During the mayoral primary, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund’s (AALDEF) poll monitors found broken voting machines, missing interpreters, a lack of translated materials, and even racist remarks by poll workers.
\nAALDEF sent attorneys to over 50 polling places in Queens, Brooklyn, and Manhattan to monitor today’s mayoral primary for compliance with the language assistance provisions (Section 203) of the federal Voting Rights Act and to document other voting barriers.
\n\u201cNew York’s elections continue to unduly challenge Asian Americans voters with insufficient language access services,\u201d said Glenn Magpantay, Director of the Democracy Program at AALDEheF<\/p>\n
Poll monitors reported a number of voting barriers. In a poll site in Jamaica, Queens (PS 131), two voting machines were broken. Despite over twenty calls to the Board of Elections, they remained unfixed until the afternoon, causing at least 15 voters to walk away. In a poll site in Astoria, Queens (PS 171), no interpreters were available in Chinese, Bengali, or Korean, as required, despite repeated voter requests. At PS 85 in Astoria, Queens, one poll inspector said that he believed all the material should just be in English because “all the idiots should learn English.”
\nAll observations were reported to the Board of Elections. A summary of voting problems follows:
\nBroken Voting Machines
\n\u2022 At PS 131 in Jamaica, Queens, since 6am, two voting machines broke down at a site where there were numerous Bengali voters. The Board of Elections was called over 20 times. A technician did not show up until after 1pm. In that time, poll workers ran out of emergency ballots. At least 15 voters were observed leaving unable to vote.
\n\u2022 At Cardozo High School in Bayside, Queens, two voting machines broke (more than once). Poll workers allowed voters to vote on \u201cemergency ballots\u201d but then did not know what to do with the ballots.
\n\u2022 At Southbridge Tower in Chinatown, Manhattan, two voting machines broke down.
\n\u2022 At Thomas A. Edison H.S. in Jamaica, Queens, one voting machine broke down and several dozen South Asian voters were unable to vote.<\/p>\n
Missing Interpreters<\/strong> Pollworker Problems<\/strong> http:\/\/www.paramuspost.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" During the mayoral primary, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund’s (AALDEF) poll monitors found broken voting machines, missing<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":72448,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"magazineBlocksPostFeaturedMedia":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","medium_large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","1536x1536":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","2048x2048":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-highlighted-post":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-medium":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-featured-post-small":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x90.jpg","colormag-featured-image":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-default-news":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg","colormag-featured-image-large":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-block-extra-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-small-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg","colormag-elementor-grid-medium-large-thumbnail":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg"},"magazineBlocksPostAuthor":{"name":"Admin","avatar":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g"},"magazineBlocksPostCommentsNumber":"0","magazineBlocksPostExcerpt":"During the mayoral primary, the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund’s (AALDEF) poll monitors found broken voting machines, missing","magazineBlocksPostCategories":[],"magazineBlocksPostViewCount":145,"magazineBlocksPostReadTime":4,"magazine_blocks_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"medium":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u.jpg",113,170,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/u-113x150.jpg",113,150,true]},"magazine_blocks_author":{"display_name":"Admin","author_link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?author=1"},"magazine_blocks_comment":0,"magazine_blocks_author_image":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/53e6cdc30765aade0129f85e5aeb50124b1d3f5bb9a70373be31e4eb328371e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","magazine_blocks_category":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/72448"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nVarious poll sites had shortages of interpreters to assist voters, including:
\n\u2022 PS 131 in Jamaica, Queens (missing Hindi and Bengali interpreters despite multiple Bengali voters).
\n\u2022 PS 89 in Elmhurst, Queens (missing Korean interpreters).
\n\u2022 Cardozo High School in Bayside, Queens (missing Chinese interpreters).
\n\u2022 PS 171 Peter Van Alst in Astoria, Queens (no interpreters in Chinese, Bengali, or Korean).
\n\u2022 PS 130 and 143 in Chinatown, Manhattan (interpreter unable to translate new address of poll site for voter).
\nLack of Translated Materials
\nThe lack of translated materials included:
\n\u2022 Southbridge Tower in Chinatown, Manhattan: the poll site had no translated affidavit ballots.
\n\u2022 PS 234 in Astoria, Queens: the poll coordinator refused to put up the translated voting machine instructions.
\n\u2022 PS 89 in Elmhurst, Queens: there was a missing \u201cVoter Bill of Rights\u201d sign, as required under the Help America Vote Act (HAVA).
\n\u2022 PS 126 in Chinatown, Manhattan: the \u201cNo Electioneering\u201d sign was hung upside down.
\n\u2022 Cardozo High School, Bayside, Queens: instructions on how to vote were missing in Korean. There were no \u201cInterpreter Available\u201d table tents identifying Chinese and Korean interpreters.
\n\u2022 Rutgers Houses in Lower East Side, Manhattan: one election district ran out of voter registration forms translated into Chinese.<\/p>\n
\n\u2022 At PS 85 in Astoria, Queens, one poll inspector said that he believed all material should just be in English because “all the idiots should learn English.”
\n\u2022 At St. Andrew’s Church in Flushing, Queens, a poll inspector initially told a voter whose first name was written incorrectly in the voter rolls (but whose last name and address were correct) that she could not vote. When another poll inspector intervened and allowed that voter to vote by affidavit ballot, the poll worker said that voting by affidavit ballot \u201cshould be illegal.\u201d
\nPoll Site Confusion
\n\u2022 PS 1 in Chinatown, Manhattan was closed to the surprise of many Chinese American voters. Voters were re-routed at the last minute to PS 126, resulting in a very crowded poll site.
\n\u2022 At PS 171 Peter Van Alst in Astoria, Queens, the poll site coordinator never appeared, leaving all poll workers confused and nervous.<\/p>\n