The candidate for the Senate for the Citizen Force movement, Rafael Alejandro Martínez, filed a complaint with the Attorney General’s Office for a series of electoral crimes, which he knows would be planned to be committed during the March 13 elections in the department of Magdalena .
According to the applicant, he has all the evidence that shows the planning of an alleged electoral fraud, fraudulent voting, favoring voting, conspiracy to commit a crime and corruption of the voter, which according to an investigation and corroborated in the territory, would be ready to be executed in favor of several candidates.
“We base ourselves on an investigation carried out by a journalist in Santa Marta, who determined that a total of 185 people, fully identified in the complaint, would be in charge of carrying out the fraud through the retention of identity cards; others operate with direct advances to the voter, purchase of votes, among other actions”, expressed Martínez.
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He also asked the authorities to verify the evidence presented in the shortest time possible and deprive those responsible of their liberty.
We have asked Dr. Iván Romero, director of the Prosecutor’s Office, to act, because if this materializes they are guilty, they are accomplices
The complaint details that the mechanics used by this network of buying and selling votes is aimed at altering the results of the E14 formats, to add more votes to the candidates who are part of this network of corruption.
According to Martínez’s version, the municipalities where the vote-buying network operates are Aracataca, Pedraza, Cerro de San Antonio, Zona Bananera, Zapayán, Pijiño del Carmen, Concordia, Ariguaní, Pivijay, Ciénaga, El Retén. , Nueva Granada, Puebloviejo and Santa Bárbara de Pinto, with their rural areas.
“In the elections of House and Senate In 2018, an atypical vote of between 40 and 100% of the vote by polling stations was detected in favor of a single candidate and his party, a behavior that was replicated in all the positions,” Martínez stressed.
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In the last security council, where the electoral problem was addressed, Fuerza Ciudadana exposed the evidence of collusion and political friendship between two municipal registrars in Magdalena, Ciénaga and El Retén, with several candidates for the Senate.
“We have asked the doctor Ivan Romero, Director of the Prosecutor’s Office, to act, because if this materializes, they are guilty, they are accomplices, because institutionally they are the ones who can avoid it,” said candidate Martínez.
In the criminal complaint, the member of the Citizen Force movement details the members of this structure, their modus operandi and for whom they work.
“We hope that the National Registry provide the guarantees for the electoral exercise of the next March 13 and that the Attorney General’s Office prosecute those who break the law and prevent the fraud they have orchestrated,” said the senate candidate.
Martinez also pointed out that in the department there is a direct link between the registrar’s office in the department of Magdalena, the special delegates of the district of Santa Marta and municipal delegates with political agents active in political campaigns.
ROGER URIEL Special for WEATHER SANTA MARTA
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A bill to protect the right to have an abortion in the United States died in the Senate on Monday after it failed to garner enough Republican support to pass a procedural vote.
While the Women’s Health Protection Act was expected to fail, Democratic leaders were under pressure from constituents to put it to a vote anyway in a show of support for federal abortion rights, as the U.S. Supreme Court could soon upend those rights.
Reproductive rights advocates see federal legislation as possibly the best chance to codify the right to terminate pregnancy in the United States, particularly after the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative justices signaled, they could soon cut constitutional protections.
The bill would have needed several Republicans’ support to reach the necessary 60-vote threshold to overcome a filibuster. The vote was 48-46. Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat, voted against the bill, as did Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins, moderate Republicans who have supported limited abortion rights.
“Abortion is a fundamental right and women’s decisions over women’s health care belong to women, not to extremist right-wing legislators,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters ahead of Monday’s vote.
Abortion opponents characterized the bill as radical and said it would nullify state laws that have been passed to restrict abortions.
“It’s extreme. It’s an egregious violation of the most fundamental of all human rights, and that is the right to life,” Republican Senator Steve Daines of Montana said of the bill in debate on Monday.
