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The Board of Elections is facing another "royal screwup" - this time for failing to ship absentee ballots to New York troops serving overseas.

"Our troops sacrifice their lives to protect our freedoms. They should never, ever be denied the right to vote," said Sen. Chuck Schumer, who pushed a 2009 law establishing deadlines for mailing absentee ballots.

New York election officials were required to ship the ballots to U.S. citizens living overseas by Sept. 17. Because New York primaries were held Sept. 14, the feds granted local officials an extension until Oct. 1.

Several New York counties blew past the extension - including the city's five boroughs.

Schumer urged election officials to rush delivery of the ballots to ensure that military votes are counted.

If ANYONE has the right to vote and have it count, it's those who volunteer to serve.

I have to lay this squarely on feckless incompetence by government employees who just don't care about doing a good job because they can't be fired.

CHICAGO (WLS) - The U.S. Justice Department is investigating whether the state of Illinois missed the deadline for mailing absentee ballots to members of the military and other overseas American voters as part of a new federal overseas voting law.

Cris Cray, Director of Legislation at the Illinois State Board of Elections, says not all of Illinois' 110 jurisdictions were compliant with the 2009 Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act (MOVE).

The law requires every state to mail their absentee ballots 45 days prior to Election Day to overseas troops, government employees and other Americans who want to vote from abroad.

Cray says she is currently compiling data from each of Illinois' jurisdictions to determine which were compliant and which were delinquent. Cray said it's possible the ballots may not be counted because the state was tardy in sending them out.

Friday was a very bad day for the people responsible for the Keystone Kops operation protecting military voting rights inside the Justice Department. The three ranking members of the House of Representatives with oversight over military voting issues and the Justice Department sent a devastating letter to Assistant Attorney General Tom Perez. The curtain has been pulled back, and the DOJ spin that they are doing everything they can to protect military voters has become a laugh line.

Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Lamar Smith, Armed Service Committee Ranking Member Buck McKeon, and Elections Subcommittee Ranking Member Kevin McCarthy all joined forces to describe the clownish DOJ enforcement tactics in the letter. The problem for Eric Holder is that in just a few weeks, these three will probably shed the title “ranking member” and replace it with “chairman.”

Military ballots were required to be sent by September 18 under federal law. Some states, such as New York, received an extension to October 1. Despite these hard deadlines, nearly a third of states have failed to comply with the law. Military ballots have not been sent and in some cases this means our soldiers overseas are going to lose their right to vote. The public is beginning to see why.

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So how did private citizens learn about violations of federal law in places like New Mexico, New York, Arkansas, and Illinois before the DOJ did? That’s where the story shifts from comic to tragic.

have to lay this squarely on feckless incompetence by government employees who just don't care about doing a good job because they can't be fired.

Purplehood wrote:Gents, the last time I looked into this issue was about 25 years ago. I was stationed in my home state of Colorado as a Recruiter and I wanted to make sure that my absentee ballot had been received (I had submitted it before my transfer to Colorado). I spoke to the county clerk office and was thrilled to be told, "We stick all the Military ballots in a closet. If there is a close count, we pull them out and count them. Otherwise, they are not counted".

To me, this is nothing new. Our servicemembers that are using Absentee ballots are really wasting their time voting. In general, they are not counted anyway. It just makes good news to hear how our servicemembers are being denied their voting rights when they really have been denying them as a normal practice the whole time.