Federal officials say that absentee ballots being sent to U.S. military serving in Afghanistan may have been burned in a plane crash. A top official in the Federal Voting Assistance Program this week notified election officials across the nation that a transport plane crashed at Shindad Air Base on Oct. 19. The crash resulted in the destruction of 4,700 pounds of mail inbound to troops serving in the area. Go To Site

The professional core of the U.S. military overwhelmingly favors Mitt Romney over President Obama in the upcoming election — but not because of any particular military issues, according to a new poll of more than 3,100 active and reserve troops. Respondents rated the economy and the candidates’ character as their most important considerations and all but ignored the war in Afghanistan as an issue of concern. Go To Site

Fifteen Ohio military groups have gone to court to oppose an “offensive” lawsuit filed by President Obama’s campaign that challenges a law allowing military members to vote on days when the rest of the state cannot. Go To Site

Some States Not Sending Absentee Ballots to Military

Election, Government, Incompetence

Jurisdictions in Vermont, Michigan, Mississippi and Wisconsin have failed to mail absentee ballots to military members by the Sept. 22, 2012, deadline established by the MOVE Act. That was 45 days before the November 6 elections, which was what was required.

Military Voters in Wisconsin Told to Submit Ballots a Week After Deadline

Election, Oops

The Federal Voting Assistance Program website published an incorrect deadline for the return of returning military ballots in Wisconsin. Had this error not been corrected, thousands of Wisconsin servicemen and women could have been disenfranchised in this key swing state this November. The FVAB website incorrectly stated ballots must be returned by November 16. The actual deadline is 4 p.m. November 9. Any military ballots received in that intervening week would not have been counted by local and state election officials.

Pentagon fails to comply with law to help overseas soldiers vote, watchdog says

Election, Government, Incompetence

The Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment (MOVE) Act was passed by Congress in 2009 and signed into law by President Barack Obama and was supposed to make it easier for both soldiers deployed overseas and U.S. citizens living abroad to cast ballots back in their home states. One of the key provisions required each military branch to create an installation voting assistance office (IVAO) for every military base outside an immediate combat zone. But the Pentagon’s inspector general, the military’s internal watchdog, reported Tuesday it got a disappointing result when it tried to locate such voting assistance offices on each installation earlier this year. “Results were clear. Our attempts to contact IVAOs failed about 50 percent of the time,” the inspector general reported. “We concluded the Services had not established all the IVAOs as intended by the MOVE Act because, among other issues, the funding was not available.”