Kruger Blasts Election Board For Lacking Russian Translations

State Senator Carl Kruger is up in arms over a Board of Elections oversight that omitted Russian-language translations for online voter education materials.

Kruger has fired off a letter to the board after he learned that it failed to include either written or audio instructions for Russian-speaking voters on how to use the new voting machines. The senator was the lead sponsor of a state law passed recently that requires large municipalities to translate all voting materials into Russian.

The Board of Election’s failure to “comply with the law’s specifications and its intent is a grievous insult to the Russian-speaking community that must be corrected at once,” said Kruger.

The board’s voter education website, Vote-NY.com, has posted videos about the operation of new optical scanner ballot machines rolling out this year. In line with other state voter laws, the site offers translation options for Spanish, Chinese (Cantonese and Mandarin) and Korean. But there’s no option for Russian.

Kruger’s office said he has received “assurances” from the board that the mistake will be corrected.

However, none of the site’s other translation options for the videos work, with the exception of the Cantonese version. No mention has been made of whether the city will fix those glitches.