Paper Ballot Thrown Out In Maryland


Discarded paper ballot draws ire of voter

...22 people in Howard County who filled out a paper ballot in the March 2 primary election rather than use the new touch-screen voting machines, and whose votes were thrown out.

Under the touch-screen system, those 22 paper votes didn't count, county elections officials said.

This is such bullshit. Didn't count?

I can tell you that in CA, the reasons we (election officials) were given as to why a provisional ballot might get discarded were that the voter wasn't actually entitled to cast that vote at that time in that place:

1. they'd already voted in their own precinct and were casting a provisional ballot in ours;
2. they weren't actually registered as the party they were trying to vote in (if there were partisan ballots);
3. they weren't actually registered to vote in the county or state;

etc.

NOT: "We wanted you to vote using a different method than you used with your provisional ballot."

So, here's my question: did the provisional ballots I processed in March's CA Primary get thrown out? What about my own absentee ballot?