Department of Federal Elections: Homelycooking, SoFE

[Poirot]

My guess would be he wasn't registered for enough days prior to the election.

[Poirot]

In a ballot case like OAM, is it left to the Secretary's judgement to interpret the ballot ? I'm not familiar with candidate rankings on ballot in real life so I don't know the rules.

In my opinion, I would stop counting a ballot when there is the same number twice. The sequential order of numbers is broken. The second rankings are treated as two reals 2, but they are not necessarily a real 2 and 3. There is a 6 missing on the ballot so maybe a 2 is a 6 (could have happened by pressing the wrong key). Perhaps the voter started marking an order and changed his mind, erased numbers, changed others numbers and it leaves the ballot unclear of his official order. Or it could simply be that the voter entered 2 at the wrong line by mistake, continued ordering candidates and at then saw a blank at his desired second preference and entered 2 at that spot.

It's too bad people can't touch their ballot after some minutes. It leaves incorrectly filled ballots. I know the rule is there so people don't start changing their vote. I guess it's one or the other, no system is perfect.  

[Poirot]

It will be held next week, per Atlasian law. The Presidential/Regional Senate election will then be held the subsequent week.

Does next week for At-large special election mean February 15 ? I thought that was the date for the Presidential election.

[Poirot]

The special election to fill tmth's seat is scheduled for Friday Feb 28 - Sunday Mar 02.

What is the deadline for candidates to be on the ballot?
If it's before February 21 (one week before election) it doesn't leave much time to declare and for parties to select a candidate. Candidacies could also depend on what happens in this weekend's election.
 

[Poirot]

Poirot and JCL declared less than 24 hours before the start of the election, so they have official write-in status, but can't be listed on the ballot.

That is unfortunate. There was a 20 hour period after the confirmation of the election to meet the ballot deadline.

[Poirot]

Aaawwww
Thank you for your years of service running elections.

[Poirot]

If the question is about putting numbers before names of candidates, I have found this on the wiki. (I don't know if there has been a change since then))

Section 1: Votes
1. In their vote in the Elections to the Senate and the Presidency, each voter shall list some, none, or all of the candidates in the voter's order of preference for them.
2. If no numbering of the preferences is stated, then the candidate at the top of the list shall be presumed to be the first preference, the candidate on the second line of the list shall be presumed to be the second preference, and so on.

https://uselectionatlas.org/AFEWIKI/index.php/Consolidated_Electoral_System_Reform_Act