Official Write-in Candidates List (Texas)

[realtonygoodwin]

Here is the list of write-in candidates we received with our absentee ballot.

Stewart Alexander
Rocky Anderson
Avery Ayers
Andre N. Barnett
Virgil Goode
Thaddaus Hill
Thom Hoefling

This is in addition to the following candidates, who actually are on the ballot:

Barack Obama
Mitt Romney
Gary Johnson
Jill Stein

[sailingaway]

However, for those who write in Ron Paul, it will be counted, if not by name. It will at least go into a poll of 'overvotes', where people bothered to vote, but rejected the choices on the ballot:


Counting Write-In Votes

Since all ballot boxes will be pre-locked and pre-sealed, thereby preventing election day judges from having any access to voted ballots on election day, write-in votes must be counted at the central counting station. After the ballots have been hand-sorted and any irregularly-marked ballots are resolved and duplicated if necessary, the ballots will be sent to the tabulator machines. The tabulators can be set to stop when a ballot containing a write-in vote is counted. These ballots may then be set aside to be delivered to a tally team to count the write-in votes for the declared write-in candidates. It is important to keep track of these ballots to ensure that, after the manual tally of the write-in votes is completed, the ballots are returned to the box containing other ballots for that precinct and stored properly.

Tabulation of Over Votes & Under Votes

Section 127.1301 of the Election Code requires the tabulation of over and under votes by office and proposition and by election precinct. The tabulation device may do this automatically. If not, the central counting station manager will have to provide a record of this information by hand. The record is preserved with other election records for the twenty-two month federal retention period and for the 60-day preservation period, as applicable.

http://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/laws/advisory2008-13.shtml

[realtonygoodwin]

I hope to vote for a candidate on the ballot or write in list, personally.

[sailingaway]

I hope to vote for a candidate on the ballot or write in list, personally.

and you know who those are. But there is a counting for those who aren't on those lists, it is just collective, opposing those who are on those lists, instead of individually credited. But if it is voting for a catchall 'none of the above' or for the wrong candidate, I'd rather the former. Opinions vary, I guess.

[realtonygoodwin]

True. My normal rule-of-thumb is to vote for the best candidate (based on the issues that matter to me, weighed for priority) out of all the candidates whose votes will be counted in enough states to have a mathematical chance to win the election. So, part of my research on the candidates listed will be to see how many other states ballots they are on, or states they can be write-in candidates for.