• Compton mayor's race raises profile of former child star Rippy

    Damian Dovarganes / AP

    Rodney Allen Rippy poses for a photo outside Compton City Hall in March during his campaign for mayor. He finished 10th among 12 candidates.

    By John Rogers, The Associated Press

    COMPTON, Calif. -- Before he suddenly surfaced in the race for mayor of this hardscrabble Los Angeles suburb, Rodney Allen Rippy's name was likely to evoke that question inspired by that class of former child stars who didn't die young, end up in jail or a celebrity rehab series: "Whatever happened to that guy?"


    Rippy was just 3 in 1972, when he became the toast of a generation as the pint-sized TV pitchman for the Jack In The Box fast-food chain. When he picked up a hamburger that looked as a big as a hubcap and tried to cram it into his mouth, America was entranced. When he finally said, "Too bigga eat!" a national catchphrase was born.

    Soon the cute, chubby-cheeked youngster with the Afro as big as his head was hanging out in Hollywood with Michael Jackson. He made movie cameos and recorded a hit album called "Take Life a Little Easier."

    Then the 1970s ended, and so did Rippy's career.

    More than 30 years later, he resurfaced as a candidate for mayor in a city known variously over the years as the birthplace of gangsta rap, the murder capital of the country and the home of the drive-by shooting.

    Although he got only 75 votes, finishing 10th among 12 candidates, his earnest but futile campaign raised the inevitable question of where he had been.

    Rippy never strayed far from Hollywood, it turns out. He simply stepped away from the cameras.

    When his Jack In The Box career ended about the time he was finishing high school, he went to college and earned a marketing degree.

    "I wanted to continue to act, but at the time acting was a thing that unless you were really burning hot, you better have something on the back burner," he said recently over lunch at a Compton restaurant down the street from City Hall.

    Seeing how the adults around him had turned a cute little kid from Long Beach into a national star, he decided marketing was the way to go.

    He formed Ripped Marketing Group in 2000 and has promoted everything from smokeless cigarettes to leisure wear to country music. It gave him the idea, he says, that he could promote Compton too. He wanted to change the image of a city that, although financially troubled, has seen crime and gang violence drop precipitously in recent years.

    He wasn't the first child star to remerge from anonymity to run for office. His contemporary, the late Gary Coleman, did the same when he launched his quixotic campaign for governor of California in 2003.

    Unlike Coleman and many other former child stars, Rippy never got into a fistfight with an autograph seeker. He hasn't been caught in a crack house or drunkenly crashed his car.

    "Don't get me wrong, I know the good, the bad, the ugly, but I have sense enough to stay away from it," he said. "My mom always said, 'Rodney, you need to understand this: It's very easy to get into trouble. It's very difficult to get out."

    The Afro and the chubby cheeks are gone, but Rippy's appearance often has people scratching their heads, wondering where they've seen him before. Their reaction when they find out is sometimes like that of Saudia Pearsall's.

    "THE RODNEY ALLEN RIPPY?" the waitress shouted with glee after she spotted him at a back table.

    "Ahhhhh! I might vote for you just because I like you," she added, laughing. "That little Afro. 'This burger's too bigga eat!'"

    A day later, she was having second thoughts, realizing she didn't know much about his campaign.

    Her reaction — delight at meeting a celebrity but wondering what the heck he's doing here — is something Rippy says he sees often.

    Rippy lost out on a marketing job once, when the person he was to work for started to believe he was being punked for a reality show: "He thought it was some kind of game, like I had some sort of hat-cam on." 

    © 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

  • Cyberattack on Florida election is first known case in US, experts say

    Internet security experts are keeping a close eye on a case in Miami that may be the first of its kind --an attempt to fraudulently obtain absentee election ballots online. Correspondent Mark Potter reports this is being seen as a wake up call to the risks involved in voting on line

    By Gil Aegerter, Staff Writer, NBC News

    An attempt to illegally obtain absentee ballots in Florida last year is the first known case in the U.S. of a cyberattack against an online election system, according to computer scientists and lawyers working to safeguard voting security.

    The case involved more than 2,500 “phantom requests” for absentee ballots, apparently sent to the Miami-Dade County elections website using a computer program, according to a grand jury report on problems in the Aug. 14 primary election. It is not clear whether the bogus requests were an attempt to influence a specific race, test the system or simply interfere with the voting. Because of the enormous number of requests – and the fact that most were sent from a small number of computer IP addresses in Ireland, England, India and other overseas locations – software used by the county flagged them and elections workers rejected them.

    Computer experts say the case exposes the danger of putting states’ voting systems online – whether that’s allowing voters to register or actually vote.

