By Brad Friedman from on the road in Burlington, CO…
The recent Dan Rather report (complete video here) on the gaming of the paper punchcard ballots by Sequoia Voting Systems in Florida, just prior to the 2000 election, plugs up at least one important “hole” in the Clint Curtis story. We first broke Curtis’s story back in late 2004 and have been reporting on it ever since.
You’ll recall that Curtis alleged — in sworn affidavit [PDF], live video-taped testimony before a U.S. House Judiciary delegation, and via polygraph test — that he was asked by Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) to create a touch-screen vote-rigging prototype program, just months prior to the 2000 election when they both worked at the same Florida software firm.
One of the main criticisms of Curtis’s striking allegations at the time was that “nobody was even thinking about touch-screen voting systems in Florida prior to the 2000 Presidential Election debacle.”
Dan Rather’s remarkable investigative report, however, would seem to indicate otherwise: seven Sequoia company whistleblowers reveal on camera that, despite their objections, they were forced to use poor quality paper for the punchcards to be used in Florida in 2000. They also revealed that they had been instructed to deliberately misalign the chads for ballots going to Palm Beach County, FL, only.
Back in 2004, just after The BRAD BLOG broke the original story of Curtis’ allegations, some in the media were skeptical. On 12/13/04, Kim Zetter picked up on the story for WIRED and wrote…
Unknown to the dubious Zetter at the time, was that someone at Sequoia, as the Rather report now reveals, seems to have known what they were doing when they gamed those paper ballots in Florida in 2000, since the company had already had touch-screen voting machines in the pipe-line, and indeed, already in use since as early as 1999 in California. If someone at Sequoia was pushing towards a change to touch-screen voting for Florida in 2000, the charges that Feeney might well have been aware, and supporting such a move is not quite as absurd as Zetter seemed to suggest in her article.
As well, another recent revelation puts the lie to Feeney’s claim, made years ago, that he no longer had anything to do with the owners of the Oviedo, Florida, firm where he was the general counsel and registered lobbyist in 2000 (even as he served as Speaker of the FL House at the same time). Curtis was employed as a computer programmer for the company, which had multi-million dollar contracts with both the state and NASA, where Feeney’s wife has worked for several years.
New information reveals that the owners of the company remain personal friends with Feeney, and continue to funnel money to him even while they hope for further contracts from the U.S. House Subcommittee on Space & Aeronautics, in which Feeney has recently been promoted to ranking member.
TOUCH-SCREEN VOTING SYSTEMS AND PRE-2000 FLORIDA
Connecting a few dots here… Sequoia had already deployed its new touch-screen voting systems in several precincts in Riverside County, CA, back in 1999. In 2000 the systems were to be used county-wide for the first time. Sequoia knew damned well that they stood to make millions from the use of touch-screen voting systems long before the 2000 election, even as their paper ballot shop was preparing the flawed paper ballots for use in Florida’s election that same year.
As reported by Rather, the company made just pennies per ballot on the punchcards and only a few hundred dollars on punchcard counting machines. But millions stood to be made on their newer technology, which sold for thousands of dollars per touch-screen machine. The stunning on-camera testimony from the seven company whistleblowers suggests that the company — and/or someone else — may have had a plan in place to speed the transition to touch-screens prior to the 2000 election in Florida. That, of course, is precisely the same moment in time that Curtis alleges Feeney asked him to create touch-screen vote-rigging software, when they both worked for Yang Enterprises, Inc….
While virtually all other points of Curtis’s claims have now been independently verified as accurate — Yang was overcharging the Florida Dept. of Transportation (FDOT), Yang was employing an undocumented worker who was performing espionage on behalf of Communist China, etc. — we still have only Curtis’s word for it that Feeney requested such a program during a meeting at the company in September or October of 2000.
Curtis says that the only people present at the meeting were he, Feeney, company owner Mrs. Yang, and her executive assistant and then-company spokesman, Mike Cohen. Other than Curtis, everyone else allegedly at the meeting either denies Feeney asked for any such thing, or they refuse to comment on the meeting at all.
In misreporting the exclusive news that Curtis had successfully passed a polygraph test concerning these matters back in April of 2005, St. Petersburg Times Pulitzer Prize winning political reporter Lucy Morgan wrote [emphasis added]:
Feeney also points out that touch screen machines were not even contemplated before November 2000, when widely used punch card machines contributed to 36 days of uncertainty over the presidential election.
