SENATE BILL: The No Moderator or Accidental Invalidation Amendment (Passed)

[Dr. MB]

I would assume based on my reading of the situation that the electoral act merely needs an up or down vote in this chamber correct and thus is unlikely to be changed further? Therefore is safe to modify this based on that text even though it hasn't signed? I mean what are the chances of it being voted down or vetoed? 0%?

Correct.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Relevant portion of the House passed version of the Federal Electoral Act:

Section 6. Voting.
1. Presidential elections in Atlasia shall be conducted using instant-runoff voting as described in subsection 7.1 - voters shall list a preference order for some, none, or all of the candidates.
2. Elections to the House of Representatives shall be conducted using single transferable vote as described in subsection 7.3 - voters shall list a preference order for some, none, or all of the candidates.
3. In any election, other than a run-off election, a voter may choose to cast a write-in vote. Any vote for a candidate who does not appear on the ballot shall be considered a write-in vote for that candidate.
4. No write-in for the House of Representatives shall be considered valid unless the candidate in question has accepted write-ins for the office by either stating as such in the Candidate Declaration Thread or by casting a vote in the election that includes a write-in for themselves. Votes for an unaccepted write-in shall automatically skip to the next preference during evaluation.
5. No write-in for the Presidential election shall be considered valid unless it is cast for a complete ticket and both candidates in question have accepted write-ins for the specific ticket in question by either stating as such in the Candidate Declaration Thread or by casting a vote in the election that includes a write-in for that same ticket.  Votes for an unaccepted write-in shall automatically skip to the next preference during evaluation.
6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.
7. If, in any race, only one candidate or ticket has been marked or listed on a ballot, then that ballot shall be considered a first preference vote for that candidate with no other preferences in that race.
8. If a ballot lists a Presidential candidate with no vice presidential candidate, and that presidential candidate is listed on the official ballot exactly once, on a presidential ticket, then the vote shall be considered a vote for that ticket.
9. If a ballot uses multiple indistinguishable or insortable marks to list candidates being voted for, or orders candidates without placing a mark next to them in a manner that is clearly distinguishable from reposting the exact initial ballot without marking any candidate, then the order in which the candidates are listed on that ballot shall be considered the preference order of that ballot.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.

7. Persons who edit their post in which their vote(s) are contained at the place of voting after twenty minutes shall have their vote counted as void.
      a. All replies shall count as Ballots, even if later deleted, and no voter shall cast multiple ballots in an election, unless:
       I.  Evidence exists that the first ballot submitted by the citizen was deleted by a Moderator or Administrator of the Atlas Forum, or
   II. The second ballot submitted is identical to the first ballot and was submitted within five minutes of the first ballot, in which case only the first ballot shall be counted.  
   a-2. In all other cases, including all cases of casting a third or subsequent ballot, the casting of multiple ballots results in the invalidation of all of the user's votes in that election.

8. No ballot cast in a script other than the Latin Alphabet shall be counted as valid.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

In my view, given that it may be some time before the new electoral act is in fact passed, we should pass this as it stands, especially given amendment-level support for it may not be there in the next term. We can always amend the legislation portion by simple majority at a later date, but the Amendment portion needs to move immediately as all House Rightists oppose it and they may gain a seat in the upcoming elections, enabling them to stop amendments.

[Sestak]

Hold up, you guys still haven’t passed the FEA? What happened?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Hold up, you guys still haven’t passed the FEA? What happened?

I think it got amended in the house, plus Senate activity took a hit because of the holidays slowing progress through the House passed/amended bills.

I have repeatedly urged people to introduce such bills into the Senate introduction thread to bypass the backlog.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It looks like the electoral act will be law in the next day or two. So we we should move in a direction of amending the contained text to reflect that lest we create confusion or refuse part of the electoral act without realizing it.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The electoral act has now been signed into law, so I will repost below my earlier post comparing the texts to facilitate discussion and eventually an amendment.

6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.

7. Persons who edit their post in which their vote(s) are contained at the place of voting after twenty minutes shall have their vote counted as void.
      a. All replies shall count as Ballots, even if later deleted, and no voter shall cast multiple ballots in an election, unless:
       I.  Evidence exists that the first ballot submitted by the citizen was deleted by a Moderator or Administrator of the Atlas Forum, or
   II. The second ballot submitted is identical to the first ballot and was submitted within five minutes of the first ballot, in which case only the first ballot shall be counted.  
   a-2. In all other cases, including all cases of casting a third or subsequent ballot, the casting of multiple ballots results in the invalidation of all of the user's votes in that election.

8. No ballot cast in a script other than the Latin Alphabet shall be counted as valid.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

To restart things off based on where we were, the electoral has now been passed so the relevant text is this:

6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.

I hope to be able to offer an amendment today based on this updated statute because as things stand right now, the bill amends a law that no longer exists, also there are aspects of the existing text I am not fond of such as how it handles non-ballot posts, which could affect things like time confusion reposts (we had a few those in the past year) and other circumstances where such could be unavoidable. I don't want to cause other problems while trying to solve another.

