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As the runner-up of the 2010 Maine gubernatorial election laments the state’s absentee voting process, municipal officials cite the difficulty of small cities and towns to process early votes.
Independent candidate Eliot Cutler, who lost on Nov. 2 by slightly more than 9,400 votes — less than 2 percent of the total vote — wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal on Nov. 17 titled “Who Stole Election Day?”
In it, he told the story of “Marie,” a voter he met in Lewiston who told Cutler personally that she made “a mistake” after not voting for him early.
“In the end, more than 207,000 voters marked their ballots for me, and perhaps several thousand more would have had they not voted early,” Cutler wrote. “About 25 [percent] of all votes were cast this year before Nov. 2. Many voters are making decisions at times when horse-race coverage dominates the news, attention to issues is limited, and key debates haven’t taken place.”
He also referenced his independent status, saying parties calculated “which candidate was in the best position to deny the governorship to the candidate they didn’t want. The parties effectively played to these fears well before voters realized that three independent candidates offered them other choices.”
LePage spokesman Dan Demeritt, contacted by The Maine Campus on Friday, said his campaign fielded no complaints from voters who wanted to change early ballots in LePage’s favor. He also said Cutler was merely “complaining.”
“Whether you’re a Republican or Democrat, you’re going to have a certain segment of the population that will look at the letter next to your name [and is] going to vote against you every time,” he said. “As an independent … you don’t have the party label or any of the baggage.”
Cutler did not respond to inquiries from The Maine Campus as of print time.
On Election Day, according to the Portland Press Herald, Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap allowed an interpretation of existing state law that said early voters could receive new ballots from municipal clerks if their original ballot did not reflect their intent in response to questioning from the Cutler campaign.
Maine law, according to the article, always provided for the issue of a second absentee ballot due to “good cause,” such as loss or damage but was never interpreted to include voter mistakes.
According to Orono Town Clerk Wanda Thomas, one person changed an early vote in Orono. Old Town City Clerk Patricia Brochu said nobody contacted the city to change a vote.
Maine is one of 32 states that, along with the District of Columbia, offer no-excuse early voting at election offices — meaning that voters do not have to present any reason for Election Day absence. Voters can also vote absentee 30 to 45 days before Election Day at municipal offices, according to the Maine Secretary of State’s website.
The state also offers no-excuse absentee ballots sent out by mail after constituent requests. Those requests can be made online, by telephone, in person or in writing.
Municipalities send those ballots to voters directly — something that Thomas said is a drain on town staff.
“The thing that puts the pressure on the staff is that everything is done by hand,” she said. “You get a request, then you have to fill out the paperwork, then you have to get the envelopes ready, then you mail it to them and it costs the town 61 cents apiece to mail them out.”
According to Thomas, Orono had seen a rise in absentee voting over the past few years. That number has, however, dipped rapidly since 2008.
In the 2008 presidential election, she said 2,355 of 5,820 votes cast in Orono were absentee — more than 40 percent. The 2009 referendum questions yielded 1,454 absentee votes out of a total 4,323 — just less than 34 percent. In the 2010 election, 662 of 3,293, or 20 percent, of votes were completed through the absentee process.
In Orono and many other places statewide, Thomas said absentee ballots are also taken to polling places on Election Day, where wardens open them and enter votes into machines. Changing the process, she said, is an unnecessary burden on small offices.
“We do everything at this office, and for people to suddenly change their mind after they voted … we’re talking at least double the paperwork,” she said. “If they wanted to absentee vote, they should have made a good, conscious decision as to who they wanted to vote for and I would think that was your reason to absentee vote.”
She said she would like to see early voting and absentee voting scaled back. In 1999, no-excuse voting was enacted; before then, absentee voters were required to provide a reason for voting absentee. Thomas said she would like to see a return to that policy.
“If you were out of town, if you were sick, if you were in the hospital … that was a legitimate reason,” she said.
Brochu, the Old Town clerk, said absentee votes do drain staff at the city office somewhat, but said “it’s for a good cause.”
“It’s important for people. A lot of times they just don’t want to have to wait in long lines,” she said. “Once there was no longer a reason needed, I think people took advantage of that in a good way.”
She said approximately 400 absentee ballots were processed in the 2004 presidential election while more than 1,000 were cast in 2008.
According to The Bangor Daily News, 3,044 Old Town residents voted in the 2010 election out of 7,896 registered voters. Approximately 450 of the ballots cast were absentee, according to Brochu.
Demerrit questioned the number of votes that would change after absentee re-votes.
“If people liked Libby Mitchell enough to vote for her absentee weeks in advance, how many of them are going to [change their vote]?” he said.
Thomas said the amount of time polls are open on Election Day should warrant a scale-back of absentee voting.
“We do have polls open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., and we have four polling places, so I feel there was ample opportunity for people to come and vote that day,” Thomas said. “If they wanted to absentee vote, they should have made a good, conscious decision as to who they wanted to vote for.”
Cutler won the University of Maine campus vote convincingly on Election Day with nearly 49 percent of the vote. Democrat Libby Mitchell was a distant second with nearly 24 percent, while LePage took third with 20.5 percent. Independents Shawn Moody and Kevin Scott split nearly 5 percent of the vote, respectively.
