Voters from the 51st US state - we want you! (Overseas absentee voters)

With the US presidential election less than six months away, both Republicans and Democrats are working hard to secure expat votes.

This massive surge in activity is because many people believe expats could decide the election this year.

He reminded the German chapter of Republicans Abroad in April how much the absentee vote (the ballot papers coming in mainly from abroad) mattered in the pivotal state of Florida in 2000.

"It was the absentee votes that turned the tide in Florida. Every vote counts. We need to get the word out," he said.

The 2000 vote was the closest in American history, with George W Bush gaining a margin of 537 votes in the crucial Florida count.

With around six million Americans living abroad, there are enough voters to make up a 51st state. But US voters are registered in the county and state in which they last lived. And it was the absentee votes (and the way they were counted) that made the difference in the crucial states in 2000.

An investigation published by The New York Times in July 2001, eight months after the poll, found that overseas ballots — the only votes that could legally be received and counted after election day — were judged by markedly different standards, depending on where they were counted.

That was because the Bush team, anxious to ensure their man won a precariously balanced race, pushed to count the maximum number of overseas ballots in counties won by Bush while seeking to disqualify overseas ballots in counties won by Democrat challenger Al Gore, according to The New York Times.

Florida officials, the newspaper found, accepted hundreds of overseas ballots that failed to comply with state laws — 680 questionable votes that had missing postmarks, were postmarked after the election, were without witness signatures or were mailed from towns and cities within the United States. Even some ballots from electors who had voted twice.

If the state's election laws had been strictly enforced, all these votes would have been disqualified.

The push provided an effective counterweight to the Gore team's own push for manual recounts in mainly Democratic states in southern Florida.

The study found no evidence of vote fraud in the 2000 election. But the closeness of the race and the importance of the expat vote have made a lot of people sit up and take notice of Americans living abroad.

Both Republicans and Democrats are pushing to get expats to register to vote. But it seems to be the anti-Bush groups that are really making waves.

In the past year, a clutch of small-scale groups have started campaigns to get expat voters to register - most in the hope that these reluctant voters will support Democrat candidate John Kerry.

Perhaps none more so than American Voices Abroad which is aiming to collect 100,000 pledges from US citizens rejecting the Patriot Act (the legislation enacted following the September 11 terror attacks) and what it calls the "doctrine of pre-emptive war" - the hawkish policy of the US administration that has led to action in Iraq and threats of military intervention elsewhere in the world.

Brian Thomas, political adviser to AVA, says the group is non-partisan, and that there are voters in the Republican Party who oppose these two policies. But he admits that the group will attract more Democrat and independent votes.

"It's really the first time Americans in Europe have organised themselves outside of the traditional two-party structure, filling a political niche and responding to political needs the party structure in the US isn't filling. This is mirrored in the US by hundreds of political movements."

Thomas claims AVA is gaining a strong following, with new groups forming on a weekly basis.

"The response is far more than we anticipated. People are just coming out of the woodwork. American expats here are mobilising and registering," he says.

A similar movement is TellAnAmericanToVote.com, started by two American expats living in Amsterdam.

Claire Taylor, the co-creator of the website, says: "In 2000, just 537 votes put George W Bush in the White House, yet most Americans abroad don't bother voting.

"The bold opinion of our Dutch friends and neighbours inspired us. The US president affects the whole world and we want to give the world a chance to have their say."

The site allows anyone to send a message to American friends and colleagues, including the required forms and instructions for overseas voting.

It's a way of allowing non-Americans to vote by proxy, but also to encourage discussion about the right to vote as the real basis for democracy, she says.

"After the election, a lot of people were saying, why does everyone in America want the war, why did they support Bush?" says Taylor.

"But you forget that half the US didn't vote for Bush. That's always a discussion - I am having to defend the US policies when I don't necessarily support them myself."

Kevin Prager, chairman of Democrats Abroad in Belgium, says he has noticed a massive increase in Americans registering for their absentee ballots in Belgium compared to the 2000 election.

"Furthermore, people are doing it earlier, and more traditional independents seem to be registering. We have also seen an unusual number of first-time voters signing up," he says.

"Similar trends have been confirmed by our sister groups in other countries around the world, and, significantly, in a number of the state primaries."

"Democrats Abroad has grown from 23 to 37 country groups in the last year, and all of the country groups — both new and old — are reporting record membership growth, turnouts at events and voter registration numbers," he says.

"The most amazing thing is that all of these people — from the International Chairperson to the newest member — are volunteers, many of them getting involved in the political process for the first time."

"I know a number of registered Republicans have made the difficult choice to vote for the Democratic candidate this year," says Prager.

"Through their policies, the Bush administration and certain GOP members of Congress have made a growing number of moderate Republicans increasingly uncomfortable over the course of the last three and a half years.

"The majority are loyal Republicans, but they don't like the direction the country is going, in both the domestic and international arenas. They do not want four more years of Bush and his associates, and they will certainly not vote for Nader. That leaves Kerry."

