[Voterescue] Texas Straw Poll - Our experience, & Exit Poll Results

[Vickie Karp]

  VoteRescuers, What an amazing day we had in Fort Worth yesterday! 
  Our small but very committed group of volunteers assembled yesterday
  in Fort Worth and conducted an exit poll at the Ft. Worth Convention
  Center, succeeding in garnering a fantastic 23.8% participation rate,
  or 308 exit poll participants, among the 1300 official Republican
  delegates who voted in the official Straw Poll.  We dealt first with
  rain, then intense heat, and a guard at the door who would not let us
  set up in shade (but at least did not throw us off the property of
  the Convention Center.)  MANY THANKS TO OUR WONDERFUL VOLUNTEERS: 
  Laura and Randall Killins, Laura Westcott, Hector Del Toro, his
  friend Jimmy (last name?  We never got! :( ) Bill Giltner; Kathy Cox,
  Gregory Gory, Whitney Young, Kathleen Winn, and Terry Melton.  Our
  real break came when one of our Exit Poll teams gained access inside
  the building and managed to station themselves just outside the exit
  doors of the room where voting took place.  (This may well have been
  because of the yellow "Vote in Sunshine" T-shirts obtained by
  volunteer Gregory Gory from the hard-working election monitors from
  the Iowa Straw Poll-- which looked amazingly similar to the yellow
  T-shirts worn by official Straw Poll volunteers! Happy
  Coincidence!)  The mad rush to complete Exit Polls was on sometime
  between 12:30 and 1pm when voting began, until just after 2 pm when
  it ended.  (Many thanks to volunteer Kathy Cox who got access to
  Guest Passes for most of us, allowing us inside where the biggest
  crowds of voters could be accessed in the shortest period of time.) 
  We immediately sent most of our Pollsters to that location, which was
  how we got such a great percentage of respondents.  Below are our
  results, set side-by-side with the "official" results from the Straw
  Poll:   

  Texas Republican Party Straw Poll

  Saturday, September 1, 2007

  Results for Election Verification Exit Poll conducted by

  Texans for REAL Elections:

  Candidate Our Results Official Results

  # of Votes / % of Total # of Votes / % of Total

  Sam Brownback 1 .33% 6 .46%

  Hugh Cort 2 .65% 3 .23%

  John Cox 4 1.30% 10 .77%

  Rudy Giuliani 7 2.27% 78 6.00%

  Mike Huckabee 23 7.47% 83 6.39%

  Duncan Hunter 101 32.79% 534 41.08%

  John McCain 1 .33% 8 .62%

  Ray McKinney 2 .65%  28 2.15%

  Ron Paul 90 29.22% 217 16.69%

  Mitt Romney 11 3.57% 61 4.69%

  Tom Tancredo 2 .65% 6 .46%

  Fred Thompson 64 20.78% 266 20.46%

  TOTALS: 308 100.00% 1,300     100.00%

  The largest discrepency between our results and the official results
  was in Ron Paul's totals.  Our poll showed him coming in 2nd after
  Duncan Hunter with 90 (out of 308) votes and 29.22% of the total; the
  "official" results showed him coming in 3rd with 217 (out of
  1300) votes and 16.69% of the total.

  "Pen, Pencil, Pen, Pencil, Pen, Pencil..." 

  As we hand-counted our results outside the main entrance of the
  Convention Center, (in full public view and being

  videotaped by Gregory), a delegate/voter approached our table and
  said he was puzzled that pencils were being provided for use in the
  voting room.  He told us he reached for a pencil, then thought better
  of it since he realized his vote could easily be erased and
  changed, then got a pen to mark his ballot instead.  He said that a
  selection of each was lined up on a table like so:  "pen, pencil,
  pen, pencil, pen, pencil".  He commented that using erasable pencil
  for voting did not make sense to him.  Another delegate/voter
  who came over to talk with us heard the first gentleman's comment
  and, with a look of dismay, realized that she, too, had selected a
  pencil--and had used it.  She said, "I can't believe I was so
  stupid!"...In hindsight, it seemed peculiar to us that pencils were
  provided to voters at all since the Tarrant Party Republican Party
  Chair, Stephanie Klick, had told one of Ron Paul's supporters that permanent
  ink pens would be used for marking the ballots

  No public or media observors of the counting were allowed

  Our VoteRescue director Karen Renick last week had communicated to
  the Texas GOP a comprehensive list of recommendations on how
  to assure that the hand-counted paper ballot Straw Poll election
  could be executed with the highest security and transparency
  possible.  Due to the last-minute nature of these e-mail exchanges
  with Texas GOP Party Communications Director Hans Klingler, we do not
  know if he ever received or read these recommendations before going
  to Ft. Worth to oversee the Straw Poll, or if he did in fact see them
  but chose not to act on them.  (This e-mail exchange, including
  Karen's specific suggestions, will be posted on our website within
  the next day or so.)

  What we do know is that there were many vulnerabilities in the "chain
  of custody" of the official ballots from the point at which the
  election ended until votes were being counted; and that
  neither media, nor any citizen observors with videocameras (or
  otherwise) were allowed in the room where counting took place.  Our
  videographers Terry Melton, Kathleen Winn, and Gregory Gory, as well
  as any other interested parties, had to satisfy themselves with quick
  glances through small windows in the doors of the counting room.  

  Video clips and personal stories to be presented at our next meeting!

  Please keep watch for an announcement of our next meeting, where we
  will ask our videographers to bring their favorite clips from the
  event yesterday, and ask our volunteers to share their stories with
  the group.  Many interesting details are not included here, but we
  look forward to sharing them with you then.

  Again, we want to thank our new and veteran volunteers for their
  amazing efforts yesterday!  It was truly impressive what we were able
  to accomplish with our committed, "small but mighty" group!  We
  appreciate you all!!

  Vickie and Karen

  The largest discrepency in our totals and percentages was in Ron
  Paul's numbers.  In our Exit Poll, Dr. Paul came out 2nd with 90
  votes, 29.22% of the total; in the "official" vote, he came in 3rd
  with just 16.7% of the total. 
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