    “It’s the first documented attack I know of on an online U.S. election-related system that’s not (involving) a mock election,” said David Jefferson, a computer scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory who is on the board of directors of the Verified Voting Foundation and the California Voter Foundation.

    Other experts contacted by NBC News agreed that the attempt to obtain the ballots is the first known case of a cyberattack on voting, though they noted that there are so many local elections systems in use that it's possible that a similar attempt has gone unnoticed.

    There have been allegations of election system hacking before in the U.S., but investigations of irregularities have found only software glitches, voting machine failures, voter error or inconclusive evidence. Where there has been evidence of a computer security breach -- such as a 2006 incident in Sarasota, Fla., in which  a computer worm that had been around for years raised havoc with the county elections voter database -- it was unclear whether the worm's appearance was timed to interfere with the election.

    In any case, experts say they’ve been warning about this sort of attack for years.

    Tim Chapman / Miami Herald

    About 2,000 rejected absentee ballots at Miami-Dade Elections Department, mostly for lack of signatures or review of signatures from the last election.

    “This has been in the cards, it’s been foreseeable,” said law Professor Candice Hoke, founding director of the Center for Election Integrity at Cleveland State University.

    The primary election in Miami-Dade County in August 2012 involved state and local races along with U.S. Senate and congressional contests (see a sample ballot here). The Miami Herald, which first reported the irregularities, said the fraudulent requests for ballots targeted Democratic voters in the 26th Congressional District and Republicans in Florida House districts 103 and 112. None of the races’ outcomes could have been altered by that number of phantom ballots, the Herald said.

    Overseas “anonymizers” -- proxy servers that make Internet activity untraceable -- kept the originating computers’ location secret and prevented law enforcement from figuring out who was responsible, according to the grand jury report, issued in December. The state attorney’s office closed the case in January without being able to identify a suspect.

    Read the Miami-Dade County grand jury report (PDF)

    Then came the Herald report, which said that three IP addresses in the United States had been identified among those sending the requests and that there had been a delay in getting that information to investigators, which a Miami-Dade elections official confirmed to NBC News. Terry Chavez, spokeswoman for the state attorney’s office for Miami-Dade County, also confirmed to NBC News that the investigation was reopened to look into those IP addresses. Chavez said she could release no details on the investigation.

    Rep. Joe Garcia won the Democratic primary in the 26th District and went on to win the general election. Jeff Garcia, his chief of staff and no relation, said last week that no state or federal investigators had contacted the congressman's office about the case.


    State Rep. Jose Javier Rodriguez, a Democrat who won the District 112 seat, said Thursday that his office had not heard from investigators about the case either. A message left at the legislative office of state Rep. Manny Diaz Jr., the Republican who won the primary and the general election in District 103, was not immediately returned.

    The Herald report said that as the requests began coming in, elections officials figured out that they were improper and started blocking the IP addresses. “I guess they finally gave up,” the newspaper quoted Bob Vinock, an assistant deputy elections supervisor for information systems, as saying. 

    People who study election security say the fact that this attempt did not succeed should be of little comfort to election officials. They warn that attempts to attack voting systems are likely to increase.

    “In this case the attack was not as sophisticated as it could have been, and it was easy for elections officials to spot and turn back,” said J. Alex Halderman, an assistant professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Michigan who studies the security of electronic voting. “An attack somewhat more sophisticated than the one in Florida, completely within the norm for computer fraud these days, would likely be able to circumvent the checks.”

    Fraudulently obtaining absentee ballots is just one way elections might be subverted by digital means, experts say. Among the other methods and attack points:

    •  Malware. Rogue software infects millions of home computers across the country. Jefferson said hackers could use malware to change votes or prevent them from being cast in an online election.
    • Denial of service attacks. Jefferson said that hackers could use botnets to prevent election-system servers from working for hours, or perhaps longer. In fact, during an election in June 2012, a DOS attack hit the San Diego County Registrar of Voters' website, preventing voters from tracking the results.
    • “Spoofing” of election websites. For example, Hoke said, legitimate requests for absentee ballots could be misdirected to another site. The data then could be misused, or the requests could hit a dead end, and voters would be left wondering where their ballots were.
    • Exploiting software flaws in digital voting machines, known as DREs. The flaws could allow insertion of viruses or alteration of programming code that would change votes or delete them. (Read one description of hacking a voting machine.)
    • Tampering with email return of marked ballots. Experts say email return is troublesome because of the multiple points for attack along the ballots’ electronic path. “The overwhelming consensus of the computer science community is don’t do it, it’s a bad idea,” said Jeremy Epstein, a senior computer scientist at SRI International. But in about half the states, email absentee ballot return is an option for members of the military and their families, along with some other U.S. citizens living overseas.
    • Wholesale hijacking of an online voting system. In 2010, the District of Columbia Board of Elections and Ethics tested an Internet-based voting system for a week, asking computer experts to probe it for flaws. It took only 48 hours for a team led by Halderman to break in and take control of the site – even altering it so that the University of Michigan fight song played after a vote was cast.

