Vendors looking after courts and votes

There are certainly more vendor and advocacy tables at the DFL convention than the GOP had. We spoke with a few more public policy advocates this weekend.

Minnesotans for Impartial Courts had a well-presented table, devoted to their message of keeping the money out of judicial elections.

Their motto is "Judges based on merit. Elections based on performance," and they're offering a nice folder of information with overviews of the retention election system and the complete final report of the Citizens Commission for the Preservation of an Impartial Judiciary (a.k.a the 'Quie Commission'), which took 14 months to complete.

Roger Moe has recently joined the group's board, and it's supported by top DFLers like Sen. Larry Pogemiller (DFL-Minneapolis) and Rep. Margaret Anderson-Kelliher (DFL-Minneapolis), we heard from Dan Mikel, manning the booth. Mikel says that Quie sees this as the most important issue he's ever worked on his life, and they're expecting to tackle the issue at the Legislature during the next session.

Citizens for Election Integrity Minnesota (CEIMN) advocates for clean, transparent balloting systems, and they organize vote audits within the state. Compared to the troubled election systems in many other states, Minnesota's "in a pretty good place," says Mark Malmberg, but there "can still be over-votes," and they're "looking for that sort of thing."

The group's founder, Mark Halvorson, went to see the recount process in Ohio in 2004, and was "appalled" at the situation. In response, he set up CEIMN and promoted vote audit laws. They're collecting volunteers for audits after the election this November. Additionally, they consult a lot with the Minnesota chapter of the League of Women Voters.