who are fighting for our freedoms are able to cast their vote and be counted.
Currently the DOD uses the Federal Voter Assistance Program (FVAP), which provides a 460 page instruction manual detailing the step by step procedures for completing and sending the Federal Post Card Application (FPCA). The FPCA is a combined voter registration and absentee ballot application that was created from the Uniformed and Overseas Citizen Absentee Voter Act of 1986. As states have a variety of different requirements, the “catch all” FPCA is difficult to fill out and a significant portion end up getting rejected by the states. According to a Pew Research study, 40,000 military FPCAs were rejected in 2006 due to some error in filling out state requirements. Furthermore, units Voter Assistance Officers are not given proper training on the difference between local registration and the FPCA.
In 2004 I was appointed as the Voter Assistance Officer (VAO) for my Troop. The only information or guidance I received was the memo assigning me the extra duty. Being responsible, I set out on my own to find resources and pathways to get my soldiers registered either locally or in their home state. I did locate the FVAP, and made attempts to get every soldier that was interested properly registered. In 2004 this was not as easy of a task as it is today. In garrison, this program works, as it relies on the predictability of the US. Mail. However, the Pew study shows that in 2004 VAOs reached only 50%of military voters. Furthermore, states require a myriad of different requirements that lead to confusion and error when filling out the FPCA. The Federal Voter Assistance Program is assigned the responsibility to register overseas voters, yet does not have the authority to affect and change the systems needed to make registration happen.
On October 1, the Senate passed S 3073, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act. This act requires the Secretary of Defense to establish procedures for collecting absentee ballots of military overseas voters in elections for federal office; and delivering such ballots to the appropriate state election officials. Additionally, it mandates that the delivery must take place prior to the polls closing and authorized the DOD to use express mail and contract delivery services to ensure local receipt of ballots.
This Act takes care of the biggest and most obvious flaw with Federal Voter Assistance Program. As anyone who has been deployed will tell you, it is impossible to plan for anything time sensitive through the mail from a combat zone. In 2006 86% of the FPCAs were sent via the mail, and with the military postal system average round trip being 24-36 days to and from Iraq and Afghanistan there is little to no room for error. Given that most service members transfer units every two to three years, and are deployed every 18- 24 months; most addresses are obsolete by the next election cycle. In 2006 this resulted in 35,000 military and overseas citizen absentee ballots being returned to local election officials as undeliverable. By requiring the DOD to ensure the safe and timely passage of military ballots to their home districts each election cycle, service members are one step closer toward ensuring that the vote that they fight to defend gets counted. Additionally, by not distinguishing between FPCAs and locally obtained election materials, the DOD allows for a much smoother process in requesting and returning the service member’s absentee ballot.
S 3073 is not a complete solution. While it does provide a greater level of assistance to the service members in ensuring timely delivery of election materials, it does not directly address the variance in state registration requirements, nor does it provide the FVAP broader authorities in reducing barriers for military voters. S3073 is a good first step, and one that I feel is long since overdue." ... Tom Tarantino.
VA Clarifies Voter Registration RegulationsSee: http://www1.va.gov/opa/pressrel/pressrelease.cfm?id=1564
"September 8, 2008 - WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced today it has clarified its policy on assisting veterans’ voter registration activities, with particular focus on inpatients and residents of VA community living centers, domiciliaries and patients with limited access to community voter registration resources.
The Department will welcome state and local election officials and non-partisan groups to its hospitals and outpatient clinics to assist VA officials in registering voters at VA facilities. Such assistance, however, must be coordinated by those facilities in order to avoid disruptions to patient care.
“VA has always been committed to helping veterans exercise their constitutional right to vote, which they defended for all Americans while serving their nation,” said Dr. James B. Peake, Secretary of Veterans Affairs. “We’ve now established a uniform approach to helping those of our patients who need assistance to register and to vote.”
The policy requires that information about the right of VA patients to register and vote, and other patients’ rights, be posted in every VA hospital, and that all VA patients be provided a copy of these rights when they are admitted to a VA facility.
Every hospital is now also required to publish a written policy on voter assistance, allowing patients to leave the hospital to register and vote, subject to the opinions of their health care providers. Patients unable to leave the facility must be assisted to register and to vote by absentee ballot.
In their written policies, VA hospital are required to establish the criteria they will use to evaluate requests from outside agencies to register voters, and to determine where, when, and how such registration activities will be conducted. They will also develop procedures to coordinate offers of assistance from state and local governments and from non-partisan organizations, and how to work with VA’s Regional Counsel offices to determine whether or not groups offering registration help are non-partisan, as required by law.
Voluntary Service Program Managers at each of VA’s 153 hospitals will be responsible for implementing the new policy, and for providing timely and accurate voting information to veterans cared for at their facilities. They will also obtain and maintain materials that are needed to assist veterans with voter registration requirements."
Original article: http://www.alternet.org/democracy/88012
An attorney for the Department of Veterans Affairs, which runs hospitals and homeless shelters for veterans, told a federal appeals court Thursday that the VA could not conceive of any circumstance where voter registration drives could occur at its facilities.
"This is an activity that could be seen as harming the appearance of the VA's neutrality," said Owen Martikan, assistant U.S. attorney representing the agency, adding voter registration drives would interfere with patient medical care and also violate the federal Hatch Act, which limits federal employees from participating in political campaign activities.
"If you cure the problem of overt partisanship, you are creating another problem," Martikan said. "Once you let in someone else, you are not being neutral unless you let everyone in."
But Scott Rafferty, a Washington, D.C.-based attorney who has spent several years arguing the VA must allow voter registration drives to help wounded former soldiers register and vote, disagreed.
"Integrating veterans into the communities that they live in is the highest honor we can award veterans," Rafferty told the court.
The issue before a federal appeals court in San Francisco is whether restrictions on voter registration drives at the VA's campus in nearby Menlo Park are unconstitutional.
The case has national significance. The VA has facilities across the country serving thousands of veterans. In 1994, then-President Bill Clinton ordered the VA to help register veterans. However, the VA ceased allowing voter registration drives during the Bush administration.
Several U.S. senators and California's secretary of state, all Democrats, have asked the VA to become a voter registration agency like motor vehicle departments. This spring, the VA issued a new policy saying it would help vets -- who asked for help -- to register and to vote. The VA also said it would allow nonpartisan voter registration drives, but then rescinded the policy on registration drives.
The suit before the federal appeals court is revisiting the question of whether Steve Preminger, chair of the Santa Clara County Democratic Central Committee -- where the Menlo Park facility is located -- has standing to question the constitutionality of the VA's policy.
On Thursday, judges from the three-judge panel asked the VA if there was any circumstance where it could conceive of a nonpartisan voter registration drive. One judge said students at her daughter's high school were given voter registration forms when they are 17-1/2 years old -- and asked why veterans cannot be given the same opportunity?
"It's a different environment than a school," Martikan said. "It means diverting resources from patient care."
Another judge laid out a scenario where anyone who would participate in voter registration efforts would not wear campaign buttons or say what party they belonged to. He asked if the VA would object to a voter registration drive if participants were told "no partisan activities."
That would not satify the VA, Martikan said, saying, the "VA has different interests."
Martikan said that Preminger and an associate came onto the VA campus in a car that had an "impeach Bush" bumper sticker. "They introduced themselves as members of the Democratic Party," he said, adding it was a fiction that registration drive participants could "pretend to be nonpartisan."
After the hearing, Preminger said his attempts to register voters were neither overtly partisan nor disruptive.
"I don't carry myself that way -- not at all," he said.
Preminger said Republican Party volunteers have been able to visit the Menlo Park facility to register voters.