    Read the University of Michigan researchers’ report on the DC hack (PDF)

    In terms of illegally getting access to absentee ballots, Epstein said, the attacker or attackers who failed in Florida might have had an easier time with Washington state and Maryland.

    He said that last summer he demonstrated to the FBI a method of changing individual voters’ addresses and other information online in those two states by predicting their driver’s license numbers.

    J Pat Carter / AP file

    Absentee ballots for the general election marked for delivery to the U.S. Postal Service for mailing are seen at the Miami-Dade County election center in Doral, Fla., on Oct. 5.

    First he used publicly available information to gain a voter’s full name and address. Then, he predicted the individual’s driver’s license number – which is based on a combination of the person’s name and numbers and letters -- and used the information to access their voter registration online. From there, he said, he could have changed their addresses and had absentee ballots sent out.

    “Imagine if (attackers) changed the address for 2,500 votes. It could be completely automated, and they have the ballots sent to a post office box or whatever,” Epstein said. “Then the registered voters would have no idea until they tried to vote.”

    In October, Halderman and other researchers sent letters warning elections officials in both states of the danger of staking system security on driver’s license numbers.

    The letter to Washington officials (read it here in PDF) also said that other security features in the state’s MyVote system would be only a speed bump to a dedicated hacker.

    “Although the MyVote system uses a CAPTCHA, an image of distorted text intended to deter simple automated attacks, this provides only minimal defense,” the letter says. “Attackers can use commercial services to defeat the CAPTCHA at a cost of less than $0.001 per voter.”

    Shane Hamlin, assistant director of elections in the Washington Secretary of State's Office, told NBC News that state election officials have acted on the recommendations in the October letter and will require additional information to register to vote or change registration online.

    Maryland election officials did not immediately return a call from NBC News seeking comment, but the Washington Post reported last month that Ross K. Goldstein, deputy administrator of the Maryland State Board of Elections, acknowledged the security hole and said the online voter registration system was being updated to address the issue.

    “I believe technology can solve problems, and there are steps that we definitely can, and plan to, take to mitigate the risks,” the newspaper quoted him as saying.

    While elections officials are attracted to the savings that online voting and registration systems promise, the cost of guarding online registration and voting systems is large, Hoke said. And that might negate the financial advantage of online balloting touted by some elections officials and vendors who want to sell electronic voting products.

    “It’s cheap, if you don’t care whether elections are stolen,” she said.

    That possibility -- of an election being stolen through digital means -- haunts researchers. For Jefferson, it’s a matter of national security.

    “The legitimacy of government depends on it being impossible for single parties to change the results of elections,” he said.

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  • Midnight party: Pot, gay marriage become legal in Washington state

    Jim Seida / NBC News

    Garth Carroll who also goes by the name of "Professor Gizmo" smokes what he describes as "good, greenhouse organic herb" at the base of the Space Needle in Seattle just before midnight on Wednesday,

    By Isolde Raftery, NBC News

    Updated at 4:51 a.m. ET: SEATTLE – When the clock struck midnight here on Thursday, hundreds of gay couples were lined up outside the county courthouse to obtain marriage licenses, while a hundred or so pot-lovers gathered across town beneath the Space Needle to light up.


    They could do this because last month, on Nov. 6, Washington state voters approved marriage for same-sex couples and legalizing marijuana. Both laws went into effect at midnight.

    The King County Recorder's Office opened its doors to couples at 12:01 a.m. At the front of the line were Kelly Middleton, 24, and Amanda Dollente, 29. They had arrived at 4 p.m., worried they wouldn't get a spot in line. 

    They had gone through three cups of hot chocolate and countless cigarettes, worried they weren't prepared and anxious that the law might suddenly change – as it did in California in 2008.

    "I ran around the building asking people, 'Are we in the right place? Will you look at my paperwork?'" Dollente said.

    There was concern last week that the marriage licenses would still carry the words "bride" and "groom," but officials came through in time. The county printed out 1,000 marriage licenses with "bride," "groom" and "spouse" just in case. 

