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By John Gideon on 3/5/2006 5:25pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon, of VotersUnite and VoteTrustUSA

The "DVN Top 5" is a feature in the weekly voting newsletter of VoteTrustUSA. The February 28 edition can be found here. The selection of what will be the "Top 5" for each week and where it goes on the list is all mine. The fact that you may disagree with my choices is great because it shows that you have been reading the DVN articles that I've posted throughout the week here on The BRAD BLOG!...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 3/4/2006 5:10pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The state of Florida has decided that just maybe they need to do something about security and the Diebold machines. They issued a technical advisory that tends to vindicate Ion Sancho. In New York advocacy groups, individuals and civil rights groups have filed to intervene in the DoJ suit against the state. And it appears that Burlington, Vermont will be the first US city to elect it's mayor using "instant run-off voting"....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 3/3/2006 7:43pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Many of us worked long and hard with folks in Mississippi to keep out the Diebold TSx machines their SoS was pushing on them. One of our cautions was that cash-strapped counties would end up having to buy more machines in order to have enough. That concern is being borne out in counties across the state. Humboldt Co., California gets a look at the Vote-PAD and likes what they saw. In Iowa there is talk that Gov. Vilsack may take a cue from New Mexico Gov. Richardson and push for a paper ballot....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 3/2/2006 5:02pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Today's news emphasis has moved from California to New York, Pennsylvania, and Florida. The news about the DoJ suing New York was expected and now it's here. The DoJ seems to want chaos in elections and they may get it. In Pennsylvania the state 'supremes' have decided that state law can be followed or ignored when it suits officials and they have allowed counties to go ahead and change voting systems. In Florida a bill has been introduced to require a voter verified paper ballot. And in Maryland it seems that the Governor is not convinced that the Diebold code question has been answered satisfactorily and he is concerned. Meanwhile there are protesters in California and New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson signs the paper ballot bill into law....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Governor's Open Letter: 'One person, one vote is in jeopardy if we do not act boldly and immediately'
But How Long Will the Bill Take To Come Into Effect?
By John Gideon on 3/1/2006 6:40pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon

"American citizens once took for granted that every vote mattered, but no longer. It is time that we, the elected state officials, work to restore American's confidence in our electoral systems and undertake reform that moves to eliminate skepticism and uncertainty." --- NM Governor Bill Richardson's 3/1/06 Letter "To the State Officials of the 50 United States of America" (Posted in full below)

Today Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico made a powerful statement to officials in all states (see full letter below) as he announced that tomorrow he would be signing legislation that would require the state of New Mexico to go to a paper ballot based voting system. No longer will the state use Sequoia DRE (touch-screen) voting machines...the machines that reported large numbers of undervotes in previous elections...The same machines that disenfranchised minority voters...The technology Richardson describes as "simply fail[ing] to pass the test of reliability" in his open letter published today.

The Governor has also announced that the bill's signing ceremony will be webcast. The announcement says:

We hope you will join the Governor, concerned citizens and legislators as the Governor's signature moves New Mexico forward by ensuring that our democracy continues to flourish. The live webcast will begin Thursday at 11:00am MST (1:00pm Eastern) and can be viewed at:

www.billrichardson2006.com/reform/paperballots

Please watch the webcast, take a moment to look at the Governor's proposals, and sign the petition to get your state, and the rest of America, to make every vote count

This all sounds wonderful, except???opponents of the legislation managed to get the legislation amended so that voting systems "owned or used" as of 1 May 2006 that do not use paper ballots can continue to be used until, among other things, debt on purchases of those machines are paid by the state. Then, the bill that appropriated funds to pay off the debt died in committee. Now the state needs to find the money to pay off the debt.

UPDATE 3/3/06: Signing ceremony video and petition calling on all states to join NM now here.

The complete letter from Gov. Richardson of New Mexico follows...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 3/1/2006 5:10pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Today the hammer finally fell on New York as the DoJ did as they have been promising and filed a suit against the state for voting rights failures. Meanwhile in Pennsylvania the "Kuznick Suit" is being heard by the State Supreme Court. New Mexico Governor Richardson has sent a letter to officials in all 50 states to ask them to support an all paper-based voting system. And, finally, California got the Ciber ITA report from Diebold. It did not address the fact that 'interpreted' code is banned by the voting systems guidelines so, again, the ITA only did the bare essentials and did not do their job to ensure our voting systems meet all of the guidelines. ...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/28/2006 5:10pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