Other media reports and official statements attempting to debunk Curtis’s claims have similarly peddled the notion that nobody in the Sunshine State had even dreamed of using touch-screen voting systems prior to the 2000 debacle. The revelations from the Sequoia Seven would seem to indicate otherwise.
Score yet another one for Clint Curtis.
‘PYRAMID’ SCHEME: THE YANGS ARE STILL SUPPORTING, PAYING OFF TOM FEENEY
Despite what Feeney claimed years ago, that he “ended the professional relationship [with Yang Enterprises, Inc]…after he was elected to the U.S. Congress in 2002” and that “his only connection to Yang Enterprises was as an attorney prior to 2002,” as usual, the facts are different from Feeney’s imaginary version of reality. And the news within the last week demonstrates that as clearly as ever.
Having set up a Legal Defense Fund to fight the facts concerning his Abramoff-funded trip to Scotland — for which several others in Congress have already been indicted and convicted — the Yangs were amongst the first in line to give $5000, the legal limit, to their old chum and business partner Feeney.
The top-dollar contribution came from Pyramid Technology, Inc., which is registered to do business in Oviedo, Florida, by Tyng-Lin Yang — the same owner of Yang Enterprises, Inc. (YEI). Both operations are based in the same building, at 1420 Alfaya Trail, according to this 2007 document obtained from the Florida Secretary of State.
Pyramid has offices in mainland China and claims to be “A Woman Owned Company,” according to its website, which, like YEI, has made much of its claims to minority/female ownership as a wedge to receive preferred status in applying for official government contracts. The YEI website has now apparently scrubbed all of its pages and replaced them with a single splash (introduction) page. Perhaps they’ve found themselves under a bit too much scrutiny for comfort over the past few years.
The same address on Alfaya Trail in Oviedo was listed as Feeney’s campaign headquarters in ’02, ’04, and ’06 because he rents office space in the Yang Building — yet another example of Feeney’s not having “ended the professional relationship” with the firm, despite his claims to the contrary.
And yet, ironically enough, Feeney claims it’s Curtis who is lying about the allegations from 2000, even as Feeney refuses, unlike Curtis, to take a polygraph test to this day.
BUT WHO’S KEEPING SCORE?
We used to estimate that 85 to 90 percent of Curtis’s allegations have been independently verified since he initially brought them to the Florida Inspector General in early 2001, and then publicly at The BRAD BLOG in late 2004. We feel comfortable, in light of this latest news, in bumping that up to an authenticated percentage of some 90 to 95 percent of the original story now having being independently verified.
Feeney’s and YEI’s record has not fared nearly as well, as one denial after another has repeatedly fallen apart and been revealed as lies throughout our more than two years of investigating and reporting on this story.
Feeney and the Yangs both still have a great deal of explaining to do regarding the allegations that the Congressman was attempting to obtain touch-screen vote-rigging software prior to the 2000 election in Florida.
Many questions remain, of course, concerning who might have been involved in the alleged 2000 scheme. Just as Sequoia still needs to explain who was behind their apparent move to game the paper punchcard ballots in Florida prior to the 2000 Presidential Election — the election that hastened the move, across the entire country, to touch-screen voting systems made by Sequoia and just a handful of other companies.
I’m agog.
Is it really true that it was the electronic voting machine company Sequoia which also produced and supplied the paper ballots in that ill-fated election of Florida 2000?
Sequoia chads?
These EVM vendors should call Senator Craig (R-Closet) if they want security holes plugged with top notch PR.
The incredible thing to me is that the EVM vendors react exactly like the
WhiteWhat House does. That makes me suspicious that their PR is canned talking points direct from spin central.Sequoia, involved in another form of election fraud???
I’m shocked and awed! (end snark)
So..how’s Clint doing these days anyway? And how’s the pup?
Hard to believe it’s been so long since this all started…
For the record, those Palm Beach ballots were printed in Visalia California by Sequoia.
Brad writes, “Sequoia still needs to explain who was behind their apparent move to game the paper punchcard ballots in Florida prior to the 2000 Presidential Election…” and John Gideon writes in the related post, “The questions remain: Who at Sequoia ordered and/or signed off on the inferior paper used for the punchcards in the 2000 Florida Election —”
As Sequoia’s former Controller stated in the Dan Rather video, she would not sign off on the shipment of inferior paper so her boss did. Her boss was Sequoia Senior Vice President Brian Lierman who was in charge of Sequoia Voting Systems ballot-printing facility at the time. Lierman’s boss was Peter Cosgrove, head of Sequoia Voting Systems. Sequoia was then owned by the Irish company Jefferson Smurfit. Cosgrove answered to Michael Smurfit.
