纽约时报 一张遍布缺陷的选举地图暴露了所有问题(1)（在线收听）

An Election Grid Rife of Flaws Shows Them All

一张遍布缺陷的选举地图暴露了所有问题

By Mike McIntire, Michael Wines and Alan Blinder

文/迈克·麦肯泰尔，迈克尔·怀恩斯，阿兰·布林德

County officials in Maryland miscalculated how many ballots they would need on Election Day--and quickly ran out in more than a dozen precincts.

马里兰州的县官员在计算他们选举日所需选票张数时出错了，很快，十几个选区的选举工作都暂停了下来。

In New York City, voters were given a two-sheet ballot that jammed machines and caused delays and long lines.

在纽约市，分发到选民手上的那种两张一连的选票不仅堵塞了计数的机器，还导致了延误，并迫使人们排起了长队。

And in Georgia, some voters failed to provide details like a birth year,

在格鲁吉亚，一些选民没有提供像出生年份这样的细节，

leading officials to reject hundreds of absentee ballots for "insufficient oath information" before federal judges intervened.

导致官员们在联邦法官介入之前以“誓约信息不足”为由作废了数百张缺席票，

Nearly two decades after voting problems in a handful of Florida counties paralyzed the nation,

曾经，佛罗里达几个县的投票问题就让整个国家的选举陷入了瘫痪，尽管此事过去已经快二十年了，

America's election grid this month remained a crazy patchwork of inconveniences, confusion and errors, both human-made and mechanical.

美国本月的选举地图还是狂乱地拼凑着各种不便、困惑以及错误，既有人为的错误也有机器方面的错误。

The lumbering system, combined with claims of voter suppression and skewed maps from redistricting,

笨拙的选举系统，加上“选民压制”之说和重新划分选区后出现的选举地图的倾斜，

once again tested confidence in the integrity of the vote.

再次考验了人们对投票公正性的信心。

As in 2000, no evidence emerged of widespread fraud or political interference.

与2000年一样，目前并没有证据表明选举存在广泛的欺诈或政治干预。

But just finding enough qualified poll workers to make Election Day happen was once again a challenge,

然而，这次选举依然面临着找不到足够多合格的选举工作人员，让选举日的工作顺利开展的难题，

as voters navigated more than 100,000 polling places, staffed by 900,000 mostly volunteer workers and administered by some 10,000 local jurisdictions.

因为选民分布在10万多个投票站，这些投票站的90万工作人员大部分都是志愿者，分属近1万个地方管辖区管理。

(After the 2016 election, nearly two-thirds of local elections officials nationwide reported difficulties in recruiting workers.)

（2016年大选之后，全国近三分之二的地方选举官员都报告说很难招到工作人员。）

The unevenness of the system across the country--in 22 states, elections at the local level were overseen by just one person--

各地选举系统的不平衡——有22个州地方一级的选举都只有一个人监管——

made it a political process open to accusations of manipulation.

让选举有了被指责存在暗箱操作的风险。

In some states, including New Jersey, South Carolina and Louisiana,

在某些州，包括新泽西州，南卡罗来纳州和路易斯安那州，

officials depended on electronic voting machines that have no paper backups in case of a contested outcome.

官员们还存在依赖电子投票机，这种机器不存在为防结果出现争议而留下的纸质备份，的问题。

In Georgia, 16-year-old machines led to the improbable scene of Brian Kemp--

在佐治亚州，正是那个已经用了16年的老古董导致了不可思议的布莱恩·肯普事件——

the secretary of state overseeing elections and the Republican candidate for governor--

肯普是监督选举的国务卿，也是共和党一方的州长候选人——

being briefly thwarted in his attempt to cast a ballot for himself.

他在试图为自己投票时遭遇了一时的挫折。

The computer system, running on Windows 2000 software, returned an error.

电脑系统，选举用的是Windows 2000的系统，反馈了一个错误。

Broader worries about the handling of provisional ballots in Georgia and the security of a computer system

人们对格鲁吉亚的临时选票会作何处理以及计算机系统安全问题的广泛担忧

led a federal judge to delay certification of the state's results.

导致联邦法官推迟了对该州选举结果的认证。

On Friday, the Democrat Stacey Abrams ended her bid for governor in the race against Mr. Kemp,

周五，民主党人斯泰西·艾布拉姆斯在与肯普竞争的环节结束了她对州长的竞选之旅，

while denouncing what she called "systemic disenfranchisement, disinvestment and incompetence."

同时谴责了她所谓的“系统性地剥夺公民权、系统性地撤资和系统性的无能”问题。

Legal actions were initiated in Florida, where close margins forced recounts in the races for Senate and governor,

佛罗里达州开始采取了法律行动，因为不同候选人的选票差额较小，迫使官员们要对参议院和州长的竞选选票进行重新统计，

and questions arose about whether eligible mail-in ballots were improperly rejected.

也因为人们对合格的邮寄选票有没有被不当淘汰产生了疑问。

Election officials were to conclude manual recounts in the Senate race by Sunday.

周日之前，选举官员将完成参议院竞选选票的人工统计工作。

But on Saturday evening, with a manual recount not conducted in the contest for governor,

然而，周六晚上，州长竞选的选票并没有重新进行人工统计，

Andrew Gillum, the Democratic nominee, conceded to Ron DeSantis, the Republican candidate.

民主党候选人安德鲁·吉卢姆因此输给了共和党候选人罗恩·德桑蒂斯。