How The Hell Did Biden Win In Maine?-- A Guest Post By Laurie Dobson

Tuesday exit polling had very quickly predicted a Bernie win in Maine-- where he also won in 2016. (In fact, he beat Hillary 64.3% to 35.5%.) But... by the time all the votes were counted:

• Status Quo Joe- 34.1%
• Bernie- 32.9%
• Elizabeth- 15.7%
• Bloomberg- 12.0%
• Tulsi- 0.9%

How did that happen? We asked former Senate candidate (2008) Laurie Dobson. This is what she wrote:

My island town of Cranberry Isles, Maine ran out of ballots last night on Super Tuesday, March, 3, 2020. We had to call the Secretary of State to try to get more. Not everyone could stay and wait, while they sent us a photocopied ballot that we could copy, so we could have enough ballots for other people that were coming to vote.

Why did we run out? We should have had enough ballots. In our town on our island we had 26 Democrats and 22 Undeclared. Why were we only given 9 ballots? The last time we spoke to the State officials was at 5:30 PM. From 6 to 8 PM on election night, I could not get through at their election number (207) 624-7650 or (888) 868-3763. If I had come after 6 they were not answering the phones and I could not have gotten copies for myself and others to vote.

My vote matters to me. It aggravated me that there were 42 ballots available for Republicans but only nine for us Democrats. Islesford the island next to us had a few more voters registered and they got 12 Democratic ballots and had one left by 5:30, when I came to our election pulling location in the ladies aid building.

I wondered why our town clerk did not prepare for our having enough ballots. it turns out that she had called the day before the election and complained that they did not have enough and was told that she would have enough. She was not sent any more ballots but on Election Day she was told that she could photocopy a ballot sent by the Secretary of State who would give permission to get the ballots.

I was told by our election workers that there were other problems in other towns. Somebody heard that Deering High School in Portland ran out of ballots and that this was a widespread problem in Maine.

On my Facebook page I asked if anyone else had this problem in their towns I learned that across the board there were towns that ran out of ballots. Everyone was aghast, with angry emojis being the popular response. I counted large and small towns and wondered how many voters were affected.

When I learned that Bernie Sanders was not ahead in Maine, a state which was highly enthused by his campaign last election, I became suspicious. He was ahead by a large degree in the expected results.

As I write this the election result is still undecided in Maine, too close to call.

As a caucus captain and Bernie candidate for State Rep in 2016, I saw that Bernie was not supported by the by the Democratic Party State officials, and this played out in prejudicial practices towards my campaign and also during the town caucuses. I took a video of a man who was angry that his registration was not brought by the town clerk to the voting place all registrations from A to G somehow did not arrive and those people had to take provisional ballots and were not assured that their votes would count.

When I followed Bernie across New Hampshire in the week prior to his primary there, I saw the treatment of him by the media particularly MSNBC. Because there were so many oppositional reports about him by these media persons, I expected to see some practices continuing against Bernie in Maine in 2020.

When I arrived at the voting place and was told there was no ballot for me to vote on that evening it confirmed my worst suspicions. Since we changed over to a primary from a caucus this year, just like Minnesota, another state Bernie was expected to win, officials were not used to running a primary; the last one was in 2000.

I did expect that officials would be prepared for a high turnout since that's what everyone's been hearing now for weeks. Ryder Kessler who I spoke with today, is the Voter Protection Director of the Maine Democratic Party. He said it was a “very active election day with 64% turn out. It did not go as smoothly as you'd prefer.”

I explained to him that I had been in touch with the Maine Bureau of Corporations Elections and Commissions, and had spoken to Anne Boucher, the ‘Customer Service Representative Specialist’. She told me that this problem with smoothness apparently happened in all 500 municipalities in Maine. It did not just happen with our town or a few other towns. Ballots ran out all across Maine, from large towns such as Portland, to small town such as Waite, Maine (an apt moniker), and included Camden, Freeport, Union, Scarborough, Saco, and our five- island town.

