Results tagged “rockthevote”

Over the weekend Rock the Vote was accused by the New York Times of botching the registration of possibly 40,000 would-be New York voters. According to the article, the online registration forms for New Yorkers on Rock the Vote's website are addressed to the New York State Board of Elections, which does not handle voter registrations. As a result, the Board of Elections has had to redirect over 100,000 forms to the county election boards, and now there's a huge backlog. Today Rock the Vote is firing back at the Times, declaring in a statement that "they got the story dead wrong":

Twice in writing the Board of Elections confirmed that Rock the Vote gives registrants the correct mailing address. See the emails here. And today, the EAC again confirmed that our system is "current and correct."...A modest journalistic effort would have revealed what Rock The Vote has been warning for some time: elections officials nationwide are not prepared to process the enormous number of new voter registrations that have been submitted in this election cycle.

But Robert Brehm, a spokesman for the state board, tells City Room, "It would have been faster for those organizations to direct people to mail them to their counties." A spokeswoman for the city's Board of Elections says they received almost 211,000 registrations in the last week of registration—not exclusively via Rock the Vote—and many of them cannot be processed because they miss crucial information. (Some states permit same-day registration and voting, but not the Empire State.)

If you are one of the 100,000 people in New York who attempted to register to vote this year via Rock the Vote, you may want to check in on the status of your registration. The Times reports that each and every one of those forms was sent to the wrong address, leaving the state's election board in chaos as they attempt to get the forms to their home county, where they should have been sent originally. While Rock the Vote denies responsibility, the Times does little to veil cynicism toward the organization on everything from the bravado they use in taking credit for getting out the youth vote to their corporate partnerships with AT&T and XBox. With real concern that "if anyone is not going to follow up on this, it would be the younger demographic,” we strongly recommended that anyone who used Rock the Vote to register check in with the NYC Board of Elections site to find out the status of their registration. Election Day is only ten days away!