    A history of pot, from George Washington to legalizing ganja
    Photoblog: Pot fans light up at the Space Needle

    Seventy-two couples down the line were Larry Duncan, 56, a retired psychiatric nurse, and Randell Shepherd, 48, a computer programmer, of North Bend, Wash. They wore matching duck hunter hats ("a fashion statement," Duncan joked) and matching shoulder-length white beards. They've been together 11 years.

    "We were at a party and we met eyes and fell in love," Duncan said.

    "He came up and asked me out, and I said yes," Shepherd added.

    They’re considering getting married on Sunday at a church conducting mass ceremonies for same-sex couples, even though they’re not particularly religious.

     “Enough people have told me, ‘God hates fags,’” Duncan said, who described himself as 'Old South.' “I want someone in a church to say, ‘God loves fags,’ to have that stamp on it.”

    Outside the courthouse, stickers were handed out and a group sang a cappella, pulling from gospel and the musical Rent. Some wore bridal veils or matching t-shirts; supporters passed out cups of coffee; one woman provided Kleenex; many hugged and kissed.

    Inside were eight couples -- some of the movers and shakers who helped to pass the law -- who had been selected as the first to receive their marriage licenses. Among them: Pete-e Peterson, 85, and Jane Abbott Lighty, 77, have been together for 35 years after meeting on a blind date and falling instantly in love. They will be getting married during a Seattle Men's Chorus concert on Sunday.

    (State law requires that couples wait at least three days after obtaining their licenses to get married, which means Sunday is the earliest day they can get married.)

    Peterson grew up in Alabama and was an Air Evacuation nurse during the Korean War. She adopted her sister's 3-year-old daughter and raised her. Lighty, who grew up mostly in the Bay Area, was also a nurse.

    "I never thought this day would come," Peterson told every reporter who asked.

    Another couple, Amanda Beane and Anne Bryson-Beane, have been together for 15 years. They have adopted seven children who are between four and 12 and who dressed up to attend the ceremony.  

    Neil Hoyt, 52, and Donald Glenn Jenny, 64, have been together for 24 years and will also be getting married at the Seattle Men's Chorus concert on Sunday night (where there will be a judge and 2,000 cupcakes).

    According to UCLA's Williams Institute, same-sex marriage could pump $57 million to the state economy in the first year – resulting in $5 million of tax revenue.

    Two miles away, revelers prepared to roll a joint or lift a pipe – even though it is illegal to smoke marijuana in public in Washington state.

    Not that the smokers were too worried. Sgt. Sean Whitcomb told The Associated Press earlier in the week that the Seattle Police Department did not expect to write many tickets – a 2003 law made marijuana the department's lowest priority.

    Related: For those hazy on pot law, Seattle police produces marijuana guide

    But Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes discouraged celebrants from smoking in public, telling KUOW they should smoke at home.

    "And be thankful that we're no longer arresting some 10,000 Washingtonians a year in the state of Washington and spending well over $100 million in law enforcement resources on that," he added. "And especially be grateful for lessening the racially disproportionate impact that these crazy drug laws have on our communities of color."

    Before midnight, the U.S. Department of Justice issued several sobering statements, reminding revelers that pot remains illegal at the federal level, and that any amount of the substance may not be brought into federal buildings, national parks and forests and military installations. And according to one statement: 

    The Department of Justice is reviewing the legalization initiatives recently passed in Colorado and Washington State. The Department’s responsibility to enforce the Controlled Substances Act remains unchanged. Neither States nor the Executive branch can nullify a statute passed by Congress.

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  • New Jersey's email voting suffers major glitches, deadline extended to Friday

    Julio Cortez / AP

    Ed Lippman, 58, wears a message on his jacket on Election Day while walking home, Tuesday, Nov. 6, in Hoboken, N.J.

    By Bob Sullivan, Columnist, NBC News

    New Jersey's emergency experiment with email voting hasn't fared well. One election official described it as a "catastrophe" and voters are complaining that computer glitches are blocking their last-minute efforts to obtain electronic ballots. An avalanche of requests for email ballots that overwhelmed county clerks' offices forced the state to extend its email voting deadline to Friday afternoon at 8 p.m., though email ballot requests had to filed by 5 p.m. ET Tuesday.

    "It has become apparent that County Clerks are receiving applications at a rate that outpaces their capacity to process them without an extension," said Lt. Gov. Kim Guadango in her order extending the deadline.

    Several election officials say misunderstanding is at the root of the problem: Email ballots are only permitted for residents displaced by Superstorm Sandy, but many who are not displaced are nevertheless deluging the system.