Anne told me that “anytime there is a problem, you could email to the drop box or stay on hold to get someone who could send photocopies of ballots. Some people were on hold 20 minutes,” she said, and she said that our town should have called them.

I defended our town clerk and said that she had tried to call the day before without result. Anne checked and saw that we had received 25 absentee Republican ballots and 10 absentee Democratic ballots, although she did not tell me how many regular ones we got, but that must have been a total of about 21 between our two islands, which was not enough to cover our registered voters.

She said people were faxing them and could not get through, but said we could have used a drop box to give the information (but admitted that they were so busy they could not get to it although they were able to get to the fax machine) and they worked 15 and a half hours non-stop, without a break.

“It was crazy,” she said. “It wasn’t just your town, it was 500 municipalities.” All of them? I asked her. “every single one was…just about…mmn hmmn. A lot of (people) were unenrolled and didn’t have enough to cover them. A lot wanted to enroll last minute on election day or even before that. That was the problem,” she said. “We sent like 60% of what we had (for registered voters) and it still wasn’t enough. It was a problem in large towns and small towns.

She went on to say that “people have had 30 days to vote and could have voted absentee but they chose not to. There was ample time to vote; that’s why we have it, for that reason.”

She defended absentee voting further by saying that “you don’t need a reason to vote absentee until the last three days prior to the election. People have a choice.”

I said that it was all over the news that it would be a big election. Why would people think that they had to vote absentee? How would anyone know that?

She said that they did not know it would be a large election. “Nobody knew, and we had no idea. We can’t predict the future. Nobody should have been without ballots. Most towns knew to call, email or copy. That way, they have it just in case.”

I still wasn’t accepting the idea that it was the voters, or town’s faults that they did not get enough ballots, since in our case, our clerk tried to get them and was not able to. It is the Secretary of State who has to allow more ballots and they just assured us that we could copy them if it came to that. In other words, when you run out, we will send you more.

I was thinking that this was absurd. It would be like a drug store saying they are out of a vital needed medicine, but hold on, we will send it to you, eventually.

She said that they had no control over the possibility that they “might send too much (ballots)-- no idea, no control over that scenario.”

I was trying to make the case for better too much than too little, because people were not always able to stick around. After 6 pm, until they closed at 8pm, they were not even answering the phone, the calls were being dropped. People were not able to get any new (approved) ballots if they ran out.

It seemed to me that the problem stemmed from the Deputy Sec. of State, Julie Flynn, did not provide enough ballots to the towns to account for overflow and thought it could be handled on a town by town basis. Too little, too late and too many people disenfranchised in the process. Why couldn’t they see that this was a terrible way to run an important Presidential Primary election? It could come down to a few hundred votes and it could come down to the votes people were unable to cast, because it was inconvenient for the Secretary of State’s office to ensure an adequate amount.

I tried to go into some of this reasoning and she said to send an email and they would forward it to Julie Flynn. The dropbox # is cec.officials@maine.gov. She said, “put your concern and Julie will handle it.”

Sure, I thought to myself. The same way she (mis)handled my ballots when I ran for US Senate as an Independent back in 2008. (That’s another story.) I did feel bad that she said it was so bad they didn’t even have time to go to the bathroom, but I tried not to picture the scene.

I was unhappy. I called the Democratic Party Voter Hotline, and I must admit, I vented a bit on the answering machine. They called back. It was a DC number and a legal intern, Buddy Norton, wanted to learn my location and who I talked to.

Buddy said he would report the issue in Maine thru a software program. When I told him that I had the number of The “Voter Protection Director” at the Maine Dem Party (I had just found his number by calling Julie Browne, the Executive Director of the Maine Senate Democrats, he admitted that he was the person I could speak to.

So coming full circle, now, back to Ryder Kessler, at the Maine Dems, and telling him what I had learned about the voters losing ballots to vote on all across Maine and not just in our town (and we were able to eventually get some, as did some other towns), he was “very sorry to hear about it.”

