A new Brennan Center for Justice analysis of data from the 2010 election indicates more than 20,000 votes for governor in New York were lost because machines read them as “overvotes,” ballots with too many candidates selected. The analysis finds New York voting machines’ confusing and misleading overvote warning message is at fault, as well as the state’s outdated ballot design.

A settlement has been announced in the Brennan Center's lawsuit against the State Board of Elections on behalf of three of New York's minor parties. The lawsuit challenged a discriminatory New York State policy for counting political party votes.

New York - The Working Families Party and the Conservative Party --  represented by the Brennan Center for Justice and the law firm of Emery Celli Brinckerhoff & Abady -- filed a lawsuit yesterday challenging a discriminatory New York State policy for counting political party votes under a procedure known as “double voting.”

The Brennan Center for Justice, New York State Conference NAACP, the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, Families United For Racial and Economic Equality, the Working Families Party, and many other civil rights, voting rights, good government groups and advocates called for the New York State and City Boards of Elections to take a simple step that will prevent tens of thousands of votes from being lost this fall.