I'm back and today's DVN includes some articles from the past two days added in with today's articles. Early voting for this year's primaries is taking place in TX and IL. It looks like NY will be using their lever machines for another election year. It would be catastrophic for them to change this late in the game. PA is a mess with counties rushing to get anything and not much really certified by the state or federal authorities. ...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/22/2006 5:08pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

From Alabama comes a report that ES&S had an internal communications problem and they provide the optical scan machines used in Belforest in their elections. "The company delivered "data packs" --- the electronic devices in which the voters' selections are stored --- programmed for absentee voting, causing the two machines to reject the ballots, Johns said. The situation did not affect the voting, as voters filled out their ballots and slipped them in an emergency bin used for occasions such as this one, he said." Imagine if that had been DREs instead of optical-scan. Just why is there an IrDA port on those Diebold machines? Just a reminder, that this will be the last Daily Voting News until next Tuesday evening. I will be off line until then. Have a great weekend....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/21/2006 5:00pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Texas began early voting for their primary with the news that many counties still do not have their paper ballots or their ballot programming complete. In California the fall-out from last Friday's announcement by SoS McPherson is making news. One can only wonder when the lawsuits will begin....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/20/2006 5:24pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

What's going on in Maryland? The Gov is against a vvpb; now he is for it. Democratic members of the legislature who are for a vvpb are belittling the Governor's change of heart as being political and are claiming he is creating chaos. Now kids! Can't we just get along and give the voter a vvpb like they want? Meanwhile in Pennsylvania the Governor has said he will veto the legislation that requires a voterID...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/19/2006 5:15pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon, of VotersUnite and VoteTrustUSA

The "DVN Top 5" is a feature in the weekly voting newsletter of VoteTrustUSA. The February 13 edition can be found here. The selection of what will be the "Top 5" for each week and where it goes on the list is all mine. The fact that you may disagree with my choices is great because it shows that you have been reading the DVN articles that I've posted throughout the week here on The BRAD BLOG!...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/18/2006 5:00pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The big news for the day is the announcement that California's SoS McPherson has conditionally certified Diebold AccuVote OS and TSx voting machines for use in the state. This announcement has many people puzzled and mad. Has McPherson bowed to pressure from the counties and, in actuality, set them up for legal problems? It seems that may be the case. Meanwhile in Maryland ES&S steps forward and says they have no idea what Linda Lamone is saying when she says no one can provide a paper based system to the state before November. They say they can do it no problem. Could it be that Linda Lamone has been caught in another lie?...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/17/2006 7:59pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

In California, SoS Bruce McPherson reached down and deep and certified Diebold for use in the state with some conditions. Note that there has still been no report from the federal ITA that was asked to reinspect the Diebold memory card. At the same time, in Maryland, Diebold and Linda Lamone have taken to ignoring the truth, or misrepresenting it as they ignore proof of lost votes in elections and try to assure voters that there are no problems. And good news from New Mexico where the state legislature has passed a voter verified paper ballot bill....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




State Senator Outraged, Says Machines, Certification Violates State, Federal Standards and Law...
SoS' Own Report Agrees! McPherson Waits Until 5pm Friday of Holiday Weekend to Announce! [UPDATED WITH MUCH MORE INFO...]
By John Gideon on 2/17/2006 6:29pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon (with some additional updates/info from Brad)

Updated with much more information...

Secretary of State McPherson seems to have a thing for making major announcements late on Fridays just before holidays. Following in what seems to be a pattern of his, he announced late this afternoon that he was certifying Diebold Optical Scan and AccuVote TSx (touch-screens) for use in elections in the state.

The re-certification (they had been originally decertified in California in 2004 when it was revealed Diebold had installed illegal software updates on the machines) is conditional on some items but not on the one thing point he had announced last December when he sent the system back to federal authorities for further testing. At that time he said he was sending the machine's memory cards to the federal Independent Testing Authority (ITA) Lab for reinspection in light of the news out of Leon County, Florida that the cards used "intepreted code" which is specifically banned by the Help America Vote Act (HAVA). A "hack test" in that county revealed that an entirely election could have its results flipped by a hacker exploiting that "interpreted code" --- without a trace being left behind.

McPherson made his announcement today without waiting to hear back from the ITA lab.

Last summer, after a massive mock election test with Diebold touch-screen machines revealed that 10% of them failed entirely with screens freezing and printers jamming --- later reports would reveal that as many as 30% of the machines actually failed! --- McPherson said, "We certainly can't take any kind of risk like that with this kind of device on California voters."