The role of Sequoia in the 2000 vote debacle has finally come to light. But what continues to be suppressed by Democrats, Republicans and some voting integrity activists is Sequoia’s role in the downfall of its chief touchscreen voting system competitor, Diebold.
In 2001 Brian Lierman’s daughter, Brianna Lierman, began employment with the office of California’s Secretary of State, Kevin Shelley. Brianna Lierman had come to the Secretary of State’s (SOS) office at the recommendation of Kim Alexander, founder of the California Voter Foundation. Brianna, as a UC Davis student, had worked as an intern and part-time employee at the foundation for several months in 2000 and 2001. Lierman worked on Voter Information pamphlets. She was suddenly assigned to the Secretary of State’s “Certification Panel.”
Shortly thereafter, the SOS announced that its Certification Panel had discovered that Diebold Election Systems was running uncertified election software on their voting machines in California. That was true, but incomplete. What the SOS did not announce was that the Certification Panel discovered that Sequoia Voting Systems was also running uncertified election software on their voting machines in California. In fact, as Brianna discovered, no voting machine vendor went through a state software certification process because THERE WAS NO PROCESS. Kevin Shelley’s predecessors, Bill Jones and March Fong Eu, did not have or require software certification during the days when California’s votes were cast by punchcards and optical scan.
This is why the LA Times (11/13/03) quotes Conny McCormack: “She said all counties in the state, whether they use electronic or mechanical voting systems, had installed significant software upgrades in the past several years to accommodate changes to primary voting and to handle the unique recall election itself. ‘All of us have made changes to our software – even major changes – and none of us have gone back to the secretary of state,” McCormack said. “But it was no secret we’ve been doing this all along. [Kevin Shelley] knew we were making changes.”
Kevin Shelley made a crucial decision. By this time, not only was the daughter of a Sequoia VP placed into a crucial position at the SOS which could have great influence on Sequoia’s competitor, Sequoia had also hired former Secretary of State Bill Jones, and his second in command, Alfie Charles, and Jones’ high level tech manager, Waldeep Singh.
The decision was to suppress the fact that Sequoia, like other vendors, had not had its software certified by the SOS and, instead, single out Diebold. This was made easier by the fact that Diebold’s reputation was taking a beating due to the “Avi Rubin” report and CEO Wally O’Dell’s remarks. And this decision was fine with SOS employees, who did not want to have to answer for the SOS failure to have a software certification process. It was certainly fine with Bill Jones and the other former SOS executives who did not want to explain the certification failure. And, of course, they now worked for Sequoia and could watch as their main competitor, Diebold, became the punching bag for activists.
So the Secretary of State’s Voting Systems Panel announced it was decertifying Diebold. No mention of Sequoia or others. Though the title, “Voting Systems Panel” may give the impression of independence, seven of its eight members were employees of the Secretary of State, answerable to the Secretary of State. The eighth was computer scientist David Jefferson. Jefferson had served as Chair of the Kim Alexanders’ California Voter Foundation.
In late 2003, Kim Alexander was given a heads up that her former employee, Brianna Lierman was soon to be exposed as the daughter of a Sequoia Vice President. To get out in front of the issue, Alexander went through the motions of notifying the SOS who pretended to be surprised and moved Lierman out.
Questions that should be pursued by a dogged investigative journalist:
What factors did the Voting Systems Panel, including David Jefferson, consider when it decided not to publicize Sequoia’s uncertified software.
What factors did the Secretary of State consider when he declined to take action concerning LA County’s admitted uncertified software?
The Certification Panel singled out Diebold, despite the fact that Sequoia had uncertified software. What role did Brianna Lierman, Brian Lierman, Bill Jones, Alfie Charles, Waldeep Singh play in this?
Who else, besides Kim Alexander, knew of Lierman’s Sequoia connection? When and how?
When and how did Alexander first learn of Lierman’s Sequoia connection? What was Alexander’s response? Has the California Voter Foundation received funds from Sequoia or any other elections companies? Does she have any financial interest in elections-related companies. Does CVF have any conflict of interest rules? When did Alexander “voice concerns” to Kevin Shelley about Lierman’s Sequoia connection? Was it before or after Lierman recommended a delay in Diebold’s certification?
