Students Paisley Palmer and David Davis said they were excited to vote for their first time. However, just days before election day, they noticed something was wrong when they still didn’t have their voter-registration cards.
“I was waiting for a while, but I wasn’t really updated, and I found out a couple days before the election I could not vote, so that sucked,” Davis said. “I’d rather not cast a provisional ballot.”
Like Palmer and Davis, ballots cast by more than 100 UNM students may not be counted after NMPIRG, a student-funded, on-campus organization, failed to submit registration cards on time, according to the Bernalillo County Clerk’s office.
Breanna Hastings, NMPIRG president, said her group turned in the registration cards late to the County Clerk, but said there was confusion about the clerk’s deadline.
“We were told we could submit registration forms 48 hours after the Oct. 6 deadline,” Hastings said. “We did everything to abide by the rules that the County Clerk gave us.”
The County Clerk’s office did not comment on the miscommunication claim but confirmed it received the registration cards one day late.
Katie Otsuka, a PIRG representative, said the group mailed the forms from the post office off Cornell Drive on Oct. 5 after 7 p.m. But when the documents reached the County Clerk’s office, they were postmarked Oct. 6, a day after the deadline.
PIRG did not learn about the incident until a few days before Election Day when a student contacted the group after he was turned away from an early-voting site.
“We contacted the county clerk’s office, and they told us the forms we submitted after the deadline were in question,” Otsuka said. “We then made the effort to contact the students.”
Out of more than 100 who did not get registered, PIRG contacted 15-20 students, told them they were not registered to vote and advised them to fill out a provisional ballot at the polls, Otsuka said. She said of those reached, three received their voter card and were able to vote.
Davis said he ended up filling out a provisional ballot.
Palmer said she did not.
“The voter card never came in the mail, so I though it wasn’t possible to vote,” she said.
Hastings said NMPIRG, which stands for the New Mexico Public Interest Research Group, apologized to students and is cooperating with the County Clerk’s office to ensure the students’ voices are heard.
“It was really disheartening,” she said. “I’m not sure what we could have done better.”
Now, it is up to the New Mexico Election Commission to determine if there is enough evidence to count the ballots after the election, despite the registration error.
“It was a pitfall for both the County Clerk’s office and the PIRG’s,” Hastings said.
Through the New Voters Project, PIRG registered more than 1,200 voters on campus since the beginning of the fall semester. It also made more than 9,500 get-out-the-vote reminder contacts, Hastings said.
NMPIRG receives about $50,000 of its total funding with student fees.
Although she was not able to vote in her first election, Palmer said she understands this was a miscommunication issue and is not ready to blame the organization.
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“They messed up the last day of voter registration forms,” she said. “But I am sure they did a lot of good before that.”