The Women’s Health Protection Act, co-sponsored by 48 Senate Democrats, stated that healthcare providers should be able to provide abortions without a number of barriers, including restrictions on abortions prior to fetal viability, which many states currently have in place. It proposed that the U.S. attorney general could sue any state or government official who violated its terms.
Abortion rights advocates said the fact that the Senate was holding the vote at all was a victory, since it forced senators to go on the record for their constituents to judge.
Abortion is poised to be a key campaign issue for members of Congress running for re-election in 2022.
“Every American deserves to know where their senator stands on an issue as important as the right to choose,” Schumer told reporters.
The right to have an abortion prior to fetal viability, typically around 23 or 24 weeks, has been protected under the Constitution since the Supreme Court’s 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade.
In December, the Supreme Court signaled its willingness to undermine Roe v. Wade and permit a Mississippi ban on abortion after 15 weeks. The court’s decision in that case is expected in late spring.
Some 26 states would move to immediately ban abortion if Roe is overturned, according to the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights advocacy research group.
Two weeks before the elections for the Senate and House of Representatives throughout the country, not only the candidates in the regions, especially in Valle del Cauca, seek to captivate the largest number of voters for Sunday, March 13, which will lead them to seats.
Non-governmental organizations, such as the Vallecaucana Action Unit (UAV) and the Electoral Observation Mission (MOE), as well as official bodies, including the National Electoral Council (CNE) and the National Registry, have been promoting initiatives for the population to attend to the polls and exercise their right to vote, but to choose in a free, transparent and democratic manner.
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They are campaigns that invite participation, like the one of the UAV with the name ‘Your vote has power’ to elect Congress.
“This time the slogan is ‘Valle Vota Valle’, with which the vote for leaders of the territory is promoted, which increases the representation of the region and leverages resources and promotes projects for the development of the department”, said Daniel López, executive director of the UAV.
But the risks of electoral fraud and the fear among some candidates who have made it visible on their social networks are latent.
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“Voting: an action as simple as it is fundamental to guarantee the well-being of our democracy”, said Alejandro Sánchez, regional coordinator of the MOE.
“But how can we freely vote and elect those who represent us when daily in our country we face the presence of illegal armed groups, violence against leaders, clientelism and other situations that restrict the exercise of our right?” .
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According to the EOM, The Valley has four municipalities at risk of fraud in Senate elections and two more by those seeking the Chamber. There are 14 municipalities with risks due to violence.
The municipality of Valle with factors indicative of electoral fraud and factors of violence is Buga.
For the regional coordinator of the EOM, it is necessary that institutional efforts be concentrated there, in such a way that possible irregularities in these elections can be detected.
However, no fraud is reported in Cali nor in Buenaventura, but there are risks of violence. Cairo has a medium risk in elections for the House due to fraud, while Versailles, for the Senate.
Candidates like Yitcy Becerra, from Centro Esperanza, who goes after the Chamber, asks to avoid buying votes. “Electoral fraud is a threat to democracy.”
Míldred Arias is also seeking a seat in the Chamber and said that with more education there is less corruption. The municipalities with risks due to violence, with a high and extreme risk index, are Cali, Bolívar and Buenaventura.
In this list of high risks, according to the EOM, there are also Buga, Florida, Jamundí and Tuluá.
Andalusia, Bugalagrande, Candelaria, Dagua, El Dovio, Seville and Yumbo with medium risks due to violence in elections.
Beware of electoral crimes
In the National Electoral Council (CNE) they point out that the constraint to the voter is a criminal offense.
Voter fraud, fraudulent voting and vote trafficking are also criminal offenses.
In the CNE and in the Registry they promote the campaign to denounce these facts.
The Attorney General’s Office opened a preliminary investigation of the mayor of Manizales, Carlos Mario Marín, for alleged pressure on officials and contractors to favor with their vote their cousin, candidate for the House of Representatives for Caldas.
According to the Public Ministry, he received anonymous complaints that speak of the request for votes in favor of the Green Alliance candidate Santiago Osorio.