[Pyro]

To restart things off based on where we were, the electoral has now been passed so the relevant text is this:

6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.

I hope to be able to offer an amendment today based on this updated statute because as things stand right now, the bill amends a law that no longer exists, also there are aspects of the existing text I am not fond of such as how it handles non-ballot posts, which could affect things like time confusion reposts (we had a few those in the past year) and other circumstances where such could be unavoidable. I don't want to cause other problems while trying to solve another.

With this rather odd situation in mind, would it be fair to say that the amendment is, for all intents and purposes, a re-write of the bill? I'm not opposed to pursuing such a course considering the passage of the electoral act.

I'd like to hear the sponsor's thoughts on this as well, though.

[Dr. MB]

Yeah. Needs to be updated of course.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

To restart things off based on where we were, the electoral has now been passed so the relevant text is this:

6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.

I hope to be able to offer an amendment today based on this updated statute because as things stand right now, the bill amends a law that no longer exists, also there are aspects of the existing text I am not fond of such as how it handles non-ballot posts, which could affect things like time confusion reposts (we had a few those in the past year) and other circumstances where such could be unavoidable. I don't want to cause other problems while trying to solve another.

With this rather odd situation in mind, would it be fair to say that the amendment is, for all intents and purposes, a re-write of the bill? I'm not opposed to pursuing such a course considering the passage of the electoral act.

I'd like to hear the sponsor's thoughts on this as well, though.

Not of the whole piece of legislation, just the bill contained alongside the constitutional amendment.

[Dr. MB]

I'll motion for a final vote.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

SENATE RESOLUTION

To amend the Constitution to allow for limited Congressional input on vote invalidation, specifically with regards to double posting

Be it Resolved in both Houses of Congress Assembled,

Double Posting Leniency Resolution

Article I, Section IV of the Fourth Constitution is Amended as follows:

The right of citizens of the Republic of Atlasia to vote shall not be denied, except with regard to persons whose accounts is fewer than 168 hours old, as punishment for crimes of which the accused has been duly convicted, or in consequence of failing failure to meet such requirements for frequent posting, or term of residency, or the construction and revision of ballots as may be established by law; but no ballot shall be counted as valid that should list the candidates for office in a script other than the Latin alphabet, or that has been edited more than twenty minutes after its posting in the voting booth. All posts made in the voting booth shall be considered as ballots, and no citizen shall cast multiple ballots in any one election during the period the voting booth is open, upon penalty of the invalidation of their vote. Congress shall have power to make all needful rules governing the resolution of duplicate ballots and such other controversies as may arise, except as otherwise limited by this Constitution.

This text amends Article I, Section IV of the Fourth Constitution to allow for greater congressional authority into the regulations concerning voter invalidation, particularly with regards to the issue of posting multiple times in the voting booth. The amendment also cleans up some text issues and removes some of the explicit reasons why an amendment may be invalidated contained with the current constitutional text, likewise to facilitate said congressional authority.

People's Regional Senate
Passed 5-0 in the Atlasian Senate Assembled,


1. If the above amendment is ratified, the following legislative fix shall take effect:

Section 6 of the Federal Electoral Act of 2019 shall be amended as follows:

Section 6. Voting.
~~~
6. No voter may edit their ballot once twenty minutes have passed since its casting, nor may they delete their own ballot - either of these actions render the voter invalid for the election, and neither that ballot nor any other ballot cast by that voter in the same election shall be counted.
         a. A re-vote may be counted via a subsequent post to the first vote:
                 I.  Evidence exists that the first ballot submitted by the citizen was deleted by a Moderator or Administrator of the Atlas Forum, or
                 II. The second ballot submitted is identical to the first ballot and was submitted within five minutes of the first ballot, in which case only the first ballot shall be counted.  
         b. In all other cases, including all cases of casting a third or subsequent ballot, the casting of multiple ballots results in the invalidation of all of the user's votes in that election.
~~~

This amendment updates the text to reflect the newly passed Federal Electoral Act of 2019 both in terms of the text that it references and updates to the text itself, which was necessary before moving forward otherwise the bill portion as it stood would be unworkable.

I also went to great lengths to preserve any intended outcomes Sestak may have had regarding multiple posts in the voting booth. Since his text doesn't ban such multiple posts, it occurred to me that this was to avoid invalidation for say pointing out the time being incorrect or some other flaw in the voting booth whereas previously the text of this bill laid a foundation by banning all extraneous posts I at least tried to narrow it just to ballot posts.

Aside from that I generally preserved the main features of the failed House text including the solutions to moderator deletion and to forum glitches, and avoided expanding beyond that to any other matters, which was my preference hence at least part of the delay.

I therefore offer the amendment. If you see any problems with the text or issues please raise them ASAP.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Sponsor?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

MB?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

MB?

[Dr. MB]

no objection

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Senators have 24 hours to object.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The amendment is adopted.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I motion for a final vote, Senators have 24 hours to object.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

A final vote is now started on this bill, Senators please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

AYE

[Former President tack50]

Aye

[Pyro]

Aye