Recently, the Seventh Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals issued an opinion (the state’s motion for reconsideration of the ruling, which includes the opinion itself, is attached). This opinion calls for a special election on Nov. 2 to fill the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Roland Burris — for part of the lame-duck session. This would elect someone to serve for a month, between the state’s proclamation of results Dec. 3, 2010 and the Jan. 3, 2011 seating of the new Congress.
Under this plan, voters would make two choices for U.S. Senate on Nov. 2 — once for a candidate to serve as U.S. Senator in the lame-duck session, and then another choice below or above that on the ballots for a candidate to serve as U.S. Senator for the full six-year term that begins Jan. 3, 2011.
The larger concern is that such a special election would require a special primary to determine the candidates. The existing candidates for the six-year U.S. Senate term would not automatically be the candidates for the special election for the one-month term.
The Board of Election Commissioners points out the following election-administration issues this creates:
-1- Under state law, the current Democratic, Green and Republican candidates for U.S. Senate in the General Election for the 6-year term would not automatically be the candidates for the special election for the lame-duck term. State laws do not provide the option of party conventions, and instead require a special primary.
-2- Petition-circulation would need to start immediately if a special primary were to be held, at the latest, in early September. The schedule must allow for collecting signatures, hearings on any objections, and then printing ballots and programming equipment for Early Voting/Absentee Voting that would need to start in early or mid-August.
-3- Under an early-September Special Primary, absentee ballots must be accepted for 14 days after the date of the election. From there, a statewide proclamation of special primary results would likely occur one to two weeks later, in late September or early October. Such a late proclamation leaves little or no time for a recount/election contest if the statewide results are close. This proclamation also would leave little or no time for programming balloting equipment for the Early Voting that starts Oct. 11, and would overlaps when absentee voting is supposed to start in late September for Military/Overseas voters.
-4- Election authorities must meet new federal guidelines under the MOVE Act for military/overseas voters — with ballots that list candidates both several weeks before the special primary and then several weeks before the general election.
-5- There are serious and critical logistical and cost concerns related to an $8 million special primary in Chicago (perhaps upward of $20 million statewide). This will involve programming, testing and deploying all of the election equipment in advance of early September — and then after the proclamation, in late September or early October, testing and printing ballots, collecting, repairing, re-programming, re-testing and redeploying all of the equipment in time to start voting, by law, again in late September for overseas voters, and early October for local voters.