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“With all due respect, I request your intervention in the elections, since as a public official we are practically being forced to politically accompany the cousin of the mayor, and I see with great concern the active participation of several public servants exercising political proselytism,” the complaint says. which was recorded in the preliminary investigation order.
The president has asked his Municipal Cabinet to act with neutrality
It indicates that the entity will open the corresponding Preliminary Inquiry “in order to verify the occurrence of behaviors with a vocation for disciplinary reproach, identify or individualize the public and/or private servant allegedly compromised and establish if it has acted under the protection of a cause of exclusion of responsibility”.
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The mayor, for his part, reported that he had already filed with the Manizales Provincial Attorney’s Office and the Regional Attorney’s Office the evidence of the actions taken to “avoid conduct related to political proselytism” within the Manizales Mayor’s Office and its decentralized entities.
“Among the documents delivered are the certifications of the General Secretariat, Internal Disciplinary Control, Internal Control and the Office of Transparency, in which it is verified that, to date, there is no formal complaint due to political pressure. However, preventively It has been requested that the necessary actions and investigations be carried out in case of presentation, ”he reported.
From the Mayor’s Office they also pointed out that “the president has asked his Municipal Cabinet to act neutrally”, always oblivious to any project with political ends, in compliance with the Electoral Guarantees Law.
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“This position is supported by the formation of the Electoral Surveillance Committee of the Manizales Mayor’s Office, whose purpose is to apply mandatory sanctions in the event of political proselytism being found within the Administration and its decentralized entities,” adds the press release.
The municipalities of San Onofre, Toluviejo, Ovejas, Colosó and San Antonio de Palmito in the Montes de María subregion will have electoral biometrics for the elections of next March 13, to Senate, Chamber and Special Circumscription of Peace.
This was announced during the session of the Departmental Commission for the Coordination and Monitoring of Electoral Processes, which was held virtually with the departmental delegates of the Civil Registry.
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Sheep will have 20 stalls in the urban area
One of the areas where special interest will be placed is in the Montes de María
In the case of San Onofre, biometrics will be put into operation in 61 posts of 6 schools in the municipal capital.
For the municipality of Toluviejo, 11 positions will work in schools from the urban area. Sheep will have 20 stalls in the urban area. In San Antonio de Palmito 10 and Colosó will have 9 positions, all in the same municipal area.
To start this voting process, instructions are given in the five municipalities, with the aim that there are no problems on March 13.
threats
8 complaints have been addressed and these already have protection measures. The five cases are in candidates for the Chamber of Special Circumscriptions of Peace
Regarding the issue of threats to candidates reported for the municipalities of Montes de María, the territorial adviser of the National Protection Unit in Sucre, Leonidas Hernández, indicated that 8 complaints have been received.
“8 complaints have been addressed and these already have protection measures. The five cases are in candidates for the Chamber of Special Districts of Peace, one candidate for the Afro-descendant District, one candidate for the Historical Pact and one candidate for the Commons Party,” he said.
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Representatives of the Police authorities and the National Navy reaffirmed their commitment to security for the region during the electoral process, for which they stated that they will increase the force in Sucre.
“One of the areas where special interest will be placed is in the Montes de María”, they said.
Representatives of the Secretaries of Education reported that they toured the Educational Institutions chosen for the electoral process and all of them meet the required requirements.
“Of these schools, most are suitable and only a few, like the case of Guaranda, are more affected, taking into account that the municipality was affected by the floods,” they pointed out.
They will offer guarantees to the communities and candidates
They asked the municipal administrations to guarantee energy and drinking water services and also to have a contingency plan.
The Departmental Commission indicated that the commitments made include the Meeting of Rectors and Rural Directors of Non-Certified Educational Establishments, in the Fortunato Chadid auditorium, starting at 8:00 a.m. on February 22.
