TALES FROM A DAY OF DECISION
Got an Election Day story you’d like to share with us? Submit it anonymously over on our tip line or our contact page … or email our founding editor directly at w@fitsnews.com. We’ll be adding updates to this post throughout the day … and of course we’ll be hosting an election night “live blog” beginning at 7:00 p.m. when polls close on the East Coast.
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3:22 p.m. – Update from Greenwood, S.C.
Here’s a write-in vote we like …
Sic sez: Nice! We backed him in the GOP primary …
3:15 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Here’s a picture of the line at the Meadowfield precinct in downtown Columbia …
3:09 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Need a drink? Not so fast …
2:31 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
“Woodlands was supposed to have nine machines. People are talking with others about the wait time and some voters are saying ‘screw that’ and planning on not voting.”
Sic sez: Pathetic … but given the choices, not surprising.
2:28 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Source tells FITS that Meadowfield precinct (see 10:40 a.m. update below) is still having problems. “Hundreds still in line,” we’re told.
2:25 p.m. – Update from Spartanburg, S.C.
Problems in Spartanburg County … poll workers calling people back to vote again after machines malfunctioned?
Sic sez: Mulligans all around!
2:03 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
“Harbison 2 – Richland County: Got there at 9:05 am. Met with some heavy handed tactics by a supporter of the penny tax hike. Waited 2 hours and 45 mins. before I could vote. Out of the four machines in that precinct, only three were working when we got there and a second one broke before we left.”
Sic sez: “Heavy handed tactics?” Do tell …
1:50 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Sources tell FITS that there is a three hour wait at the Woodlands precinct (behind the Veterans hospital in downtown Columbia, S.C.) …
Sic sez: We’re noticing a trend … lots of Richland County issues.
1:31 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
“Morning voting at Reformation Lutheran Church (Ward 3 – Richland County) was about 10 mins shy of a Jerry Springer show. Polls workers clueless as how to direct people into correct line, divided up by alphabet, then continued to pull from one side only to the machines while the other line waited and waited. People began to ask questions, then complain, then yell and so forth. One side people waited for 2 hours, the other 45 minutes. After 2 hours and 18 minutes in line, my vote was cast. Less than 300 votes cast by the time I left at 11:30am. The place was still full of angry M-Z voters, I can only imagine how nasty it will get later…..On the plus side, it was quite comical to learn more about your neighbors while revolting against the idiotic poll workers.”
Sic sez: Sheesh … seems like clusterfuck!
1:10 p.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Official word from S.C. Election Commission (SCEC) executive director Marci Andino: “Most counties reporting heavy turnout.” Andino adds that there are “long lines at precincts in Richland County.”
12:38 p.m. – Update from (undisclosed location) South Carolina
“The lines are 3 to 4 hours , the voting machines aren’t working someone needs to be fired.”
Sic sez: Vote early, vote often … if you can.
12:35 p.m. – Update from Pennsylvania (again we know … not in South Carolina)
Gotta love this subtle suggestion …
Sic sez: Wonder how a mural of Nikki Haley would go over …
12:14 p.m. – Update from (undisclosed location) South Carolina
“Am currently in line to vote and Democratic pollwatchers are writing the names of voters, talking with voters, and letting their pads with names be seen by voters. Is that allowed?”
Sic sez: That doesn’t sound right at all … is there any more info you can provide us?
11:58 a.m. – Update from Spartanburg, S.C.
“Saw a Gayle Holt (S.C. House petition candidate) supporter and a Mike Forrester (incumbent S.C. House member) supporter calling each other out at the entrance to a polling place this morning. One was taking pictures of the other promising that they were in violation. It was good entertainement for the long wait.”
Sic sez: Nothing like politicos getting their panties in a wad over proximity issues …
11:48 a.m. – Update from Ohio (we know … not in South Carolina).
David Weigal over at Slate is doing Election Day dispatches and his first one is a doozy … showing that early voting totals from Democratic-leaning counties in Ohio are off of their 2008 pace by 4.1 percent, while Republican-leaning counties are showing a 14.4 percent increase. Obviously Democrats will retain their sizable early voting lead, but these numbers could make it easier for Mitt Romney to cut into that advantage.
