-NEWSCHANNEL 8 SCRIPT- 

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THEY MAY BE THE AMERICANS MOST AFFECTED BY THE OUTCOME OF THIS YEAR'S ELECTION. YET HISTORY SHOWS THERE'S A GOOD CHANCE MANY OF THEIR VOTES WILL NEVER BE COUNTED. FEDERAL NEWS TODAY'S CHAS HENRY HAS BEEN LOOKING INTO OVERSEAS MILITARY VOTING. HE TELLS US WHAT HE FOUND.

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THEY'RE ON THE FRONT LINES, TOLD THEY'RE DEFENDING OUR FREEDOMS, BUT WHAT ABOUT THEIR RIGHT TO VOTE? EVEN WHEN THEY WANT TO, AND TRY, MANY MILITARY VOTERS ARE EXCLUDED FROM HAVING THEIR VOICES HEARD AT THE POLLS. ONE PROBLEM: IN WARTIME, MILITARY FORCES ARE ON THE MOVE.

Samuel Wright, Military Voting Advocate: "The military voter especially is frequently, if you'll excuse the expression, a moving target.

AND ABSENTEE VOTING FROM OVERSEAS IS COMPLICATED.

Brenda Farrell, Government Accountability Office: "Registering, requesting a ballot, receiving the ballot, correctly completing the ballot, and returning the ballot to the appropriate election official."

EACH STEP, IN MOST CASES, REQUIRING THAT FORMS AND BALLOTS BE SENT BACK AND FORTH BY SOMETIMES SLOW-MOVING MAIL.

IT'S NOT AS IF THE ISSUE OF MILITARY OVERSEAS VOTING HASN'T GOTTEN TOP LEVEL ATTENTION. THERE'S THIS LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT, FOR INSTANCE. "THESE MEN AND WOMEN, SERVING THEIR COUNTRY AND IN MANY CASES RISKING THEIR LIVES, DESERVE ABOVE ALL OTHERS TO BE ABLE TO VOTE." PROBLEM IS: IT'S WRITTEN IN 1952 AND SIGNED BY HARRY TRUMAN.

THIS WAS THE SITUATION IN 2006. ONE POINT FOUR MILLION PEOPLE IN UNIFORM WERE ELIGIBLE TO VOTE BY ABSENTEE BALLOT; NOT ALL WERE OVERSEAS, BUT HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF THEM WERE. A MILLION OF THEIR FAMILY MEMBERS WERE ELIGIBLE, TOO. ADD THE ESTIMATED THREE AND A HALF MILLION OTHER AMERICANS OUTSIDE THE COUNTRY, AND THE TOTAL NUMBER OF POTENTIAL ABSENTEE VOTERS NEARED SIX MILLION.

Rosemary Rodriguez, Chair, Election Assistance Commission: "Million ballots were sent out, almost, to those voters, but only three hundred thousand were actually counted."

ELECTION OFFICIALS SAID SOME BALLOTS NEVER MADE IT TO THOSE WHO REQUESTED THEM. OTHERS WEREN'T RETURNED ON TIME, OR DID MAKE IT BACK, BUT WEREN'T FILLED OUT EXACTLY RIGHT. THOSE FIGURES DIFFER STARKLY WITH THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT'S MORE OPTIMISTIC SURVEY-BASED ESTIMATE OF VOTING IN TWO THOUSAND FOUR.

Scott Wiedmann, Federal Voting Assistance Program: "The military voted at a rate of seventy three percent, there were actually another six percent that attempted to vote, for a total of seventy nine percent voting participation."

Brenda Farrell, Government Accountability Office: "We have some concerns about that survey."

BECAUSE, SAYS THE GAO, THE RESPONSE RATE WAS LOW AND RESULTS WEREN'T WELL ANALYZED.

Farrell: "There are techniques that DOD could have applied through analysis to make the projections more likely to be accurate, and those were not taken."

MILITARY VOTING ADVOCATES SAY THE DISENFRANCHISEMENT OF FORCES DEPLOYED OVERSEAS IS STARK AND DISTURBING.

Bob Carey, Overseas Vote Foundation: "In the general population, about eighty five percent of the absentee ballots that are requested are actually cast. In the military, only about twenty five percent."

KEEPING, BY BOB CAREY'S ESTIMATE, MORE THAN FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND MILITARY PEOPLE FROM MAKING THEIR VOICES HEARD AT THE POLLS IN 2006. STILL, MILITARY PEOPLE DO TRY, ENCOURAGED BY THE DEFENSE DEPARTMENT'S VOTING AWARENESS PROGRAMS.

BUT WHEN THEY DO MAKE THE EFFORT, IT'S FAR FROM EASY. WITH SOME STATES PRINTING BALLOTS JUST WEEKS BEFORE AN ELECTION, IT'S LIKELY THERE WON'T BE ENOUGH TIME FOR ONE TO TRAVEL EIGHTEEN DAYS OUT, THE AVERAGE TO A MILITARY OVERSEAS VOTER, THEN EIGHTEEN DAYS BACK.