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For her part, Lucy García Montes, ad hoc Secretary of the Interior for electoral affairs, affirmed that in order for the election process to be carried out in a transparent manner, guarantees will be offered to the communities and candidates.
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In six municipalities of Antioquia, three of them in the Aburrá Valley, there is an alert for possible cases of transhumance or vote rigging, warned the EOM (Electoral Observation Mission).
According to the report, there would be possible cases in which the magnifying glass should be put due to the importance of the upcoming elections for Congress and the presidency of the Republic.
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The most worrying cases are in Sabaneta and Briceño (north of Antioquia) that have an extreme risk because they have rates of 206 and 199 registered per thousand inhabitants, respectively.
They are followed by Mutatá and Vigía del Fuerte, with a high risk according to the EOM because they have rates of 159 and 152 registered per thousand inhabitants, respectively. Finally, they follow Envigado and La Estrella, both in the south of the Aburrá Valley, with medium risk with rates of 96 and 92 registered per thousand inhabitants.
Verónica Tabares, coordinator of the EOM in Antioquia, said that there are some reasons that would explain what is happening in the three municipalities of Aburrá that are under suspicion: “There is a citizenry that lives in one place and may be working and studying in another municipality; Likewise, there are municipalities with a high degree of urban projects that stimulate the population to move”.
In the case of Briceño, Mutatá and Vigía del Fuerte, there is a special characteristic and that is that they are municipalities that are part of the Special Transitional Districts of Peace (CTEP), which aim to increase the political representation of the areas most affected by the armed conflict.
“What could have happened is that with the identity card process carried out by the Registrar during this period, people were encouraged to register their identity card at a rural polling station or that those at the head went to rural stations or that people who had not voted before in the past, they were encouraged to be part of this process, ”said Tabares as a hypothesis in the face of the unusual increase in ballots.
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Card registration table.
However, the MOE insisted that an investigation should be carried out to detect possible corruption networks in those six municipalities.
The alert is not free because it should be clarified that in Colombia this is a crime. For the political consultant, Miguel Jaramillo, in these six municipalities there are also traditional practices of possession of groups of relatives of public officials.
“They are family sectors and that happens a lot on the Caribbean coast, Urabá and Bajo Cauca in Antioquia, Norte de Santander, Meta, Caquetá, Putumayo and the south of the country where there are families that dispute power. and they have in power the mayor’s office and the governor’s office, a loot that takes turns and that loses hemegony from time to time, “explained Jaramillo.
In these areas, classified as at electoral risk, there are also some patronage practices due to the high dependence on public procurement in the economy of many of these municipalities.
“This transhumance becomes a recurring practice through which votes are transferred to certain regions in order to strengthen voting, especially to the House of Representatives”, explained the analyst.
It should be remembered that on January 13, the period for registering citizenship cards to vote in the 2022 Congress of the Republic elections ended, which had started on March 13, 2021.
According to the Registry, 2,611,750 identity cards were registered throughout the country. In person, there were 989,648 citizenship cards, of which 879,640 were made at the offices of the Registry at the national level and at points authorized by the entity throughout the country, and 110,008 at Colombian embassies and consulates. Digitally, 1,622,102 registered, that is, 62% of the registrations were made remotely.
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Make sure you know your polling place before you go to vote.
Photo:
Diana Sanchez. AFP
Other causes
But there are other issues that influence possible cases of vote rigging and it is about violence and drug trafficking, driven by illegal groups.
Jorge Andrés Rico Zapata, professor of political science at the UPB, explained that as an act of corruption and as a crime defined in the Colombian Penal Code the so-called ‘vote rigging’ is a constant risk in each electoral processbecause the violence and the presence of illegal armed groups remains and increases.
“Behind this action there is an operating mechanism that directs citizens who may not be aware of the seriousness of carrying it out and/or who are forced by coercion and threat, which is a vicious circle that has structural problems. in the specific territories (electoral crime risk zones versus a situation of violence and multidimensional insecurity there),” explained Rico.
