A few days before the Maryland primary, Theodore and Beatrice Hirsh returned to their home in Baltimore from a six-day vacation and found 31 messages on their answering machine.
Only four of the calls were from friends. The other 27 were pre-recorded messages from politicians urging the couple to vote.
The Hirshes deleted every political message without listening.
“It’s a real pain in the telephone,” said Theodore Hirsh, an attorney. “If I keep getting more, I will vote against them on those grounds.”
For years, political campaigns have used so-called “robo-calls” to reach voters. Because the calls are cheap — they typically cost about 5 cents a dial — and require almost no manpower, they are an appealing alternative to phone banks and campaigning door-to-door.
But this year, an unusually large number of contested elections in Maryland and increased use of automated calling have combined to create a volume of calls that has overwhelmed – and infuriated – some voters.
“It’s a continuous bombardment,” said Elkridge resident Scott Young. “We’ve stopped answering the phone altogether.”
Because the calls are popular with local, state and national candidates alike, it isn’t uncommon for a household to receive half a dozen calls a day before an election.
Young, a social studies teacher at a middle school in Frederick County, said he and his wife received about 10 calls a day in the weeks before the primary, “and who knows how many more we didn’t pick up.”
Though politicians say they only want to inform voters, many of those voters said they hang up immediately after they realize they are listening to a recording. Some said the calls changed their votes– that is, they were convinced to vote against robo-calling candidates as a kind of revenge.
Elkridge resident Jeff Johnson, a Department of Defense employee, said he began writing down the names of candidates who sent him robo-calls so he could to vote for their opponents.
“They always come during dinner too,” he complained.
Most calls are placed between 5:30 and 6:30 in the evening — when people are usually home from work, but haven’t started dinner yet, campaign managers said.
Now that primaries are over, there are fewer candidates in the pool and the number of automated calls has diminished. But many Maryland candidates say they plan to send more calls as the November election nears.
“People enjoy being informed about what the campaign is doing,” said Rick Abbruzzese, a spokesman for Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley, the Democratic candidate for governor. He admitted, however, he had not personally received any feedback.
Abbruzzese said robo-calls are cheaper than campaigning by direct mail, television and radio. He knows robo-calling is successful, he said, because people turn out at campaign events after automated calls have been made in the area.
Shareese DeLeaver, a spokeswoman for Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich’s reelection campaign, said people are annoyed because calls are coming more frequently this election season due to the large number of candidates, not because campaigns are relying more on the calls.
But for Voice Broadcasting Corp., a Dallas company that has made robo-calls for 17 Maryland candidates this year, demand for the calls has increased almost