Trustworthy Electronic Voting Project Please visit our collection of links to articles, reports and other resources for studying problems with electronic voting machines.

Electronic voting machines, many with a touch screen feature, now account for at least 20 percent of all voting systems and many more will be installed in the next year. The problem is that these machines are subject to manipulation and malfunction, and there is no way to know when this happens. This means that we cannot trust the results of elections and that a major basis of our democracy, open and honest elections, is severely compromised.

There is a solution, though—requiring an independent paper printout that allows the voter to confirm that the machine is recording what the voter intended, and that also can be used to audit the vote totals that the machine reports.  But few current voting machines are set up to create such a voter-verifiable audit trail (VVAT).

There is no adequate national legislation to address this issue. If this situation is not corrected, it is not an exaggeration to say we will have lost our democracy.  The public and our political representatives are largely unaware of the seriousness of the problem. While a number of articles in the press have addressed some aspects of the issue, they have been overshadowed by media coverage of the war with Iraq and other issues.

Coverage by the media has been minimal, considering the significance of this issue for the future of American democracy. Further, the nature of print coverage has been inadequate.  It has obscured the overwhelming importance of technical considerations, which are not adequately addressed by the typical inclusion of anecdotal comments of citizens about how much they like voting machines or manufacturers’ assertions that amount to “just trust us.”

Election security is an urgent matter.  Spurred by the Florida election fiasco in 2000, Congress passed the “Help America Vote Act of 2002” (HAVA).  Using HAVA-designated monies, states across the country are rushing to adopt new voting technology, primarily touch-screen electronic machines, in time for the 2004 election. Unfortunately, the provisions of HAVA are inadequate to guarantee that the electronic voting machines will not be subject to manipulation, and that thewith an independent VVAT that is an accurate record of the intent of each individual voter. Once these machines have been purchased and the systems are in place, it will be much harder to go back to try to change them or disqualify them. We must act now.

A bill, HR 2239, “Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003,” has been submitted in Congress by Rep. Rush Holt.  This bill appears to address many of the concerns about electronic voting machines. However, unless the media deal with the issue more appropriately and the public is able to understand what will be needed to have confidence in the outcome of elections, neither this bill nor any other proposed legislation is likely to get the attention it deserves. The public must know what is going on and be motivated to pressure Congress to take action.

Commonweal Institute has a project designed to bring the electronic voting machine problem to the attention of the public and our elected officials. We will seek to get sufficient attention for the seriousness of the problem, so that the public and many elected officials will demand that there be at least a partial solution prior to the 2004 general election. We need support for this project now.

Goals of the Trustworthy Electronic Voting Project are:

1. Making electronic voting machine vulnerability a major national media story
2. Ensuring media attention to the key point: That we must be able to trust election results, and this is not possible without a voter-verifiable system
3. Getting citizens to contact their members of Congress to demand action.

The project will involve:

·        Researching media coverage of the issue to date;

·        Using the research results to pressure the media to focus on the critical importance of trustworthiness of  the voting process, by creating impact at the Radio & TV News Directors Assn, major Journalism Reviews, awards shows, regional meetings of news managers, etc.;

·        Using public relations techniques to publicize the issue widely; e.g., press placement, press releases, faxblasts and email campaigns, tip sheets, Fraudulent Voting Machine (online demonstration with citizen action tips), and perhaps a newsworthy event;

·        Targeting major moderate and progressive organizations that should be supporters, to win their support or at least neutrality.  Some currently oppose voter verification because they do not understand the seriousness of the threat to our democracy and their goals, nor the significance of factors such as technology limitations, ownership of machine companies, and the real potential for the manipulation of elections if touch screen machines are used without a voter-verifiable audit trail.

·        Pushing for widespread citizen action in communicating to Congress about this issue, with the intention of having national legislation passed; this will be done in collaboration with other organizations and individuals concerned with the integrity of our elections system (e.g., MoveOn.org, California Voter Foundation, People for the American Way, Professor David Dill of Stanford University, Bev Harris of Black Box Voting).