Under this scenario, he said, the areas at electoral risk are connected to some of the points of greatest violence in the country: Catatumbo, Arauca, Norte de Santander, areas of Antioquia, Chocó, Putumayo, the Pacific coast and Nariño, which are of direct interest to violent structures.
“As for the municipalities of Valle de Aburrá, it ends up being the result of the weakness and lack of control of the territory, where illegal groups are linked, maintained and in fact increase,” he added.
The teacher proposed a solution to those cases of increased registration of identification cards that could be a crime and said that the tools of the different agencies for monitoring, review, surveillance and control should be activated for possible electoral crimes.
DAVID STREET MEDELLIN WEATHER On Twitter: @davidcalle1
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Animosity toward China, which has long simmered in South Korea, exploded into the open this week following a pair of controversies during the Winter Olympics in Beijing.
It began when a woman dressed in a pink hanbok, a traditional Korean dress, carried a Chinese flag while marching in the Olympics opening ceremony. Many South Koreans were outraged, seeing it as Beijing’s latest attempt to claim beloved aspects of Korean culture.
Once the competition began, things only got worse. On Monday, two South Korean short track speed skaters were disqualified for moves deemed illegal, allowing a pair of Chinese skaters to advance and eventually win gold and silver medals. South Korean media outlets echoed discontent, accusing Beijing 2022 judges of bias in favor of China.
“Just let the host country China take all the medals,” declared an article in the Seoul Sinmun newspaper, which began by repeating that sentence 11 times. SBS, a major South Korean broadcaster, aired a segment titled, Top 10 Worst Moments of Cheating by China, featuring past incidents involving Chinese athletes.
The anti-China uproar comes less than a month before a tightly contested presidential election. Both main presidential candidates have weighed in, saying the South Korean skaters were the rightful winners and that the hanbok display is the latest evidence China is engaging in cultural appropriation.
“Do not covet the culture (of others),” warned ruling party candidate Lethe Jae-myung on Facebook. In his own Facebook post, Yoon Seok-youl, the main conservative candidate, accused Beijing of a broad effort to “subjugate and incorporate Korean history into China.”
Growing animosity
The incident reflects growing animosity toward what many South Koreans feel is China’s distortion of history in order to claim South Korean culture, such as the hanbok. Recent years have also seen eruptions of nationalist-tinged anger over Chinese state media claims that kimchi, a fermented cabbage dish ubiquitous in Korea, originated in China.
Underpinning the tensions are wider concerns about China’s growing economic and military strength, and its more combative stance toward its neighbors, which analysts say is Beijing’s attempt to reassert its position as a dominant regional power.
Things were not always this tense. In 2015, only 37% of South Koreans had a negative view of China, according to data from the Pew Research Center. By 2020, that figure had more than doubled to 75%. Recent opinion polls suggest South Korean perceptions of China are now roughly equal to views about Japan, Korea’s former colonial ruler.
South Korea-China ties especially deteriorated after 2017, when Seoul installed the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense U.S. missile defense system, known as THAAD, to counter the threat posed by North Korea. Beijing objected to the deployment and waged a painful campaign of economic retaliation.
Perceptions of China have especially worsened among younger South Koreans, “who were born in a time of China’s rise and felt its overarching influence everywhere,” said Go Min-hee, who teaches political science and international relations at Seoul’s Ewha Womans University.
Complicated roots
For many South Koreans, China’s display of the hanbok dress during the Olympics opening ceremony hit a particularly sensitive nerve — although the controversy may not be immediately apparent to outside observers.
For its part, China said the hanbok display was not meant to be a statement about its cultural origins. The hanbok-clad performer, Chinese officials insisted, was only meant to represent ethnic Koreans — one of dozens of China’s ethnic minority groups featured in the parade.
Some South Koreans sympathize with that view, saying the hanbok also should belong to the Korean diaspora, including the around 2 million ethnic Koreans living in China. “What exactly was this Korean Chinese participant supposed to wear?” asked an editorial in the left-leaning Hankyoreh newspaper.
