Earlier this year, in line with our international obligations, the State Department issued a formal invitation for the OSCE to send an Observation Mission for this year’s General Elections in November. To prepare, ODIHR sent a Needs Assessment Mission in May to assess the situation and evaluate what type of Mission would be appropriate, if any. The
Report of that NAM has now been published, and, for those of us who care about how our elections are administered, it makes for interesting reading. (Did you know, for example, that there will be an estimated 185,000 Polling Stations established on Voting Day?)
The report contains brief sections on the Legal Framework; Electoral System; Election Administration; Voter Rights, Registration and Identification; Candidate Registration; Alternative Voting Methods; New Voting Technologies; Election Campaign; Campaign Finance; the Media; and the possibilities for election Observation. (In this context, its important to note that only eight states and the District of Columbia explicitly permit international Observers to have access to Polling Stations — California, Colorado, Missouri, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota and Washington. Other states delegate the authority to grant access to local jurisdictions, or leave it undecided.)
The report concludes with a recommendation that OSCE deploy a full-scale Observation Mission, with a Core Team of a dozen analysts based in Washington, D.C., plus some 100 Long-Term Observers to be deployed around the 50 States and a hoped-for number of 400 Short-Term Observers from all across the 57 Participating States. They would spend roughly one week in-country, being briefed by the Core Team, deployed in 200 binational teams of two, visiting polling stations and preparing reports on E-Day, then returning for debriefings and departure.
Will International Organizations Observe the U.S. Elections Again?
