AZ Democrats' Plan Thwarted
     Online voting suffered another blow when the Voting Integrity Project (VIP) filed a federal lawsuit in an attempt to block Arizona's Democratic party from conducting part of its presidential primary via the Internet. The party said that it wanted to increase participation in the primary, which is held three weeks after the state's Republican counterpart, and generate publicity by offering the online voting option. Cortland Coleman, the Arizona Democratic Party's interim executive director, explained that voters would have the option of casting their ballot online, which they can do beginning March 7, or voting in person on March 11. But the VIP argues that the move will hurt minorities and low-income voters by eliminating one venue of access to the polls for those who don't have a computer.
     "We're trying to protect minority voters so that their vote is not diluted," said Deborah Phillips, a VIP spokeswoman. "We just think that when you're making it convenient to a certain sector to vote in their bunny slippers and making it difficult for anyone else, there's no question that you're injuring the minority voters."
     But the party argues it is simply giving voters an additional option for their convenience. "The plaintiffs have neglected to mention when we send out our mailing to all registered Democrats, we'll include a request form so they can ask for a mail ballot in the event they don't want to cast an Internet ballot," said David Eagle, the party's vice chairman and attorney.
     Although a court date has not been set, the VIP has asked for a hearing before Election Day.

Tech In The Tundra
     Those who make their living promoting Internet voting don't appear swayed by the recent setbacks. Last week, 3,500 Republicans in Alaska's northernmost, rural regions were offered the option of logging on to participate in their state's straw poll. Only 36 actually voted. And the Washington, DC, office of Sen. Frank Murkowski estimates that around 10 of those votes came from Alaskans working for the congressional delegation in the District. VoteHere.net, which ran the elections, noted that there are many factors that contribute to voter turnout — not just the Internet. Christy Adkinson, the company's marketing director, said that many people she talked to threw away the forms notifying them of the election because they thought it was junk mail. And although VoteHere.net is touting the experiment as a success (in the 1996 straw poll, no registered Republicans from the three remote regions voted) it has turned its attentions to developing computer systems to be implemented at polling sites to take the place of traditional ballots.
     "Internet voting will probably start at the polling site," Adkinson said. "With remote Internet voting, we can do it today technically, but states will require legislative changes…Several hurdles still have to be crossed for remote Internet voting to happen anyway."
     But Election.com is setting its sites on the prospect of voting from home. After conducting over 600 elections, CEO Joe Mohen says he sees Internet voting as an opportunity to make the electoral process more inclusive, especially targeting younger voters who have traditionally had lower turnout rates.
     "It's imminent, and it will become the de facto standard for the U.S. in five years and for the world in 10 years," Mohen said of Internet voting.
     That's around the same time frame that Iowa's Secretary of State Chet Culver gives in his predictions for Internet voting. Culver ushered in a November e-vote that enabled voters to cast their ballots electronically after they voted by traditional ballot. And with a positive response, Culver is looking into the future of providing Internet voting as yet another option for casting ballots, said spokesman Donn Stanley. "The No. 1 issue for him is that voter turnout is at historically low levels," Stanley said. "He believes that you need to continue to experiment and explore new things to deal with the problem instead of just wringing your hands about it."
     But Culver's office has been dealing with the troublesome issue of the digital divide, meaning that some voters are more likely to have access to computers and therefore have an easier time casting their vote.
     "Letting people vote on the Internet dramatically decreases the cost of voting for those people who do that and feel comfortable, so it would obviously have an impact on voter turnout and what groups would turn out more," said Tom Leonard, vice president of the Progress and Freedom Foundation.
     He added that an additional obstacle to online voting was the public perception of the Internet and electronic transactions. In a recent PFF poll of New Hampshire voters, most said they would rather vote in person than via e-mail. However, Leonard said, when pollsters questioned those voters who had made at least one purchase online, around 60 percent favored Internet voting.
     "It seems as people get more into the Internet in general, I think they're going to get more comfortable with the idea of voting on the Internet," Leonard said. "We shouldn't do it tomorrow, but it will come after a while. It won't be too long."
- by Stephanie Lash