election integrity

Greg Gordon (McClatchy Washington Bureau) today had a story that actually made it into the front section of my local paper:

Texas-based Premier Elections Solutions last week alerted at least 1,750 jurisdictions across the country that special precautions are needed to address the problem in tabulation software affecting all 19 of its models dating back a decade.

• Read more

Part of "Electronic Voting Machines Project"

The security of elections and the ability of citizens to participate in the political process by voting are fundamental to our democracy. However, the history of elections has shown that when there are opportunities for fraud and deception, there will almost certainly be individual and organized efforts to exploit them. Various forms of disenfranchisement and voter intimidation have also long been a feature of elections.

• Read more

 Black Box Voting

Beginning with the swing states, and then proceeding to counties whose election officials have been secretive, members of BBV’s Clean Up Crew make formal requests of public records under FOIA (the Freedom of Information Act) to force officials to disclose their electoral procedures, and take them to court if they refuse. Headed by e-voting activist Bev Harris, Black Box Voting has been a leader in documenting investigations, exposés, whistle-blower accounts, and many examples of flawed elections. Currently BBV has a Help America Audit campaign and is drawing attention to VoteHere’s  cryptographic “solution” that would make a farce of voter verifiable paper trails.

California Voter Foundation

Active lobbying in California and at the national level on voting issues. CVF has a good list of the types of errors that were reported with electronic voting machines in Nov 2004 election.    

• Read more

SINCE the 2000 election, those who have been close to voting issues have been intensely concerned about the integrity of the vote. However, there has been scant coverage of this issue in the major media and, perhaps reflecting this, little interest by the broad public. Moreover, few elected officials of either major party are willing to address what is, without a doubt, the major political issue of the day.

• Read more

This tabular presentation is an overview of a number of problems with the U.S. election system, with some of the proposed solutions.  It is not meant to be comprehensive, but rather to give others a starting point.

See table.