    "The numbers are overwhelming. The county clerks are inundated with requests," said Michael Harper, clerk of the Board of Elections for Hudson County, N.J. which includes Hoboken, one of the hardest-hit regions recovering from Sandy. Asked to describe the situation, he said, "I would lean more towards catastrophe."

    New Jersey has taken the extraordinary step of allowing votes to be cast all the way up until Friday. This applies to voters in counties affected by Hurricane Sandy, and could make the state vulnerable to lawsuits. NBC's Pete Williams reports.

    New Jersey's email voting law allows overseas residents and active duty military to request ballots electronically; it was extended by state executive order on Saturday to apply to residents displaced by the storm.

    NBC News Justice Department correspondent Pete Williams said the extreme step of extending the voting deadline could expose New Jersey to lawsuits.

    "This raises some interesting legal questions," Williams wrote. "A federal law requires all states to choose their presidential electors the same day. But another law says if a state fails to do that, then its legislature determines how its presidential elections are determined. Some legal experts say they believe while New Jersey may be in technical violations of federal laws if it does this, it's Congress that makes the ultimate decision about whether to accept a state's electoral votes. And they doubt that Congress would fail to count the votes of a state brought to its knees by the storm. "

    Another hitch is this: Residents must email or fax their requests to their county clerk's office, which must respond individually to each request. The mountain of last-minute requests is crushing clerks' capacity to respond.

    Janet Larwa, the deputy clerk at the Hudson County Clerk's office, told NBC News there were eight workers trying to process 3,000 email requests as of mid-day Tuesday.

    Frustrations weren't limited to Hudson County. In Essex County, which includes the state's largest city, Newark, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit after it received 25 complaints from residents who said they'd requested email ballots, but hadn't received them. Voters reported that emails sent to the county clerk's office were bouncing, indicating the clerk's inbox was full or not functioning. 

    "You've got people who are trying to utilize this email or fax voting capabilities the state has said they are entitled to," Alexander Shalom, policy counsel for the ACLU, told NJ.com. "The counties are so overwhelmed with these requests, they are not able to reply. People have emailed in requests to get ballots and they are not hearing back."

    The ACLU sought a court order that would have allowed displaced residents to fill out a Federal Write-In Absentee Ballot, typically used by overseas voters who apply for but don't receive their blank absentee ballots in time, but an Essex County judge rejected the petition on Tuesday night.

    Essex County Clerk Christopher Durkin tried to ease the problem by giving out his personal email Hotmail address to voters, inviting them to send ballot requests there,  according to a message posted on the official Facebook page for West Orange, N.J., a city in Essex County.

    In Morris County, BuzzFeed.com reported that emails sent to that county's clerk were bouncing. The Daily Record reported the clerk there was struggling under a mountain of 1,000 requests.

    Harper, from Hudson County, said the problems stem from the wider email voting process being "thrown upon us at the last minute," not to mention the unprecedented volume. Larwa said that voters who aren't displaced from their homes are being turned down. Her office is calling some voters and denying their email ballot requests, telling them to go to their usual polling place. With power restored to much of Hudson County within the past 48 hours, very few polling locations have been relocated, she said.

    The problems might not stop with delivering email ballots, however. Experts are also worried that even if all New Jersey voters who need them receive email ballots in time, there will be confusion about submitting the ballots. The state's email voting procedure is a three-step process which is new to nearly all voters, and ripe for confusion, according to J. Alex Halderman, an electronic voting expert at the University of Michigan.  Voters must request a ballot electronically; email or fax the completed ballot to the clerk; then mail the original hard copy to the clerk. 

    "I'm not sure that voters will understand they still have to mail the ballot," Halderman said. "They may not be aware for requirement, even though it's on the form. If people don't do that, it will be fodder for lawsuits."

    Halderman is also concerned that computer hackers can intercept email ballots and alter votes, or otherwise electronically tamper with the process.

    "Email voting is tremendously risky ... you never want to make last minute change to an election process. That's a recipe for chaos," he said. "It's a reflection of desperation and seriousness of the situation New Jersey (post-Sandy) that officials are using email voting."

    Voting officials in New York apparently agree with Halderman. New York State Board of Elections co-chair Doug Kellner said during the weekend that his state rejected emergency email ballots because, "they're hackable and they're not verifiable," according to USA Today.

    Still, Halderman is worried that voters who get a taste of email voting may clamor for it in future elections.

    "We are definitely concerned that voters will want to have access to this again if they it convenient," he said. "But transmitting votes by email doesn't have good secrecy or integrity protection. It's easy to spoof an email, intercept an email, find it in someone's outbox and alter it ... It's possible to hack email servers and change votes after they are received. It's the highest level of risk for any kind of electronic voting." 