South Koreans, however, became upset in part because of China’s long-standing efforts to claim Korea’s ancient kingdoms as part of its own national history. The territory of the Korean kingdoms, known as Goguryeo and Balhae, overlap with what is now part of modern China.
From Koreans’ perspective, claiming these Korean kingdoms as a small part of a bigger and more important historical Chinese entity is extremely offensive, said Darcie Draudt, a postdoctoral fellow at the George Washington Institute of Korean Studies.
“The issue of sovereignty is at the heart of it. Korea has been ‘border insecure’ since Japan colonized it. And then it was divided, with north and south cut off. And then you must consider all the Koreans now in China, Manchuria, Russia, and elsewhere. So, then it becomes tied into national division, in a sense,” she added.
Major political issue
The Olympics controversies have become a major campaign talking point in Seoul, raising the possibility that anti-China sentiment could be exploited for political gains ahead of the March 9 vote.
Yoon, the conservative candidate, had already spoken in blunter terms about China. In December, he declared “most South Korean people, especially younger ones, do not like China.” He has also called for additional THAAD deployments in South Korea.
Lee, the ruling party candidate, says South Korea must maintain a balance in its relationship between the United States and China. But Lee too has taken a more adversarial approach toward Beijing this week, promising to “strongly crack down” on Chinese vessels fishing illegally off South Korea’s coast.
The China issue is not likely to be decisive in the South Korean election, say observers, who note that both campaigns remain focused on domestic issues.
“Over the long run, however, I think that fueling the anti-Chinese sentiment will backfire,” said Go. “The complexity of Korea-China relations will be a significant burden to the incoming administration.”
The president-elect was warned – there was a conspiracy to prevent the counting of the electoral ballots and disrupt his inauguration. There was even talk of seizing Washington by military force in a deeply divided nation.
It was not Joe Biden receiving the alarming reports after his 2020 election, but Abraham Lincoln following the vote of 1860.
“There was also an assassination plot against the president-elect to prevent him from arriving in Washington at all,” according to Lincoln historian Howard Holzer.
This April 2, 2015 photo shows a lamp, believed to be one of two that were on the original train car that carried President Abraham Lincoln’s coffin along the 1600-mile route from Washington, D.C. to Springfield, Ill., in Elgin, Ill.
Members of a white supremacist secret society and a Baltimore militia, both committed to preserving slavery, had discussed seizing Washington by force before looking to sabotage the train carrying Lincoln to his inauguration.
Lincoln was inaugurated as the 16th president of the United States on March 4, 1861. By then southern states had already begun seceding to form the Confederated States of America. To get to the ceremony in Washington, Lincoln avoided going through the slaveholding city of Baltimore, as had been announced, detouring to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania disguised as an ordinary passenger in a sleeping car on a night train.
The plot to kill the president-elect (who was assassinated in 1865 after winning a second term) “turned out to be little more than rumor and drunken boasting and Lincoln was afterward so embarrassed that he had listened to any of it that he almost went to the other extreme in disregard of his personal safety,” according to Princeton University Professor Allen Guelzo.
As in 2020, some Americans in 1860 were incensed by unfounded charges about the legitimacy of the popular and electoral votes.
“It was even more ridiculous than the recent charges by Donald Trump,” Holzer told VOA of the claims that Lincoln was not legitimately elected because he prevailed in the North but had no electoral votes in the South.
Lincoln “won the election on the strength of the electoral college vote, but with only 39 percent of the popular vote. However, the states where he won the popular vote — and thus the electoral vote — gave him whopping margins of victory, so there was never any question about challenges to electors in those states,” says Guelzo, director of Princeton’s Initiative on Politics and Statesmanship of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions.
FILE – Protesters loyal to then-President Donald Trump storm the Capitol, Jan. 6, 2021.
