Texas Wouldn't Let This Afghanistan Vet Vote in the Last Presidential Election

[babylonsister]

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/12/texas-voter-law-signature-afghanistan-veteran


Texas Wouldn't Let This Afghanistan Vet Vote in the Last Presidential Election

—By Dana Liebelson
| Fri Dec. 13, 2013 3:00 AM GMT

snip//

Granger, who was deployed for seven months in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan in 2012, says he's voted in every presidential election since he turned 18. But after he sent his absentee ballot to Tom Green County, Texas, to vote in the 2012 general election, he received a rejection notice claiming that his vote was discarded because his signature on the ballot application and the signature on the ballot's envelope were signed by different people:



"I was surprised and aggravated," says Granger, who, having spent four and a half years on active duty, now lives in Belleville, Illinois, supporting U.S. Air Force Air Mobility Command on active reserve. "As the guy that requested the ballot, carefully looked over the candidates, carefully signed the envelope and the ballot with a good pen, and then walked across my base to the post office to mail it personally, the rejection was insulting."


snip//

Granger says that if the Election Board truly thought someone had stolen his ballot envelope or application, "isn't that cause for the launch of a criminal investigation?" Vona McKerley, the election administer in Tom Green County, tells Mother Jones that "several" ballots were turned away in last year's election because of non-matching signatures. "The ballot board was following the law as prescribed in processing the ballots. No, there was no investigation."​

Granger is, nonetheless, concerned that this is just another way to disenfranchise voters: "I am a young educated military officer and I know how to sign my own name for God's sake. And even if I didn't, is poor penmanship good cause for disenfranchisement? What about the elderly whose hands may shake?"​

[Coyotl]

1. Oh the irony! Whoever filling in the hand printing can barely write!

Someone didn't go to Catholic school!

[ConcernedCanuk]

2. Hell, I hardly recognize some of my OWN signatures.

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Stress, distraction, cold - so many things make a difference in my signature.

Only a handwriting expert should be the one to consult re validity of handwriting methinks.

I wonder how many times this happens, but the voter never gets a notice?

naaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhh . . . never happen in MuirKa

Could it?



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