11:39 a.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
Ward 14 – another downtown Columbia, S.C. precinct – has “six voting machines” but only two are working, resulting in a “three hour + line,” according to new media maven Ashley F. Miller.
Sic sez: What’s the point of having these voter machines if they don’t work?
11:08 a.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
2 hour line at Pennington Precinct (Asbury Methodist off of Leesburg road). Two (2) poll workers (one checking folks in and one helping with the machines).
And (Democratic House candidate) Joe McCulloch working the lines.
Sic sez: If Joe McCulloch shook your hand you might want to sanitize it. No … seriously.
11:01 a.m. – Update from Mount Pleasant, S.C.
“Pretty sure I just saw a woman present a non-S.C. Drivers’ License – advise that she hasn’t received a S.C. Voter Registration card – and be allowed to vote at National Guard Armory in Mount Pleasant.”
Sic sez: Nice!
10:40 a.m. – Update from Columbia, S.C.
A precinct of more than 1,700 voters in South Carolina’s capital city has just one working voting machine – resulting in a wait of more than three hours for those hoping to cast their ballots. And that’s “if you got there early” one frustrated voter tells FITS.
This lengthy wait was reported at Meadowfield Elementary School – a downtown Columbia, S.C. precinct in the which has historically voted “Republican.”
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57 comments
State law is 1 machine per 250 registered voters, they should have 6 machines.
Brian,
how do they decide how many polling locations to have? Is there a limit as to how many machines/people they are supposed to serve?
Saxe Gotha was snaking the line in loops through the basement. We were so packed we had to have been in violation of the fire code.
S.C. Law, Section 7-7-710, requires that all precincts be divided so that they contain
no more than 1500 registered electors.
I assume that this can go higher when people register close to election day and not enough time is available to create new precincts.
There’s over 2200 registered voters in my precinct. At least that’s what is says when I go to scvotes…
2800 registered voters in my precinct. I think we had 9 or 10 machines, with one not in use (no idea why).
Voting machines that don’t work, and yet this isn’t our first year using them, nor does it appear to be mere isolated incidents.
God, please don’t let us be the next Florida!
Two machines have been carried out of Lonnie B. Nelson, one of them stuck on the voter’s selections. The line is about one hour forty five minutes and growing.
I expect a record turnout and if this is going on across the country, the president is in trouble.
Kudos to the “gap toothed” guy managing the Lonnie B Nelson precinct – he got everything on line (6 machines) and kept the growing lines moving. By the time I left, the line was roughly 200 people in a precinct of 2,400. I expect the voter turnout to be 80% percent for the Spring Valley Precinct. If you want to know how many people vote at your polling place look here: http://www.scvotes.org/data/vrcurr.html
It took me one hour and forty five minutes almost to the second to vote (one hour thirty nine minutes in line, four minutes listening to the guy in front of me trying to explain to “grandma the poll worker” that his dad, “Somebody Somebody the III” had voted absentee and that he was “Somebody Somebody the IV” (who does that these days?).
Took me less than 2 minutes to vote even writing in my wife for school board and county council. I held my nose and voted for Wilson just to make sure he beats “Donald Duck”.
The “gap toothed” guy is one of your fellow OCS classmates.
ROTC USC ’87
Did you smoke dope during ROTC classes?
Two out of 5 machines not working at my precint in Spartanburg, but the wait was minimal earlier this morning.
I heard from a friend that no machines were working at a different precint in west Spartanburg and they are using paper ballots.
A dozen coworkers, each in a different polling location, report lengthy waits not only from high turnout, but from malfunctioning machines and understaffed and incompetent poll workers. My location had about half the number of workers this time, and they were more interested in chatting with each other than in making sure the line flowed smoothly. One coworker said the person checking voters’ names in the A-L line disappeared for half an hour – and none of the other workers would step in to help – nor did the poll manager hang up her cell phone long enough to actually MANAGE things.
MUCH worse experience than 2008.
That had to be at Trenholm Park. I can confirm the accuracy of the A-L line and the manager on her cell phone. I was the 53rd voter at 9:15. Had been there for nearly three hours at that point.
Arrived at 7 a.m. sharp in Fort Mill to find a full parking lot and a long, long line. What normally takes 10 minutes took me over an hour to vote. No problems…just lots of participation.