Ryder agreed that it was “a massive problem, all across the state. We want to do better and push back so it won’t happen again. We are watchdogs for the process.” He said that the Sec. of State decided that 60% was the threshold of what everyone voted in recent years and said that 60% is more than enough of active voters in each municipality. It’s a subset under registered. That’s how it works. The number of registered is higher than the number of active. He said he guessed that 8 registered voters represented 60% of those who voted in recent elections in our town, on our island of Great Cranberry.

In the last Presidential Primary that we had, 25 to 30% was the turnout. We thought maybe there would be more, but, yes, he admitted. They ran out everywhere. Higher than expected.

Kessler believed the issue to be that a lot of people requested absentee and when their candidate dropped out, they tore up their ballot and then came in, to the polling location to get another, therefore, two printed ballots were used up. This sounded contrived to me, but he was stretching for an explanation. After all, his boss, the Democratic Party, could have just helped to elect the wrong candidate.

(Update: 6pm March 4, 2020): I was just told that our combined island vote in Cranberry Isles was Bernie with 22 people (38.6%) over Biden 14 people (24.6%.) Warren got 11(19.3.) Bloomberg got 3(5.3%), Steyer got 6(10.5%) and Buttegieg got 1(1.8%). The statewide total, according to today’s Bangor Daily News, is Biden at 34.3% and Sanders at 32.9%. However, when you consider all the people that were either turned away or did not go because of the lack of ballots at 500 places across the state, it seems understandable that the election was a muck up as bad as Iowa. We can assume that older and more moderate voters who are not looking for a change candidate would be likely to vote earlier in daylight hours, not coming back from work, not picking up kids, not making dinner.

We lost one young voter, because she had duties and couldn’t stick around while the Sec. of State decided to send more ballots at her convenience. How many have we thoroughly disillusioned to the process of voting? More than we can afford, in Maine. If this was the case in Minnesota, or elsewhere, is anyone else even noticing?

Ryder said that they must be much better prepared and have overinclusion. They tried hard, he said, and were talking to clerks and wardens past 8pm and doing a lot of triaging. Larger towns got addressed first, with faster prioritizing.

But why should it even come to this? I wanted to know who bore the responsibility. He said it was split- towns and clerks have discretion over the towns, and the Sec. of State prints, distributes and allows the photocopying of ballots. The Primary is run by the State Party, not election officials, however, he said. That means that there is no clear blame that can be laid on anyone, since the Legislature elects the Sec. of State, who is a constitutional official and not the employee of the State Party.

“If you want to empower local clerks, then the Sec. of State is the one to be lobbying to and sharing your concerns with,” Kessler said. Meanwhile they will work on having more ballots and overcome the shortages. They will try to deal with issues in order to advocate on the state level.

This really did not satisfy me. Why isn’t the solution to have enough ballots at the start of the election? Is this just crooked partisan politics at work, trying to keep people from a representative and inclusive vote? I am thinking of all those frustrated people looking forward all day to voting and having to go home without an “I Voted Today” sticker.

“Our State looks like it got a black eye,” I told him. You can’t really influence or dictate to the Sec. of State, you can just share your concerns with these decision makers. Or share your opinion. Or something else you can comfort yourself with as they steal your right to vote from you.

Kessler kept trying. “My position is to fight for every eligible voter to get a ballot and push for better solutions and better outcomes.” That’s what his Party, the Democratic Party, has taught him to say and he is so earnest, I want to believe him… and he isn’t done.

He wants me to know that he “did not witness any bad faith actors, that everyone was operating in good faith for it to go as smoothly as possible.” I had to let it go. This is not my first election rodeo and I keep saying that it will be my last, every time I witness these monstrosities.

Hope dies last, they say. It’s especially so when it comes to voting, the one thing we all continue to agree, that makes us feel like first class citizens. I think it is time to crack some heads, personally. This gets old.