Columbia Journalism: Elections coverage: Padwe RW1

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SUBJECT INDEX
Presidential Election U.S. Senate New York State Immigrant Vote Minority/Ethnic Vote Voting Issues Polls and Polling Get Out The Vote Ballot Bloopers Up Close and Personal

SPECIAL REPORTS
Uptown 2004 The Catholic Vote The Homeless Vote Columbia e-Day News

VIDEO COVERAGE
High School Students Blind Voters Democracy Plaza First Time Voters Homeless Votes Nader Campaign Patients Voter Registration Index

CLASS INDEX
Prof. Sig Gissler Prof. LynNell Hancock Prof. Stephen Isaacs Prof. Rhoda Lipton Prof. Laura Muha Prof. Sandy Padwe Prof. Robin Reisig

Special Report: Uptown 2004

"He Died for What?"
By Billy Baker
Manuel Moreno's eyes welled up when he said he couldn't vote in Tuesday's presidential election, an election centered around the war that took the life of his younger brother, Luis. He was only 19, Moreno said of his brother, and he died for what? "The main reason we started on this war was chemical weapons. And what do we get at the end? We get nothing. And my brother is dead."

Albany Inspires Voter Apathy
By Amanda Bensen
Democracy is supposed to be "the government of the people, by the people, and for the people," as Abraham Lincoln said. But what happens when the people are sick and tired of it?

GOPoaching NYC's Latino Vote
By Andrew Clevenger
The New York Republican State Committee office at 154 Dyckman Street is a modest affair, with a red, white and blue awning and a small sign in which the letters N and Y take the shape of an elephant. Its floor-to-ceiling storefront window creates a fishbowl effect, and pedestrians on the busy sidewalk can easily look in on the handful of desks and bulletin boards.

Involved and Young
By Matthew Goad
New voters on four college campuses in upper Manhattan expressed a wide range of political opinions in the days leading up to Tuesday's presidential election, but in the end John Kerry received most of the support.

Rise in Registration Promises Record Turnout
By Jennifer Grogan
With her certificate of naturalization in hand, Arelis Bonilla rushed from the district courthouse to the New York City Board of Elections office on the last day of voter registration for new citizens last week. "It feels like I count more because I'm part of the United States and I can be more personally involved by voting," said Bonilla, 21, who is from the Dominican Republic and now lives in Washington Heights, after registering on Oct. 22.

"Are you Better Off…?"
By Marnie Hanel
Americans entered polling stations on Tuesday to answer a simple question that was posed by Ronald Reagan in a 1980 presidential debate against Jimmy Carter: "Are you better off than you were four years ago?"

Small Print, Large Consequences
By Nate Herpich
Last August, Verna Eisenberg's name appeared on a petition nominating Republican Olga Mendez for state senate. Yet, she had no idea how it got there. The Verna Eisenberg on the petition sheet lived in apartment 6N at 760 Grand Concourse. Eisenberg lived at 760 Grand Concourse, but not in apartment 6N. Could there have been another Verna Eisenberg in the building?

Looking Back in Anger
By Jim Higdon
In June of 2003, Specialist Alberto Ortiz rescued a Halliburton truck driver during a barrage of small arms fire on a dusty highway between Baghdad and the Kuwaiti border. But on Election Day, Ortiz and some of his fellow soldiers in the 719th Transportation Company will vote for John Kerry, the only candidate that Ortiz believes can end the American occupation in Iraq and return his fellow soldiers safely.

Coalition of New York's Committed
By Candace Jackson
Three years after almost winning the Democratic nomination, Fernando Ferrer, the former Bronx borough president, seems poised to run again for mayor in 2005. He recently launched a Web site and his fellow politicians seemed well aware of his probable run.

And They're Off! (To the Polls)
By Aaron Kinney
The fierce and closely contested 2004 presidential election, in which both candidates have spent more than $200 million, may wind up hinging on which campaign drives more new voters and people who usually don't vote to the polls. In New York, campaigns are scrambling to get out the vote, both locally and in swing states across the country.

Whose Fight is it?
By Tim McManus
Jacquez Renana's mother told him that that when she watched TV and heard the names of the soldiers killed in Iraq, too many sounded Spanish.

The Latino Dilemma: Pro-Life or Pro-Kerry?
By Sheila G. Miller
After stopping by noon mass at St. Elizabeth's parish in Washington Heights last week, friends Antonia Cruceta and Mirian Rodriguez stood in the crisp October sun, engaged in a heated discussion about the presidential election and abortion. Rodriguez, 38, ticked off a long list of issues she felt were important in this campaign, while Cruceta, 46, chided her in rapid-fire Spanish, repeating the Catholic pro-life stance. Both held their church bulletins, complete with an election message from U.S. bishops reminding readers of the church's social teachings-first and most prominently its beliefs on protecting human life.

Ferrer's Tale of Two Cities, 2005
By Tom Namako
There was something different about Fernando Ferrer at the first mayoral run-off debate in 2001. The Bronx borough president had every reason to be confident; several days before he led the closest of six competitors by over 36,000 votes in the Democratic primary. But now that he was facing off with Mark Green, the city's public advocate, for the party nomination, he didn't seem like the same candidate. Ferrer sounded different. Something was missing, and would remain missing for years after he lost that fall's controversial election.

The Importance Of Earning NYC's Black Vote
By Rattaphol Onsanit
In late October, on an otherwise quiet street corner in Washington Heights, a group of parents and schoolgirls found their groove when asked whom they supported for president. "Kerry! Kerry! Kerry!" they cheered, throwing their hands in the air. Some of the girls started to dance. "Two thumbs down for Bush," Kathy Chestnut, one of the parents, chanted.

Voting Poor
By Hilary Russ
Janine Reid tried staying with friends and family. She tried the New York City shelter system. She tried Section 8 housing vouchers. With all those options exhausted, the 31-year-old with glossy black hair and doe eyes is squatting in an abandoned building in Bushwick with four other people. They put pictures over the holes in the walls. "Where are you gonna go if you can't renew your Section 8 but don't have adequate income to pay for rent?" she asks, referring to the federal housing program that gives vouchers to help low-income people pay their rents and mortgages. "You might be literally scrimping for pennies. Forget about welfare. I'm acting like it was never around."

Last Hurrah for the Real Machines
By Sandra Upson
Carmen Maldonado sat down in December of 2002 to detail the results of an audit of New York’s State Board of Elections that had been conducted after the contentious 2000 presidential elections. She found insufficient and inconsistent technician training standards, a lack of contingency plans in cases of machine breakdowns and instances of poor logging of calls for assistance from pollworkers when problems arose.