Apparently the Secretary of State of America's largest "voting market," as Diebold refers to it, was just kidding about that.

State Senator Debra Bowen, (D-Redondo Beach), the chairwoman of the Senate Elections, Reapportionment, & Constitutional Amendments Committee issued the following Press Release after learning of McPherson's remarkable decision.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Evan Goldberg (###) ###-4028/(###) ###-9176

February 17, 2006

BOWEN ON SECRETARY OF STATE'S DECISION TO RE-CERTIFY DIEBOLD MACHINES FOR USE IN CALIFORNIA

SACRAMENTO ? "How the Secretary can re-certify the Diebold machines when they don't comply with California law, they violate the standards set by the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) that the Secretary said he intended to follow, and he still doesn't have the report back from the ITAs that he said he was waiting for is beyond me."

That's how Senator Debra Bowen (D-Redondo Beach), the chairwoman of the Senate Elections, Reapportionment, & Constitutional Amendments Committee, reacted to today's decision by the Secretary of State to re-certify Diebold's electronic voting machines for the 2006 elections.

"Last December, the Secretary announced with great fanfare that he was sending the Diebold machines back for review by the Independent Testing Authorities (ITAs) because the memory cards those machines rely on hadn't been reviewed," continued Bowen. "Now, contrary to what he said two months ago, he's approving the Diebold machines without waiting for the report from the ITAs. Instead, he's basing his decision on a supposedly 'independent state audit' that no one has seen before today. There's a March 1 public hearing for four other voting machine vendors before their machines can be certified for use in California, so what was the rush to certify Diebold and side-step a public hearing on this issue?"

Seventeen California counties rely on the Diebold optical scan machines and a number of other counties have bought or are planning to buy the Diebold TSx touch-screen machines to use in the 2006 elections in order to comply with the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA). The Secretary's decision is only good for the 2006 elections and comes with a number of conditions.

"In August, the Secretary said any machine approved in California would have to comply with all federal standards and regulations, yet the EAC bans machines that contain interpreted code and these Diebold machines rely on that type of code to operate, so he's gone back on that commitment," continued Bowen. "In December, he said he'd wait for a report from the ITAs before acting on the Diebold re-certification request, yet now he's re-certified the Diebold machines without hearing from the ITAs. He says he's acting based on the recommendations of an 'independent state audit' that came out on Tuesday, but the California State Auditor hasn't issued any reports on this issue and hasn't been asked to do a report. Asking a board appointed by the Secretary to make recommendations doesn't constitute an 'independent state audit' in my book.

"The other thing that no one has mentioned is the fact that the Diebold machines don't comply with the state's paper trail law because they don't provide blind or visually impaired voters with a 'read-back' of what the paper trail recorded, they only read back what the machine recorded electronically," noted Bowen. "That's not what the law requires, yet the Secretary has decided to go ahead and approve these machines for use anyway. If the Secretary wants to say he's changing his mind and lowering the safeguards California voters are entitled to have to ensure their votes are accurately counted, that's certainly his decision to make, but saying these Diebold machines comply with state law and with all federal regulations and requirements simply isn't accurate."

Under Elections Code Sections 19250 and 19251, all direct recording electronic (DRE) voting systems have to come with an accessible voter verified paper audit trail (AVVPAT). The AVVPAT must be "provided or conveyed to voters via both a visual and a nonvisual method, such as through an audio component." The Diebold TSx doesn't contain that feature, therefore making the AVVPAT that all DREs are required to have as of January 1, 2006, useless for blind or visually-impaired voters.

###

VOTING SYSTEMS HEARINGS, MARCH 1:
Also of note is the announcement of public hearings (as mentioned in Bowen's release) persuant to the certification of various voting systems, many of which are still not federally qualified. This announcement is not accompanied by any of the test reports necessary for citizens to go to this hearing with any knowledge of what the state found in their testing. Perhaps this is because none of these systems have been tested by the state yet?

...DEVELOPING...MUCH MORE BELOW...UPDATES, ACTION ITEMS, ADDITIONAL INFO...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By John Gideon on 2/16/2006 5:07pm PT  

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The news today is full of news from Maryland in regards to the letter from Gov. Ehrlich to the State Elections Board. Is this another nail in Diebold's coffin? The fact that they have raised their maintenance charges 1000% over four years is astonishing. Also, counties in Pennsylvania are still trying to decide what they can do in the aftermath of the court decision of earlier in the week. And, the DoJ has given their opinion to Connecticut and they have promised to work with them to meet HAVA mandates....

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




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