sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2000/11/08/politics2207EST1052.DTL&type=election
Election officials said Wednesday that 19,120 ballots from Palm Beach County had showed votes for more than one presidential candidate. Those votes were nullified and not included in the count. That total is a high number,'' said Palm Beach County Commissioner Carol Roberts, who is part of the canvassing board that is conducting a recount of the presidential race. On Wednesday, hundreds of Al Gore supporters called the county elections office, saying the punch-card ballot was so confusing they thought they may have accidentally voted for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan instead of Gore. Lawyers for the Democratic Party said that the design of the Palm Beach County ballot is illegal and that they may ask for a re-vote. Buchanan got 3,407 votes for president in the heavily Democratic county Tuesday, more than he received in any other Florida county, according to unofficial returns. Bush by fewer than 1,800 votes, and Florida held the key to the national race. It was so hard to tell who and what you were voting for. I couldn't figure it out, and I have a doctorate,'' voter Eileen Klasfeld said. Two larger counties south of Palm Beach both had much lower Buchanan results -- 789 in Broward County and 561 in Miami-Dade County. In Duval County, a much more conservative county in northeast Florida, only 650 Buchanan votes were cast. The confusion apparently arose from the way Palm Beach County's punch-card style ballot was laid out for the presidential race. Candidates are listed in two columns, with holes down the middle between the columns, to the right or the left of each candidate's name. Arrows linked the names with the proper hole, but some voters feared they had missed the arrows and punched the wrong hole. When ballots are placed in the slide for voting, Al Gore and Joe Lieberman are the second names on the ballot, but the third hole to punch,'' Florida Democratic Party Communications Director Bill Buck said in a statement. But Clay Roberts, director of the Florida Department of Elections, said the problem was exaggerated. I think they left the polling place and became confused. Then you have voted for who you intend to elect,'' said Roberts, a Republican appointed by Gov. Florida law specifies that voters mark an X in the blank space to the right of the name of the candidate they want to vote for. Jeff Liggio, a lawyer for county Democrats, called the ballot illegal. Dillman of the American Association for Public Opinion Research, who has done research on the design of paper questionnaires, called the ballot confusing. I've never seen one set up like this,'' Dillman said from Pullman, Wash. It's very confusing the way they have put things on the right side together with things on the left side. Thousands of people were confused,'' said 42-year-old Niso Mama.
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