Got to the poll shortly after ten this morning and was done in less than twenty-five minutes. If I had had extra Voters Registration cards and several changes of clothing I probably could have voted ten times today.
Voted at Tigerville, SC. After instructing the poll worker that my voter registration card was the ONLY ID needed in this election, I voted with no problem.
The friend who went with me presented a military ID. They asked for a 2nd. She informed them the military ID was current and that was all that was required, she was permitted to vote.
We were numbers 386 and 387 at 9:30. In and out in 30 minutes.
I have voted on my driver’s license in the last four or five elections, btw, but I felt it my civic duty to use my voter registration card as a matter of principle.
I just got a facebook message that Meadowfield has 3 working machines and they moved through about 100 people in the first 2 hours.
I was at Asbury Methodest just around the corner from there and it took us 2 hours to get through about 175. We had 5 or 6 working machines.
My poll staff was a pretty good representation of the New America.
A fat flaming queer in a tight-fitting pink sweater shouting orders towards the line of voters
A young white girl checking in voters quietly
A rather odd acting black handicap person of questionable gender barking at the other workers and only being polite to the black voters running a sign-in sheet
A white female senior citizen running a sign-in sheet who acted like she ate a qualude for breakfast
A black middle aged male walking around with a cup of coffee basically observing.
The machine malfunctioned three times.
Where the hell do you vote, Greenville or Charleston ?
Is the fat guy someone you met at a Rest Area? As condesending and judgemental as you are, you have to be a Republican.
Would you work a 13-14 hour day for $75? They are.
Interesting Vic, are you suggesting that all homosexuals hang out in rest areas? Is that a liberal statement? Hmmm.
Everything os moving well at the Garden City fire house. Maybe a 15 minute wait at 9:30 AM.
I was in line at Meadowfield before polling opened this morning. It took me 2 hours to vote. They had 4 machines on site, but only 1 wasn’t working at that time. The precinct workers had put in a call for repairs before opening, but still had not heard back about it by 9 AM.
I was planning on voting for Romney, but a Puerto Rican girl at the polling station promised she would show me her tits if I voted for Obama. So I did, and those nips were like saucers man.
75 minute wait here in Sparkle City. Only had one book to check folks in with. 7 voting machines, only 4 were being used. An elderly lady in front of me refused to vote in the handicapped “line” and stood up for 75 minutes. She is an inspiration to us all.
Only 3 out of 5 machines working at the Zion Hill Precinct in Spartanburg. Did the Election Commission get hacked too?
Methodist church off Broad River: poll workers were there early, but no one knew the code to disable the church’s burglar alarm. Finally got up and running at 7:30.
Waited one hour at “New Life” church. (Or at least I think that’s the name of it. It used to be a Wesleyan church.) Near Poplar Spring FD. There were around 6 machines, but they couldn’t keep them filled as there were only two workers checking folks in. It was a typical voting experience for me. No problems at all.
I know it isn’t technically a report from SC, but it fits in well with the malfunctioning polling machines:
cbs42.com/content/localnews/story/Voting-machines-switch-Romney-votes-to-Obama/m9dR8WDjbUKX8OFu4meIFQ.cspx
Reports of voting machines where selecting Romney selects Obama instead.
youtube.com/watch?v=QdpGd74DrBM
Video of a guy selecting Obama and the machine selecting Romney instead.
Someone remind me, why the fuck are we using these machines? If you can’t even select the person you want to vote for without some bullshit glitch, how the hell are we supposed to believe that some glitch won’t just fuck up the results entirely?
By the way, the video is of a PA voting machine, and the layout looks exactly like our machines. Fun times.
Exactly why we need a written record of each vote cast. If an ATM caan do it, why not a voting machine?
If the GOP would work on that as hard as they did the worhtless photo id issue, it would be resolved already.
Right on Vic, if it’s broken the GOP is at fault. If it works, move your lazy ass to the front of the line to use what someone else built. Socialist punk.
I’ve always believed the S.C. machines switch any and all Democratic votes to GOTPers. Otherwise, it means that the 49 per cent of the people – those who voted first for Sanfraud and second for Queen Nimrata – are just plain stupid.
Interesting to think that some programmer at Diebold actually controls the country, isn’t it?
