LIVEBLOG: Election Day begins across Michigan

2:04 p.m. — Macomb County. Michigan Messenger broke the news in early September that the Macomb County GOP had plans to challenge voters here based on foreclosure rolls. A lawsuit by the Democratic National Committee that sought to deny the Republican Party from using this tactic as a legal basis for challenging voters’ residency was settled in October with the GOP agreeing not to employ foreclosure rolls in voter challenging efforts.

Michigan Messenger’s Alexa Stanard spent the morning visiting voting stations in the Macomb County cities of Warren and Mount Clemens, and found GOP voter challengers at only one of the two sites. Neither of the two Republican challengers she met at the Mount Clemons Community Center seemed to have paperwork that might suggest the use of lists on which to base challenges.

GOP voter challenger Jeff Quesnelle, a student at Oakland University, told Stanard that he and his partner, also an Oakland University student, were sent to the working-class community, which is about 40 percent black and 60 percent white, by the Michigan GOP. Quesnelle said he was looking for people who did not have their IDs and “who did not seem to know what their address is,” adding, “anything that would indicate that they were trying to cast a vote fraudulently.”

The GOP challengers said that neither expected a lot of problems with fraudulent voters, since the ID law seemed to take care of a lot of that, they said. Neither carried or seemed in possession of lists to work from.

As for turnout, poll worker Harriet Lee said, “I’ve never seen it this large.” This morning when she arrived at 7 a.m., she told Stanard, voters were lined up around the building. “It was an onslaught. It’s just amazing and so good to see and things are running smoothly.”

One voter approached Stanard to speak his mind. James Gergis, a laid-off metal stamp factory worker, said that he doesn’t like how American jobs get shipped overseas. “Auto jobs go offshore because they say it’s cheaper to make cars overseas, but how come they’re priced the same when they come back? The rich guys don’t care about the middle class.” Gergis said he had voted for Obama.

12:48 p.m. — Todd Heywood reports from Southfield Municipal Center in Oakland County that a ES&S M100 vote counting machine “jammed” as voter Marshall Zweig put his ballot in to be counted. Clerk L. M. Banks moved the machine across the Center’s lobby and plugged it into a different outlet. The following exchange occurred between Banks and Zweig:

Zweig: It was at 561 when I stuck it in.
Banks: Now it’s still at 561; where’s your ballot?
Zweig: I stuck it in.
Banks: Okay, your ballot is stuck in there.
Zweig: That’s good.
Banks: I don’t know if it’s good. It’s supposed to say, “Ballot jammed.”
Banks asks a volunteer to get her a folder, then opened up the machine, told Zweig to grab the ballot.
Banks: Get it?
Zweig: Yeah.
Banks: Slowly pull it out.
Zweig pulls out the ballot.
Banks: I want you to put it in bottom side first.
Zweig fumbles with the ballot at this point as he tries to determine which end is the bottom, then slides the ballot into the machine, and almost as if uttering a mantra, mutters, “Please go to 562.”
Pause here, then Zweig exclaims, “562!” then turns to crowd and says, “You’re back in business!”
Heywood says the entire process looked like a VISA debit card advertisement, where the purchase slows down the line of sales by introducing cash instead of a card into the process. Once the jammed ballot was successfully recounted, the machine was redeployed and voting continued smoothly.

12:30 p.m. — Northwest of Detroit at the Southfield Municipal Center, two very enthusiastic Democratic volunteers approach voters as they arrive at the polling place, just at the 100-foot zone beyond which electioneering is not permitted.

They very quickly rattle off a list of candidates to vote for and positions on ballots while handing out campaign literature to voters, who are almost exclusively African-American. Todd Heywood, reporting from this venue, will look into the disposition of the campaign literature, with pictures to follow.

11:52 a.m. — In Saginaw Township, located two hours north of Detroit, there was a line of approximately 60 voters at 10:30 a.m., extending out the door of the polling place. Voters were predominantly white, middle-class and middle-aged, but far more in quantity than usual.

Poll workers said that they had an exceptionally high number of first time voters in this traditionally Republican precinct. Several voters appeared unfamiliar with the voting process, hesitantly stepping up to a polling booth and forgetting the privacy sleeve for their ballot in another case. The process was unremarkable if busy, with voting taking 30 minutes from arriving at the polling place until submitting completed ballot on average.

Workers, however, were not providing much instruction about completing the extensive ballots.

8:38 a.m. — Minehaha Forman called in from the polling place located at the Central Methodist Church in Detroit, next door to Comerica Park, home of the Detroit Tigers. She says that voters are given a “raffle ticket” as they enter the polling place and are seated in church pews to wait their turn to vote; poll workers call out the last three digits of the next ticket, and the voter holding that ticket proceeds to vote.

Minni says there are a lot of voters and that it’s running very smoothly, although she notes the quiet in the voting location, which she likens to a doctor’s office. The voters she’s spoken with also agree that voting is going very smoothly; when asked one voter had been waiting “only” two hours, and another one hour. She said she feels the voters are being very optimistic.

Minni will have a video uploaded shortly — check back soon!

7:05 a.m. — Our first liveblog report on this historic Election Day called in from the field comes from Tony Collings, now standing in line with other voters in Scio Township, Mich. The township is located just northwest of Ann Arbor, home of the University of Michigan, and about one hour west of Detroit.

Tony quizzed a worker in the polling place about the number of voters as they waited for the polls to open; they said there seems to be a larger number than usual, but did not seem surprised by the quantity already waiting. The voters were typical of the locale, being predominantly white and middle-aged; Tony said they were waiting quietly, although laughter could be heard in the background over the phone as the polling place opened at 7 a.m. sharp.

This polling place uses Accuvote optical scan machines; the ballot in this precinct features partisan choices on the front of the ballot and a single partisan township office on the back with all nonpartisan selections also on the back of the ballot. Poll workers at this early hour were ensuring there were sample ballots for voters’ consideration and reviewing completion of the ballots both front and back with voters before they entered the the voting booths. The line appears to be moving quickly.

Another voter waiting with Tony said that all Ford Motor Company workers had the day off today; this apparently had been negotiated by the UAW as the last contract between the union and Ford was drafted.

We’ll have more from the field shortly as we liveblog Michigan’s vote throughout the day. Check back frequently for more reporting from our team now deployed around the state.