Dear friends,
We all remember the first few hours after the polls closed last Tuesday night. Because the first ballots counted were from heavily Republican counties, Steve Cooley opened an 8-point lead that led Cooley to declare himself the victor, yet by Wednesday morning Kamala Harris was ahead.
Even after every precinct in the state reported its vote tallies last week, more than two million additional ballots remained uncounted, and now we are working to ensure that the process goes smoothly and fairly. However, this is a significant new cost that we need to cover. Can you help us make sure the votes are counted fairly by contributing $25 today?
As the counties tabulate late-arriving absentees and provisional ballots, we’ll see many abrupt swings in the vote totals. The current count shows Cooley with a small lead for the same reason he appeared to be ahead early on Tuesday evening – the overwhelming majority of the ballots that have been counted since November 2nd have come from conservative counties where Cooley won by large margins. For example, the current vote tally reflects results from Orange County, which represents only 8 to 9 percent of the statewide vote; yet Orange County accounts for nearly one-fourth of all the votes that have been counted post November 2nd. The majority of the counties where Kamala surged on Election Day, including many counties where she defeated Cooley by a two-to-one margin, have yet to tally their uncounted ballots in any significant numbers.
Furthermore, few counties have yet counted provisional ballots, which traditionally have leaned towards Democratic candidates. You can learn more about the provisional balloting process at the Secretary of State’s website. Voters can also check the status of their ballots -- contact information is available here.
While the ultimate outcome may not be determined for several weeks, our supporters wasted little time in organizing and activating one of the largest volunteer vote-monitoring teams in California statewide election history to ensure that every vote is counted. As of this morning, we have recruited more than 1,000 volunteers who are being dispatched county-by-county to ensure the integrity of the ballot counting process.
Can you contribute $25 to help us to continue our efforts to ensure every vote is counted?
We are incredibly grateful to our friends and supporters who are volunteering their time to help protect the vote, and to everyone who has supported us throughout this process.
Sincerely,
Brian Brokaw
Campaign Manager
Update [2010-11-9 4:28:18 by ArthurPoet]:
NOTE: Explanation of the lengthy process to count the remaining ballots, which consist of:
(A) Mail-in Ballots (mailed)
(B) Mail-in Ballots (handed in at voting booths)
(C) Provisional Ballots (filled out at voting booths)
Counting is afar more laborious than one might realize, because each ballot has to be:
- reviewed for correctness,
- sorted, (a) by precinct, then (b) by name,
- cross-referenced to each respective precinct's list of names to ensure that someone has not already vote,
- last, but not least, then it must be counted.
Unfortunately, this a necessarily painstakingly tediously slow and ERROR-PRONE process. In the database world, this is called: SORT MERGE PURGE.
It ain't so easy, and it ain't quick. And with 2 million outstanding ballots (as was reported by LA-Times on Saturday) this could take some time, assuming they are doing it correctly, which we must ensure they are.