Americans Overseas Get To Cast Their Votes
By Matthew Williams
14:13, February 5th 2008
45 votes
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Americans Overseas Get To Cast Their Votes

Democrats from overseas were the first ones to vote in the Super Tuesday primaries at midnight in Indonesia through Democrats Abroad.

Those who wanted to vote for the democrats showed up in hotels and coffee shops or they could cast ballots online.

According to Democrats Abroad, next week the Americans who live in over 30 Asian nations will vote for their nominee at the 2008 U.S. presidential race, casting ballots at a hotel in Australia, a pub in Ireland and a Starbucks in Thailand.

Democrats Abroad is an official branch of the Democratic Party and is recognized as a "state" party by the Democratic National Committee.

According to the Associated Press, over 6 millions Americans who live abroad are eligible for voting, but in the past only a fraction of them have done it.

Since 2003 Republicans Abroad has been operating independently of the Republican Party and therefore it cannot have person or Internet votes overseas. Still, is organizing to have more Republicans from abroad to register back home and get their ballots in time and cast their votes in primaries later this year.

In August at the Democratic National Convention the expatriate Democrats will have 22 delegates present. According to the party rules, the delegated will get at the convention half a vote each in order to have a total of 11.

A resident from Philippines, Melissa Howell-Alipalo explained how the online system works.

She said: “I registered with Democrats Abroad, I was approved, received my ballot number and a pin code in an e-mail. I clicked on the hyperlink, entered my ballot number, address and birth date.”

Then she voted.

Arian Ardie, country committee chair for Democrats Abroad, said that the membership for the country committees tripled in the last six months.

He said: "We have people who are first-time voters. We have people who were out of the voting process for many years," CNN informs.

It is known that Democrat Barack Obama lived in Indonesia with his mother from the age of 6 until 10.

Seventy five percent of the nearly 100 votes cast by expatriate Americans voted for the Illinois senator at the ballot organized in a hotel in Jakarta.

Tristram Perry, the public diplomacy officer at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, said: “It is the first time someone who grew up in Indonesia is running for president.”

 



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