Something Fishy with Ohio 27th District State Senator Race?

[we can do it]

Ok - I probably should have posted this earlier, but the more I think about this, the stranger it seems. Judy Hanna was winning all night (I went to bed she was ahead by 4% I think, with 78% of the votes in). I was totally surprised to find the official outcome completely flipped - Coughlin wins by the same percentage as he was losing with only 22% of precincts not tallied. Does this strike anyone else as odd?

Ohio - 27th District state senator
Democrat - Judy Hanna, 60,356
Republican _Kevin Coughlin,* 66,689

[onenote]

1. not necessarily

would have to know which precincts had reported and when. Several races that I was following had sizable shifts in percentage margin as various precincts reported. And then there is the possibility that the reporting had the results inverted. Or there's something fishy. Too little info to tell.

[we can do it]

2. Sorry, I Got Caught Up In the National Election - I Will Try To Find More

This was one of those campaigns with fear mongering, anti-gay, deceitful lies and ugly pictures of his opponent. While I was out canvassing, nearly everyone was commenting that they were glad I wasn't from the repub-or Coughlin campaign. Most everyone I talked with said they were voting straight Dem -

[philb]

3. It sounds unusual because usually small counties using opti-scan report first

and the big urban counties tend to report later in areas that I've monitored. Dems tend to do well in the big
urban areas that report late in some states. But it can also depend on the type of voting system the county uses,
machine problem/glitches that occurr frequesntly these days and delay compiling.

Its strange enough that given the widespread manipulation and glitches of the last 2 elections, I would want to do a pretty full election audit before conceding.

See if you see which counties reported late. It is a fact that in Ohio in 2004 some Repub counties waited until late to report and appear to have stuffed the ballot boxes with extra votes to help swing Ohio, according to Richard Phillips analysis and documentation- see his thread.

I would look into "undervotes" by county and precincts if there appears to be a problem.
From the SOS or SOE web sites.

Also were there reported switching incidents or machine glitch problems.
Do any of the results in some areas look suspicious based on their demographics?

Absentees are often used in tight races to swing the results. Close analysis of these should be done.
See the thread on 8 close races still undecided about how to do an election audit and some things to look at.

[we can do it]

4. I Will Keep Looking -BTW, Summit County Is Pretty Democratic & Not Rural

map of Ohio 27th
http://www.kevincoughlin.com/districtoffice/map.aspx

[philb]

7. Here are voter reported irregularities in Summit Co. in 2004

Here are voter reported irregularities in Summit Co. in 2004

www.flcv.com/summitoh.html

and other counties in Ohio, resulting in enough votes swung to make Kerry the winner www.flcv.com/ohiosum.html
Did I hear the new incoming Dem At. Gen will be looking into this now
A lot of fraud and manipulation has been documented, and its known who was responsible in some cases.

[philb]

10. Summit had punch cards in 2004; what did they replace them by?

[we can do it]

11. ES&S

We now have ES&S optical scan, I believe.

http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1105&Itemid=51

[we can do it]

5. Here's Something Else That Seems Odd - Lots of Precincts with More Votes

..than registered voters, on Summary Results Official Canvass 2006 November General

http://www.summitcountyboe.com/ElectionResults.htm

[OnTheOtherHand]

6. odd indeed -- the turnout figures don't match the votes

Take the very first precinct, Akron 1-A, although it doesn't happen to show 100%+ turnout. But it lists 672 "ballots cast," and a total of 315 votes counted for governor. Ulp.

Why are the ballots cast #s way off? I could only guess.

[philb]

9. Sounds like Switching to Blank again, as in Sarasota & lots of places in 2004

[philb]

8. That happened in several counties in Ohio in 2004; see Richard Phillips Ohio thread

for documentation of which counties and how


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x458005