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Document Type

Report

Language

English (en)

Publication Date

2010

Abstract

The residual vote rate is a metric that can be used to evaluate the comparative performance of election systems, particularly voting technology and ballot design. If collected at the appropriate levels of disaggregation (county- or more preferably precinct-level) and by different modes of balloting (in person, absentee, and early voting), the residual vote rate can identify ways that voter demographics, voting technology, and the time and place of casting the ballot may influence varying levels of voting errors.

This report describes a project that examined the residual vote rates in the state of Florida’s 2008 presidential preference primary, taking advantage of a state law that, for a time, required all jurisdictions to report over- and under-votes at the precinct level.

Keywords

Election Law, Elections Data, Residual Vote Rate, Election Systems, Voting Technology, Ballot Design

Publication Citation

Paul Gronke, Charles III Stewart & James Hicks, Residual Voting in Florida, (2010)

Comments

This research was funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Trusts. The authors would like to thank the Director of Elections of the State of Florida for providing assistance and support for this project. We also thank Reed College for providing infrastructure support for the Early Voting Information Center. Eva Galanes-Rosenbaum (Reed), Tony Hill (MIT), and B.K. Song (MIT) also worked on portions of this project.

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