Ohio Secretary of State says Provisional Ballots Not allowed.
Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones was joined by Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Elijah E. Cummings and members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) to demand that Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell reverse his recent decision concerning provisional ballots. The CBC letter was written in response to a Blackwell directive that would deny voters a provisional ballot when it is suspected that they do not live in the precinct in which they attempt to vote.Throughout Ohio over 700,000 individuals are newly registering or requesting updates to their voter registration status with nearly 200,000 of them in Cuyahoga County. Secretary Blackwell's directive would prohibit the use of provisional ballots by individuals who have correctly registered to vote but show up at an incorrect polling place. The provisional ballot was created specifically to allow voting in this situation. Provisional ballots are counted after regularly cast ballots. In its letter, the CBC asked if "Ohio is destined to be the Florida of 2004 where tens of thousands of votes will be discarded because of a state sponsored system that lacks both integrity and proper accountability." [more
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