Austrian Elections & Politics 2.0 (Presidential runoff re-vote: 4 Dec. 2016)

[jimrtex]

You people do realise that a 100% accurate count across a whole country is actually impossible?

* in some cases the votes were counted by people not belonging to the election commission
* in some cases, not all members of the election commission were present
* in some cases, only a member of the ÖVP counted all votes and the other commission members from the other parties just arrived later, signed that they were present and simply trusted the ÖVP-guy that he counted everything properly etc. etc.

What (or who) is the "elections commission"?  In American usage, I would think of a 'commission' as a small executive body, who may have staff (eg Texas Railroad Commission, Federal Elections Commission, Federal Communications Commission).

[jimrtex]

Interior Minister Sobotka has presented several election law fixes (which will likely be passed in parliament after the runoff):

* mandatory schooling of election officials so they have a clue of the election law and not just sit nearby the voters and tick them off and come and leave when they want to

Why do election officials tick off the voters? Are they sitting too close when they are voting?

[jimrtex]

From "Voice of America":

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http://www.voanews.com/content/youth-fear-austria-presidential-re-run/3402091.html

They have added a correction:

"Correction: An earlier draft of this article said an Australian court overturned the results. It was an Austrian court. Voice of Armenia regrets the error."

[jimrtex]

What (or who) is the "elections commission"?  In American usage, I would think of a 'commission' as a small executive body, who may have staff (eg Texas Railroad Commission, Federal Elections Commission, Federal Communications Commission).

There's an election commission at every precinct to handle and supervise the voting, which is made up of representatives from each party.

Is the election commission made up of residents of the precinct? How are the commissioners chosen? Which parties are entitled to representation in the commission. Do they actually administer the election at the precinct, or are just intended to be observers?

In the US it is typical for election judges to be appointed by political parties (or at least recommended by them). With elections on Tuesdays, they have to put in 12 hours plus for very little pay. Most are retired and have been doing this for decades. To get them to come in for training, they are offered higher pay. In the US they would probably say "we've always done it this way". Perhaps this was what happened in Austria?

While election day is a Sunday and virtually all commission members are showing up, the situation is more complex on Monday, when the postal ballots are counted. Initially, there were only a handful of postal ballots which were quickly counted. But in recent years, more and more people voted by postal ballot, meaning it takes longer to count them on Monday. Many election commission members have a regular job though, which means they cannot be present when the postal ballots are counted. They simply check in at 5 or 6pm or later when they are done with their job and sign the protocoll that they were present at the count ... (which is what the Court ruled unconstitutional). The full election commission has to be present when the postal ballots are counted. This will be changed after the re-vote, because postal ballots will soon be counted on Sunday evening with the rest of the precinct votes ...

When does election-day voting begin? Does it begin after mass?

When was "initially" for casting postal ballots (without cause)? Where do you mail your ballot to? Is it to a central location, and then distributed to the precincts?

Why do election officials tick off the voters? Are they sitting too close when they are voting?

I mean checking the voter lists if someone has voted etc.

"tick off" is probably the wrong word ...

But now some voters are ticked off at election officials?

[jimrtex]

When was "initially" for casting postal ballots (without cause)? Where do you mail your ballot to? Is it to a central location, and then distributed to the precincts?

By "initially" I mean a decade ago, when only Austrians abroad were allowed to vote by postal ballot. Only about 30.000 Austrians did so in a federal election, so the votes were quickly counted. Nowadays, about 800.000 people vote by absentee ballot.

Postal ballots are sent to the county election commissions, where they are counted. They are not distributed back to the precincts, they are simply counted on the district level.

I'm confused about the postal ballots. I thought that the main problem was that election commissioners had not shown up on Monday when postal ballots are counted. But you seem to be saying here that postal ballots are counted centrally.

In Texas (it may be different in  other States), most early voting is in person. A voter may go to any early voting location in their county. The voter rolls are electronic so they can be linked to prevent a voter from voting more than once over a two week period. In addition, voters who had been issued a postal ballot are indicated. If they attempt to vote in person, they are given a provisional ballot so that if the postal ballot is returned, the in-person vote can be discarded.

Paper voting rolls are used for election day voting by precinct. In the past, election workers were provided lists of voters who had voted early or who had been issued paper ballots, and were expected to mark the paper roll. In 2008, Democratic voters were told to vote twice, once early, and once at the precinct caucuses which are held on election day night. Some voters instead voted a second time on election day, and were permitted to because the election workers had not marked up the voter rolls.