    With reporting by NBC News Talesha Reynolds.

    Follow Bob Sullivan on Twitter; He writes for NBC News at the Red Tape Chronicles.

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  • Are you planning NOT to vote in the November election?

    We’ve heard from undecided voters, and now we want to hear from those of you who will not vote in the Nov. 6 election. In 2008, 38.4 percent eligible voters didn’t cast a ballot, according to Factcheck.org.

    If you won’t vote – for whatever reason – and you’re game to be interviewed for a story we're running next week, please contact us.

    Thank you.

  • Opponents concerned large war chest may give edge to same-sex marriage supporters in state battles

    Patrick Semansky / AP

    Zachariah Long, left, and Edward Ritchie protest against a gay marriage bill in February in Annapolis, Md. Thirty-eight states have laws or constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage. But four states -- Maryland, Maine, Minnesota and Washington -- will vote on this issue, with gay-marriage supporters hoping to net an historic win.

    By Miranda Leitsinger, Staff Writer, NBC News

    Same-sex marriage advocates have outraised their opponents in many state ballots but have ended up on the losing end in every case.

    But this time, their adversaries are worried the large amounts of cash raked in by gay marriage proponents could tilt the balance in high-stakes votes in four states this November.

    In Washington, same-sex marriage supporters have raised at least $10.5 million compared with $1.8 million for their opponents. In Maine, they have some $3.35 million as opposed to about $430,000 on the other side, and in Maryland, they have about $3.2 million while the anti-gay marriage camp has more than $835,000, according to public disclosure filings.

    “The concern that I have is that the other side will be able to swamp voters with messaging,” said Frank Schubert, campaign manager for the four state campaigns opposed to same-sex marriage. 

    “I am worried ... about the particular disparities in Maine and Washington state and somewhat in Maryland,” Schubert said. “What’s occurred in the past -- that we’ve been able to win despite being outspent -- you know, is certainly going to be challenged this time by just the sheer disparity that exists.”

    For 1st time, gay marriage may win statewide vote 

    From 2004-2011, all but one of 28 measures to either ban or limit same-sex marriage or partnerships on statewide ballots passed, according to the nonprofit National Institute on Money in State Politics. The one win for same-sex marriage campaigners was in Arizona in 2006 to strike down a constitutional amendment, but their opponents were later victorious at the polls in 2008.

    Anti-gay marriage groups were outspent by their opponents in 17 of those contests but won nonetheless, according to Denise Roth Barber, the institute's managing director. “Regarding same-sex marriage, raising more money has thus far not equated to success at the ballot box,” she wrote to NBC News in an email.

    Political scientists who conduct research on same-sex marriage votes have reached similar conclusions.

    “A money advantage in any race is generally not what it’s blown up to be,” said Patrick Egan, an assistant professor of politics and public policy at New York University whose research includes public opinion on gay rights. 

    Research shows that a big-money advantage has moved votes by a few percentage points, but those effects tend to die out within a week, he added.

    “Gay marriage is an issue on which a lot of people have made up their minds a long time ago and they’re not going to have their minds changed necessarily by a stream of advertisements. You can imagine a number of other kinds of ballot measures that are more confusing or more technical,” Egan said. “Everybody knows exactly what is meant by a ban on marriage or ... approving a law that would allow gay people to get married.” 

    But the fundraising continues for both sides. Paul Singer, a New York hedge fund titan and Republican, and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, just announced $250,000 contributions each to the campaign to maintain Maryland’s same-sex marriage law passed earlier this year. 

    Like Maryland, same-sex marriage supporters are asking people in Maine and Washington to vote yes on the ballot, rather than in Minnesota, where they will ask them to oppose a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman (same-sex marriage supporters in Minnesota have raised $5.96 million this year, compared to $1.2 million for their opponents).


    A yes vote “requires a heavier lift,” said Fred Sainz, a spokesman for Human Rights Campaign, a national nonprofit backing efforts to legalize same-sex marriage, including financially. “Whenever you’re trying to convince someone to vote yes it’s going to require more resources because the onus is on you to change the status quo.” 

    That has meant setting up a number of field offices in each state as well as running a ground campaign that involves volunteers going door-to-door to add a personal plea to voters.

    Though they have ads and fliers, the personal touch is key to their work, with volunteers in Maine having now spoken to some 200,000 people about the issue since 2009, according to the state campaign. Similar work has been done in Maryland and Washington over the last 18 months, Sainz said.

    “Our messaging has changed considerably over the years to now be all about family, love and commitment, and the establishment of a common human bond with the voter,” he said. “Explaining that narrative and that story takes time and money. … It is not a campaign that can be done in two months.”

