U.S. Sen Bob Casey Jr. says he hasn’t lost his reelection bid just yet.
In a statement posted to social media, the two-term senator said 100,000 provisional and overseas ballots remain uncounted – a detail supported by the Department of State on Thursday.
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Academic and third-party presidential candidate Cornel West will reportedly appeal a federal judge’s recent ruling that will see him barred from the ballot in Pennsylvania.
U.S. District Judge J. Nicholas Ranjan on Friday ruled legal action by West came too close to the election for him to be included on the ballot.
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A sizeable number of Democrats have downplayed concerns over non-citizens voting, while more states find thousands of them registered to vote ahead of the November presidential election.
As Republicans have attempted to pass a bill through Congress ensuring that only U.S. citizens vote in federal elections, Democrats have pushed back, claiming that non-citizens are already prohibited from voting in U.S. elections. However, states have continued to find non-citizens on their voter rolls, and some who may have have voted in federal elections, after being registered to vote through the motor vehicles department.
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Non-citizens have been added to several states’ voter rolls largely through motor vehicle departments, sometimes even after they have explained that they are not U.S. citizens.
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Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes on Sunday joined a number of his counterparts from other states for a Meet the Press panel discussion, and the top state election official claimed that artificial intelligence (AI) will pose new “mis- and disinformation” threats during the 2024 elections.
Fontes told Meet the Press host Kristen Walker, “AI is not a new weapon. It’s an amplifier and a magnifier of mis- and disinformation,” and revealed that his office held a “tabletop exercise” that apparently involved both election officials and members of the media.
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Pennsylvania’s Senate State Government Committee on Monday recommended confirming secretary of the commonwealth nominee Al Schmidt.
The panel voted 10-1 to back the Republican acting secretary and former Philadelphia city commissioner. In a subsequent, off-the-floor meeting, the committee approved a bill to facilitate removal of Pennsylvania from the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a controversial multi-state data-sharing program supporters say helps states maintain accurate voter rolls. The bill would permit the state to use the Social Security death database and change-of-address records to identify voter-registry errors.
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At Acting Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt’s initial confirmation hearing on Wednesday, many senators inquired about the commonwealth’s participation in a controversial voter data-sharing program.
Schmidt, a moderate Republican former Philadelphia city commissioner who subsequently was president of the left-leaning nonprofit Committee of Seventy, will sit for a second hearing covering non-electoral issues his department oversees (e.g., professional licensure). But Senate State Government Committee Chair Cris Dush (R-Bellefonte) suggested discussion of Pennsylvania’s participation in the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) will come up then as well.
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Tens of thousands of non-citizens have tried or made it onto voter rolls across the U.S. over recent years, according to an election watchdog’s analysis of data from several states.
Non-citizen voters have been found on voter rolls in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas and Maricopa County, Ariz. In Georgia, there were non-citizens who attempted to register to vote but were placed in a pending status because there wasn’t evidence of their citizenship, so they didn’t make it onto the voter rolls.
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Pennsylvania State Senators Cris Dush (R-Bellefonte) and Jarrett Coleman (R-Allentown) are preparing legislation to withdraw the commonwealth from the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC).
Over two dozen states and the District of Columbia participate in the election data-sharing system which they use to identify errors in their voter rolls. But seven states — Alabama, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Louisiana, Missouri and West Virginia — recently cancelled their membership in the program.
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Pennsylvania’s top election officials this week informed lawmakers that the process of replacing the state’s voter-records system is “behind schedule” but assured them his agency is prioritizing its completion.
Responding to questions from members of the state House Appropriations Committee in preparation for drafting the Fiscal Year 2023-24 budget, Pennsylvania Acting Secretary of State Al Schmidt said 23 counties are testing the initial version of the new SUREVote system.
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During discussions with Pennsylvania’s top election officials this week, state Senator Cris Dush (R-Bellefonte) urged the commonwealth to leave the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), an election data-sharing system.
Over the last 14 months, five states have nixed their participation in ERIC. This month, both Iowa and Ohio indicated they will also do so. Some Republican-led states in the partnership wanted greater autonomy regarding use of the data collected by the organization; these participants also desired an end to a stipulation in ERIC’s bylaws instructing states to contact unregistered voters to remind them to vote. In a recent meeting, the nonprofit’s board rejected the suggested changes.
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Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court on Thursday dismissed a Republican Party lawsuit seeking to prevent counties from “curing” mail-in ballots that contain mistakes.
The GOP national and state committees who sued insisted state law does not outline procedures for local election boards to inform absentee voters they made mistakes filling out their vote envelopes or to let those voters fix their errors. In recent elections, various counties did so anyway, prompting Republicans to object that the rules aren’t being followed in certain jurisdictions across the commonwealth.
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Philadelphia City Council on Thursday confirmed Seth Bluestein, a longtime aide to retired City Commissioner Al Schmidt, to replace his former boss.
Like Schmidt, Bluestein is a Republican who will serve in the minority-party seat on the three-member board which oversees elections in Philadelphia. After the former was first elected in 2011, Bluestein joined his staff and eventually rose to the position of chief deputy. Last autumn, Schmidt announced he would leave his position to head the Committee of Seventy, an advocacy group working on governance issues.
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Republican Al Schmidt, who is the only GOP member with a seat on Philadelphia’s election board, announced on Tuesday that he will resign from his position.
Schmidt, who has received harsh criticism from former President Donald Trump, is accepting a position as president and CEO of The Committee of Seventy.
The commissioner will step down in the middle of his third term.
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