The first mob at the Capitol
In another parallel to recent events, on Feb. 13, 1861, a mob tried to force its way inside the U.S. Capitol to disrupt the electoral vote count. Unlike the riot at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, authorities were prepared.
General Winfield Scott, a Southerner and hero of the Mexican War in charge of defending Washington, had even sent a cannon to Capitol Hill.
The general made it known that any intruder would be “be lashed to the muzzle of a twelve-pounder and fired out the window of the Capitol.” For emphasis, he added: “I would manure the hills of Arlington with the fragments of his body.”
“That intimidated the group a bit,” notes Holzer.
A major difference between 1861 and 2021 is that all the senators and many of the House members from the breakaway states had already permanently departed Washington.
“So, there was no one there really to take votes and object to the state counts. And that’s one of the other reasons why it actually went much more smoothly than it did in 2020,” says Holzer, director of the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College.
The vice president of the United States, who is the president of the Senate, in both 1861 and 2021 did not tamper with the ceremonial but crucial electoral vote count. On that fateful day in 1861, Vice President John Breckinridge of Kentucky (the runner-up presidential candidate from the Southern side of a split Democratic Party) presided over the event.
Two months later, civil war began when Confederate forces attacked a U.S. Army fort in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina.
President Joe Biden speaks from Statuary Hall at the U.S. Capitol to mark the one year anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol by supporters loyal to then-President Donald Trump, Thursday, Jan. 6, 2022, in Washington.
Modern day dispute
On the first anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, deadly attack on the Capitol, Biden declared: “We are in a battle for the soul of America,” accusing Trump of trying to unravel the country’s democratic system by continuing to repeat lies about the 2020 election.
Trump continues to insist, without evidence, there was “massive vote fraud” in several states he lost.
A special House committee, meanwhile, is investigating the siege of the Capitol and the violent attempt to disrupt the electoral vote counting.
The U.S. election system has improved since Lincoln’s days, but more reform is needed, according to numerous politicians, analysts and historians.
“In those days, state electors were elected in many states by the legislature, not even by voters. There was a lot of possibilities for fraud, or at least over-politicization that ignored the will of the people,” says Holzer. “We don’t have that now. We have electronic and computer counts. We have poll-watchers, we have the popular vote.”
Numerous technical issues with the certification and counting of the electoral votes remain concerningly vague, however, according to Michael Morley, a law professor at Florida State University and a member of the National Task Force on Election Crises.
“It’s an issue that four years ago wouldn’t have been on anyone’s political radar,” says Morley, who explains he is now “cautiously optimistic that we might see some changes.”
The danger for the next presidential election in 2024 in a deeply divided nation, as it was in Lincoln’s time, is “both the possibility, as well as a public perception of the possibility, that the outcome of the election could be determined by politically motivated decision-making rather than the dictates of the law and what the actual outcome of the vote is,” Morley tells VOA.
Electoral College ballot boxes arrive to a joint session of the Congress to certify the 2020 election results on Capitol Hill in Washington, Jan. 6, 2021.
Will law be updated?
Such concerns have a bipartisan group of U.S. senators examining ways to modernize the law concerning the electoral ballots.
The 1887 Electoral Count Act is woefully out of date, Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine, told reporters on Wednesday. She explained that lawmakers are exploring how to raise the requirements for members of Congress to challenge state-certified election results and ensuring the vice president’s role is purely ceremonial when the electoral votes are certified.
The 1887 act written in reaction to the presidential election of 1876, in which Democrat Samuel Tilden won the popular vote but ultimately lost to Republican Rutherford B. Hayes. Three Southern states had sent in multiple competing electoral returns and Congress had no rules in place to resolve the conflicts.
It is critical, according to Collins, to prevent a repeat of last year when Trump pressured his vice president, Mike Pence, to overturn electoral results.
“Fortunately, Vice President Pence did the right thing and followed the 12th Amendment, but the Electoral Count Act is ambiguous about the role of the vice president,” Collins told WMTW-TV. “But what if we had a vice president who wasn’t as ethical and bound by his constitutional duty?”