    Appeals court: Denying federal benefits to same-sex couples is unconstitutional
    Despite marriage progress, gay couples face big hurdles to parenthood
    Conservatives target Republicans who back gay marriage
    Same-sex couple fights to stop deportation, gay marriage ban
    Obama: 'I think same-sex couples should be able to get married'

    The National Organization for Marriage, which opposes same-sex marriage, is running a new fundraising campaign it began two weeks ago that it hopes will net an additional $3 million in the same-sex marriage battle. 

    “I’ve always said and I continue to believe that really what matters more than what our opponents spend is how much we spend and so my focus has been on working with the campaigns to improve their fundraising across the board so that they have the resources necessary to communicate with voters,” said Schubert, who is also NOM’s political director. “Even though we’re behind, we’re making good progress and I’m hopeful that at the end of the day we will be able to have a strong finish to each of the campaigns to get our messages out.” 

    Schubert said between 75 to 80 percent of their money will be spent on advertising, noting that they did not have the same infrastructure or staff costs as their opponents since they have a grassroots network through churches they can access.

    “Our messaging is just now being delivered … because of the funding disparity,” he said. “I definitely can see a path to victory everywhere. A lot of the path does depend on us being able to raise the resources though … and so, you know, money is not an insignificant factor in a statewide campaign like this." 

    "I remain optimistic everywhere but that doesn’t mean I don’t have concerns,” he added. 

    Joel Page / AP

    Rev. Michael Gray, a United Methodist pastor speaks on Sept. 10, 2012 at a rally outside of City Hall in Portland, Maine, in support of a same-sex marriage.

    Kenneth Sherrill, a professor emeritus of political science at Hunter College in New York whose research includes elections and the politics of LGBT rights, questioned if NOM was facing any difficulties.

    “They could be playing an expectations game or they could have data," he said. "It may also be that when you’re running a campaign that is appealing to pre-existing prejudices it doesn’t matter if you’re coming in late or if you’re getting outspent. There are certain attitudes that money can’t change.” 

    NOM’s opponents are also used to them coming out late in the game, such as in California during the battle over Prop 8, a citizen's a ballot measure to ban same-sex marriage that passed in 2008 but was declared unconstitutional on appeal (Schubert led the campaign there, too). That decision was appealed to the Supreme Court, which has not yet said if it will review the case.

    Did Supreme Court justice tip hand on gay marriage? 

    “If you compare their fundraising numbers to our fundraising numbers right now it clearly shows that they are having a cash flow problem,” Sainz said. "What that means to me is that there are very few people that are excited about this issue."

    But that does not mean it will stay that way, he said.

    “The way in which they do business is that all of their money comes in late,” he added. “We would not be surprised if they flooded, you know, all four … with last minute money.” 

    Today, 38 states have laws or constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

    Polls indicate that same-sex marriage may win this go-around, with a majority supporting keeping such state laws in Washington (56 percent), and Maryland (49 percent), and approving a citizen’s initiative in Maine (57 percent), according to September surveys. However, in Minnesota, 49 percent say they will vote in support of the ban on same-sex marriage, compared with 47 percent opposed.

    The importance of these state votes is not lost on either side.

    “This November we have one goal in mind and that is to take away the talking point from our opponents that we have never won at the ballot box,” Sainz said. 

    Schubert said if his opponents netted a win they could use the victory in arguments before the Supreme Court, which is expected to hear same-sex marriage cases during their current term. They may also try to qualify state ballot measures of their own to legalize such unions in other states “that would roll back protections that we’ve already enacted and would open up a whole new front for us to have to fight.” 

    “There’s a lot riding on what happens here in three weeks,” he said. 

  • Undecided voters – what's your deciding factor?

    Slideshow: On the campaign trail

    Reuters, Getty Images

    Launch slideshow

    By Jon Sweeney, NBC News

    The first of three presidential debates occurs Wednesday and many voters will use these events to educate themselves on the candidates. We want to take this the opportunity to hear what it would take to change your mind from an undecided voter to a Romney or Obama supporter.

    How do you participate?

    1. Take a picture of yourself, or a photo representing the issue that is most important to you.
    2. In the caption (or a tweet), tell us what you want to hear from the candidates. Keep your responses short.
    3. Tag your photo #NBCNewsPics in Instagram or Twitter.
    4. Or upload your photo in the box below.

    On Wednesday we’ll publish a selection of your photos and responses in PhotoBlog, so stay tuned. 