Of course, S.C., one of the very few states that refuses to give us a print out of our votes, purchased a number of reconditioned machines from Louisiana several years ago. Guess we should be thankful David Vitter isn’t representing us or that nutcase La. governor isn’t living in the Governor’s manse.
As soon as I confirmed my vote, the machine suddenly re-booted and showed an error saying to contact a technician. The tech calls some help number and after about 15 minutes of staring at the machine says “your vote was counted”. Really? You did nothing except stare at the machine and listen to what the mystery person on the phone was saying.
Two other machines in the precinct were having issues too…will be interesting to see how many votes are “actually” counted.
Should have said that this was in Greer.
If the tabulators glitch as badly as the terminals, well, your vote theoretically counts just as much as anyone else’s!
Electronic machines are nice to get a quick tally of votes (when they work anyways), but going back and counting paper ballot printouts that the voters themselves verified is the only way to be sure your vote has a reasonable expectation of being counted.
Throw out the fucking machines and go to paper ballots! Your vote can’t be changed and if a re-count is necessary, you have a record.
Sailor,
That worked real well in Florida a couple of years ago didn’t it?
You know the funny thing about the whole process- if they would have simply incorporated cheap ass little accounting calculator type printers into each voting computer they could have leveraged the technology to make counting easier and still have backup in case a recount was needed for ANY reason-as well as printed proof you voted.
I think there’s a very good reason that no one(important) wants accountability or tracibility in the new(?) technology.
Commence with the conspiracy theorist catcalls now.
? No catcall from me. We need paper backup ballots, pure and simple.
I just voted. Walked right in, no lines, entered my vote, no issues, no machine problems. Now I still have absolutely no idea if my vote will be counted.
This just in. At 12:45 pm EST all major networks, except CBS projected Oshitforbrains with 400 electoral votes and declared Odumbass President of these United States. CBS announced at 12:47 pm EST that they projected this at 11:45 am.
Have a great day you fucking libtar shits. The commies are coming home. Remember. I’ve been saying for the last 6 months you better start buying stocks in pitchfork mfg.
Have a Great Day!! :)
Frank Pytel
Reply
Well, if they are coming, it’s because the majority of America wants them.
Have a nice day.
You are really Joe (punch drunk) Biden, aren’t you? CONFESS!!
4 hours to vote is fucked up!!
Another MAJOR screwup in Spartanburg. Machines don’t work and they run out of paper ballots. People told to come back later to try again!
http://www.goupstate.com/article/20121106/ARTICLES/121109826/1112?Title=Voters-asked-to-go-to-polls-twice-in-at-least-one-precint
Ward 15 in Columbia, no wait at 2pm and everything running smoothly.
Folks, keep up the info – reading them is more fun than trying to get a rooster out of a henhouse. I need this entertainment until the “major” news networks show up tonight.
Worst experience in 42 years of voting. Arrived at 7:10 a.m. at Polo Road voting precinct. Took 2 hrs, 45 min. to vote. THIS COULD HAVE BEEN HELPED – only 5 machines and 1 didn’t work! Not enough workers, and the ones there were incompetent. They couldn’t work the computer, couldn’t find names on the rolls, slow and totally confused. There is NO EXCUSE for this. I can’t tell you how many people I saw who left because they couldn’t spare that much time. We are discouraging people from voting. Whoever is in charge of this mess should be fired.
Fire Nikki.
“We are discouraging people from voting.”
Yes, that is what we are doing.
2 family members in line at Wildewood for 4 hours. 4 of 6 machines working. Will be another hour to vote.
This is an outrageous cluster eff.
Finished in 4 1/2 hours.
Not from SC, but more proof we need a back up paper ballot.
“A Pennsylvania electronic voting machine has been taken out of service after being captured on video changing a vote for President Obama into one for Mitt Romney, NBC News has confirmed.”
Just voted at Ebenezer 2/Florence-got in line at 1:05 voted at 2:25. They only had one book to verify voters, 5 machines but only 3 were being used. Biggest complaint overheard from folks in line; parents who brought their kids and the kids were running around the fire station playing on the equipement.
The line at the JCC is out the door and across the parking lot, probably 100 -150 outside. No huge local issue or candidate on the ballot so the turn out is interesting.
You smoke way to much dope.