Guinea and Vanuatu had their ability to vote at the United Nations restored on Monday, having been denied the right at the beginning of the month over their failure to pay their dues to the world body, a UN spokeswoman said.
“The General Assembly took note that Guinea, Iran and Vanuatu have made the payments necessary to reduce their arrears below the amounts specified in Article 19 of the Charter,” U.N. spokeswoman Paulina Kubiak said.
“This means that they can resume voting in the General Assembly,” she said.
Under Article 19, any country can have their voting rights in the General Assembly suspended if their payment arrears are equal to or greater than the contribution due for the past two full years.
The payment Friday of more than $18 million by Iran, via an account in Seoul and most likely with the approval of the United States, which has imposed heavy financial sanctions on Tehran, had been announced at the end of last week by UN sources and confirmed by South Korea.
For their part, Guinea had to pay at least $40,000 and Vanuatu at least $194 to recover their right to vote.
Kubiak later added three other countries that lost their U.N. voting rights in early January had also recovered them after paying the minimum arrears required last week.
Those countries were Sudan, which had to pay about $300,000, Antigua and Barbuda, which owed some $37,000 and Congo-Brazzaville, with around $73,000 in arrears, said the spokeswoman.
On the other hand, Venezuela, which is facing a minimum payment of nearly $40 million, and Papua New Guinea, which must pay just over $13,000, remain deprived of the right to vote, according to the U.N.
They are the only two countries out of the 193 members of the United Nations that will not be able to participate in votes this year.
Using Iranian bank funds freed from American sanctions, South Korea has paid Iran’s $18 million in delinquent dues owed to the United Nations, Seoul said Sunday. The step was apparently approved by Washington to restore Tehran’s suspended voting rights at the world body.
Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the South Korean Foreign Ministry said Seoul had paid the sum using Iranian assets frozen in the country after consulting with the United States Treasury — a potential signal of flexibility amid floundering nuclear negotiations.
The ministry said it expected Iran’s voting rights to be restored immediately after their suspension earlier this month for delinquent dues.
The funds had been impounded at a Korean bank under sanctions imposed by former President Donald Trump after he withdrew the U.S. from Tehran’s landmark nuclear deal with world powers. The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control must grant a license for these transactions under the American banking sanctions imposed on Iran. The Treasury did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the unfrozen funds.
The Biden administration wants to restore the 2015 nuclear deal, which granted Iran sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program.
Diplomats are now engaged in delicate negotiations to revive the accord in Vienna, although a breakthrough remains elusive as Iran abandons every limitation the deal imposed on its nuclear enrichment. The country now enriches a small amount of to 60% purity — a short, technical step away from weapons grade levels — and spins far more advanced centrifuges than allowed.
Under the United Nations Charter, a nation that owes the previous two full years’ worth of dues loses its voting rights at the General Assembly.
A letter from Secretary-General Antonio Guterres circulated earlier this month revealed that Iran was among several delinquent countries on that list, which also includes Venezuela and Sudan. The General Assembly can make exceptions to the rule, determining that some countries face circumstances “beyond the control of the member.”
According to the secretary-general’s letter, Iran needed to pay a minimum of $18.4 million to restore its voting rights.
Iran also lost its voting rights in January of last year, prompting Tehran to lash out at the U.S. for imposing crushing sanctions that froze billions of dollars in Iranian funds in banks around the world. Tehran regained voting rights last June after making the minimum payment on its dues.
Iran over the past few years has pressured Seoul to release about $7 billion in revenues from oil sales that remain frozen in South Korean banks since the Trump administration tightened sanctions on Iran.
The frozen funds hang in the balance as diplomats struggle to revive the nuclear deal. Senior South Korean diplomats including Choi Jong Kun, the first vice foreign minister, flew to Vienna this month to discuss the fate of the assets with their Iranian counterparts.