Last week it was revealed that a former head of Republicans Abroad Belgium, Christian D de Fouloy, was setting up a group called Republicans for Kerry Europe because he "could no longer stand up for what this administration was standing for".

"I've always been a moderate Republican, but this administration has shown there's no room for us in the party," he says.

For their part, the Republicans have launched their own drive to pull in votes behind the president.

Joan Hills, Republicans Abroad global co-chairman, says on their German chapter website: "This is going to be a very close election. We want to pick up another state this year like we did in Florida in 2000.

"There is approximately 10 percent of the population that can swing this election, and the overseas vote will play a pivotal role as it did four years ago. We have a great responsibility to bring these votes in."

Henry Nickel, chairman of the German chapter, says most of his organisation's activity is geared towards registering, through blanket canvassing, online registration and what he calls public outreach programmes.

The American expat population in Germany is, at 250,000, the fourth largest in the world, and one fifth of those are in the military - conservative voters who generally tend to support the Republican candidate and whose votes were so important in the outcome of the 2000 election.

The military has almost a 100 percent turnout for elections, says Nickel. This is thanks to various programmes that make it easy for them to register and vote.

So Republicans Abroad is looking out for the other four-fifths, whose voting preference Nickel describes as "rather unknown".

"We're doing everything we can to get the message out and interact with the public," he says.

He notes that, unlike the Democrats, Republicans Abroad are no longer affiliated with the party back in Washington - so they don't have the support of the machine at home. But they are also able to raise funds here in Europe.

"This is crunch time now. You've got to be a few months ahead of the curve to get the turnout we need to be effective," he says.

And with a long lead-time necessary for registration, the receipt and mailing of postal ballots, all groups are urging American expats to sign up to vote right now.

Robert Pingeon, regional chair of Republicans Abroad Europe, says that, historically, expatriate Americans have voted 3-to-1 for Republican candidates in federal elections.

But in a recent letter to the Boston Globe, Connie Borde, chair of Democrats Abroad France, says her mailing list is 10 times the size of the Republicans'.

"By our estimates, the majority of overseas voters vote Democratic, maybe because those of us who live abroad can see firsthand how the domestic and foreign policies of the misguided Bush administration have put America on the wrong track, and that it will take years to undo what it has done at home and abroad," she writes.

As the battle begins, we'll keep you posted on what will be a decisive six months for Americans overseas.

The majority are loyal Republicans, but they don't like the direction the country is going, in both the domestic and international arenas. They do not want four more years of Bush and his associates, and they will certainly not vote for Nader. That leaves Kerry."

Conservatives voting for a communist. O.K...... Living with socialist must rot your brain.

I think the Repubs should put judges at post offices. A lot of oversees military ballots got dumped by government po employees in the last election. (Although here in Maryland, it was state DMV employees trashing Republican registrations)

"Last week it was revealed that a former head of Republicans Abroad Belgium, Christian D de Fouloy, was setting up a group called Republicans for Kerry Europe because he "could no longer stand up for what this administration was standing for".

"I've always been a moderate Republican, but this administration has shown there's no room for us in the party," he says. "

I love it when some so-called moderate Republican speaks about how the rightward tilt of the party has made them vote Democratic. Its comical really.

I mean, I can understand being upset with President Bush. There are actually many conservative reasons to be upset with him, and I can understand how it makes many conservatives want to sit out and not vote. Obviously for a conservative to vote for Kerry wouldn't make sense.

But for these 'moderates' to vote for Kerry? WTF? Okay, you think Bush is too far right (I wish). Fine. But when you then say that it has led you to decide to vote for Kerry you are betraying your true self. Kerry is very liberal. He has the record of far left-winger. He is certainly more left than Bush is right. He will raise taxes, fund overseas abortions, appoint judges who will impose gay marriage, etc. There is no doubt about this.

So when a so-called moderate Republican declares his intention to support Kerry they are in fact revealing that they are not a moderate Republican at all; they are in fact liberal Republicans who probably belonged in the Dem camp all along.

The war is one thing. Personally I think support for the war is only 'conservative' in so far as it was launched and led by a Republcian President. I don't think its inherently conservative, but what I find to be especially insulting is when Republicans who hold what are in truth liberal views on certain issues (especially social ones) are bestowed with the moderate description.

Superficially, the Iraq war has all the earmarks of the internationalist - certainly not a traditional conservative - philosophy. Had it been the project of a Democrat, the New York Times would be promoting him for the Nobel Peace Prize right now on the same facts it uses to excoriate George Bush.

In fact, the first opposition to the war came not from the left, but from the right. I remember it well, but I can't remember exacly who it was that wrote the piece I have in mind.

I shared some of the misgivings aired by Conervatives at the time. But, I have come to understand that we are in a very long term conflict that can only be won if the mindset of Islam in general is brought into the modern world. The 14th century mindset has to be made marginal and irrelevant.

We can't win by force of arms alone. Nor can WE change Islam. They have to do that themselves, but what we can do and what we MUST do is to help create the conditions on the ground for that to flower.

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