    Related Links:

  • New York-area politicians condemn Egypt's new leader over bid to free terrorist

    By NBCNewYork.com's Jonathan Dienst

    New York political leaders are voicing outrage at Egypt’s next president after he promised to fight to free a terrorist linked to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and a later plot to blow up New York City landmarks.

    President-elect Mohammed Morsi told a crowd in Tahrir Square he wants convicted terrorist Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman released from a United States prison. “I see signs for Omar Abdel Rahman and detainees pictures,” Morsi said.  “It is my duty and I will make all efforts to have them free, including Omar Abdel Rahman.”

    Rahman is serving a life sentence for his role in a plot to blow up the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels, the United Nations and other targets in the 1990s.  He has also been linked to the first World Trade Center bombing that killed six and injured more than a thousand.

    See the original story on NBCNewYork.com

    Astrid Riecken / Getty Images

    Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.

    New York politicians blasted Morsi’s comments Friday.

    “President Morsi’s offensive statements are an insult to the memories of the victims of the World Trade Center bombing,” Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said.  “Sheik Rahman is a terrorist who planned to kill innocent Americans, rest assured he will stay right where he belongs -- in jail for the rest of his life.”

    Egypt counts on billions of dollars in aid from the United States, and a State Department spokeswoman declined to comment on Morsi’s speech.

    But Rep. Peter King, R-NY, who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee, called Morsi’s speech “evidence that he is an Islamist and a radical who cannot be trusted.” 

    "This is a disgraceful way for him to start his presidency," King added.

    Egyptian leader vows to free 'Blind Sheik' jailed in US

    Stephen Ferry / Getty Images

    Workers on Feb. 26, 1993, rebuild the parking garage destroyed when a van containing explosives was detonated by terrorists in beneath the World Trade Center complex, resulting in the death of six and injuries of over 1,000 others.

    Tri-state leaders said Morsi’s comments are raising serious questions as to what kind of leader he will be.

    Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., called Morsi’s statement “…not only outrageous, but it is cause for deep concern about Mohammed Morsi’s respect for the rule of law and democracy.  Any attempt to free this convicted terrorist must be met with swift condemnation.”

    Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., said the U.S. will never free the sheik.

    “Omar Abdel-Rahman is a terrorist with American blood on his hands and he will serve the rest of his life in detention," he said.

    A spokeswoman for the Egyptian consulate in New York declined to comment.  But NBC News Correspondent Aymen Mohyeldin, who was in Cairo for the speech, said Morsi went off script to make the comments and was likely making the statements for domestic consumption – not to anger the United States.

    Hai Do / AFP - Getty Images file

    Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, seen in 1993

    “The Muslim Brotherhood, and Morsi now, are taking the position he be released on humanitarian extradition more so than overturning his conviction,” Moyeldin said. Muslim Brotherhood leaders are saying Morsi does not plan to repeat the comments in his address Saturday and has condemned acts of terror against the West in the past.

    Rahman is in ailing health in a North Carolina prison. A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment, except to say the "Blind Sheik" remains behind bars.

    More content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

    Follow US News on msnbc.com on Twitter and Facebook

    Big changes are in store for Egypt now that Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, once banned in Egypt, has won Egypt's first democratic presidential election. NBC's Richard Engel reports.

  • Typo leads to election of wrong candidate

    By Bob Connor, NBC Connecticut

    You wouldn't think a one-letter typo would make a huge difference, but in an election it apparently does.

    In Derby, James J. Butler received 1,526 votes in the race for the Board of Apportionment and Taxation Nov. 8. In fact, he got more votes than anyone else running for election to the 10-member board.

    The problem? James J. Butler wasn't running, but his father, James R. Butler, who campaigned for the position. But because of a typo on the ballot, it's the younger Butler who was officially elected to the office.

    The Democratic Town Committee nominated James R. Butler, and its members are now trying to figure out what to do, with the Dec. 3 swearing-in ceremony quickly approaching.

    "I was the one they nominated. My son wants nothing to do with this," James R. Butler told the Connecticut Post Tuesday. The older Butler noticed the error on the ballot when he voted, the paper reported.

    To add to the confusion, both father and son live on Prindle Avenue, and both share the same birthday.

    A spokesperson for the Secretary of State's Office, which oversees elections in Connecticut, said no one in the office has ever heard of an error like this ever happening. But Av Harris said the voters elected James J. Butler, and it will be up to the Democratic Town Committee to sort out the problem.

    The town has a couple of options, including swearing in James J. Butler, then having him resign, and Democrats could appoint his father to replace him. The other would be to not swear in anyone, and allow the position to remain vacant.

    The Democratic Town Committee executive committee will meet Friday to figure out what to do, according to the Connecticut Post.