Early voting results may be counted on election day (they don't use anyone under 40, for fear they would be asphyxiated if unable to use their smart phone for several hours). Since most early voting is in person, and on DREs, "counting" just means inserting a cartridge in a counting machine. But paper postal ballots can also be counted.

At poll closing time, the early results can be shown minutes later. They are indicated as being from one precinct, but it is just an aggregation. Later during the canvass they will be attributed back to the actual precincts.

[jimrtex]

Postal ballots are sent to the county election commissions, where they are counted. They are not distributed back to the precincts, they are simply counted on the district level.

I'm confused about the postal ballots. I thought that the main problem was that election commissioners had not shown up on Monday when postal ballots are counted. But you seem to be saying here that postal ballots are counted centrally.

The count itself is not the problem, it's 100% accurate. The Court has found no evidence whatsoever that there were any votes that were counted the wrong way. Even the FPÖ commission members who testified said there were no violations whatsoever.

One of the violations was that some commission members did not show up when the other commission members counted the postal ballots at the district level. For example, it might be that a Green-member or an FPÖ-member was absent and that only SPÖ, ÖVP, NEOS members were present at the count. According to the law, every member has to be present during the count.

Are all the precinct-level commission members expected to show up at the district-level counting? Do they count only the ballots from their precinct?

What types of buildings are used for the typical polling place?

I assume since there is a central registry, that you don't have to register to vote. Do you have to prove your identity? What if you had requested a postal ballot, and had misplaced it. Could you still go to the polling place and vote? When must a postal vote be received? How do the election authorities know that you completed the ballot.

[jimrtex]

Are all the precinct-level commission members expected to show up at the district-level counting?

No, there's a seperate election commission at every district voting center which only counts the postal ballots. The precinct election commission members only count the in-person votes on election day.

This seems like a much more serious dereliction, then. If your party were selecting you to serve on the district election commission, you would presumably know what you should be doing on Monday. If you said, "I've got to work on Monday", and the party boss said, "No problem, just show up after work and sign some papers", he is seriously wrong.

[jimrtex]

Today, the Constitutional Court released the full written 170-page ruling of the FPÖ-challenge.

The English summary, if anyone is interested:

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Is "assistant electoral officer" plural in the German version?

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Does a postal ballot have two envelopes:

(1) The mailing envelope, which has only the address of the election authority;
(2) A secrecy envelope which is signed on the outside? So that the signature is verified in a process equivalent to a person presenting themselves at the poll, and then is opened and the ballot placed in some sort of container for separate counting?

I don't understand why the auxiliaries should be able to discard those ballots as "obvious", unless that means they can simply have a stack of envelopes without signatures that electoral officers can confirm.

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Is this a complete list of districts in Austria, or is this a list of challenged districts, and in 14 of the 20 the irregularity was confirmed?

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If this were an election for parliament, how would the vote for the resident of Linz be counted if he personally voted in Salzburg? Would it be transported back to Linz for counting?

[jimrtex]

Is this a complete list of districts in Austria, or is this a list of challenged districts, and in 14 of the 20 the irregularity was confirmed?

There are 117 election districts in Austria. 20 of them were contested and investigated by the Court. 14 were charged with failures, while 6 did nothing wrong and everything was done according to election law.

Is there likely to be any personal repercussions in the 14 districts?

[jimrtex]

Official final results, with all postal ballots counted:

53.8% VdB (+3.5%)
46.2% Hofer

Turnout: 74.2% (+1.5%)

http://wahl16.bmi.gv.at

I was at a restaurant a while back, and there was something odd about the waiter's name on the receipt, which caused me to ask what his name was (I can't remember what struck me as odd).

But anyhow he said that his last name was Van Something, and that it was Dutch. He then offered that it had actually been Von Something, but that an ancestor (perhaps his great-grandfather had ended up in the Netherlands after World War II and changed the name, and subsequently immigrated to the United States. He also said it was a family secret that the ancestor had done some bad things during WWII - he didn't provide details, and said it was not a source of family pride.

So I was wondering about Van der Bellen. I found the answer in the Wikipedia.

So my question does his name have any impact on Austrian electoral perceptions? (e.g. that he isn't really Austrian, etc.?)