How and when was she assigned to the Voting Systems Panel from her position working on voter information pamphlets? Who recommended her assignment?
If there was a software certification process, describe it. How long had it been in place? Who was assigned what functions in that process? How long does it take? Provide records of this process from previous years.
Is it correct to say that Sequoia, after hiring as a consultant former Secretary of State Bill Jones, and hiring former SOS deputy Alfie Charles, and SOS employee Waldeep Singh, had succeeded in placing a Sequoia relative in one of the most sensitive positions in the California elections world: The very panel which determines who may or may not sell equipment in California? Sequoia had not only infiltrated the SOS office by placing an asset in the SOS office and hiring former SOS personnel, they have “penetrated” the SOS office by successfully placing an asset in a decisionmaking position which allowed it to harm its competitors.
Does this mean the famous recall of Gray Davis, which made Arnold Schwarzenegger governator of Kalifornia, was another rigged electon?
Just how screwed up is this country? We need to really get the election system fixed well and quick.
What a tangle web of decept the Brad Blog has uncovered
so far.With all the dots linking CA-SOS executive offices to the DVM companies who later corupted the FL
elections.The link to Rep-Feeney adds a nice touch,’w’
wasn’t elected by the people,rather he was crowned KING
by the U S supreme court,because the votes were rigged
in FL and OH.IF the truth ever reveals itself one fine
day,”W” lost the elections and AL GORE should have been
sworn in Jan 20 2001 as our next president.
Good dot-connecting there Brad! (Much better than all that Holt-Avante stuff, which so far, thankfully, you seem to have managed to stay clear of.) Unlike that (a couple of signs in Jersey?), this one’s the real deal:
Feeney asking Curtis to confirm that the Republicans wouldn’t be shooting themselves in the foot by getting rid of punch cards. I.e., someone had to check and make sure that the replacement systems (the touch screens) would be just as easy to rig as those defective punch cards.
Just think: if the Democrats were this smart, we’d really be getting somewhere!
“They also revealed that they had been instructed to deliberately misalign the chads for ballots going to Palm Beach County, FL only.”
OK, but this takes 7 years to come out? So, when they steal the 2008 election, THAT president will be long gone when THAT’S uncovered, right? And on and on it goes, and we don’t have a democracy. What a joke!
Maybe they’ll just “gag order” all the Sequoia whistleblowers. What a joke this country has become.
Dan Rather has to leave the corporate controlled CBS to get us the real news!
George Washington gamed the counting of his election votes and committed egregious election fraud during his presidential election. The corp-pirate emm-ess-emm will not be revealing the facts until later next year.
Is it too late to impeach George,… Washington,.. that is ?
As a poster stated above, by the time the treasonous conduct of criminality is revealed to the public it is almost too late and irreparable harm has been done to America and our cherished DEMOCRACY.
A Fascist – “Shadow Government” has installed itself via a secret coup d’état, before we realized what it was they were truly up to. Hijacking this country and our government is not something that should be passed off or rewarded – but the perpetrators must be met with the severest of punishments the law allows.
The United States Treasury is not George W. Bush’s or Dick Cheney’s private ATM cash machine – nor that of their friends, buddies, cronies, political/business associates and/or chummy pals.
OldTurk: You said,
“The United States Treasury is not George W. Bush’s or Dick Cheney’s private ATM cash machine – nor that of their friends, buddies, cronies, political/business associates and/or chummy pals.”
Apparently, you’re mistaken.
Demockcrazy … its not just for Stalin anymore.
Keep in mind, this thread that we’re in right now, has this Sequoia chad gaming story been on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, or FOX? Can someone tell me?
Is this Dan Rather show on CBS? I know it’s not on the “news”.
Dan Rather Reports is on HDNet. So unfortunately, not many get to see it (though they have here at BRAD BLOG!).
That, however, is no excuse for the rest of the MSM not looking into it.
Seven whistleblowers. On camera. By name.
Does it take 700? 7000?
Well, John Gideon and I are looking into it. And will continue to do so until someone pays attention other than us!
More fodder. Have you reconnected/recapped the Jeb Bush “connection” as well? On May 3, 2005, Matthew Haggman reported in the Daily Business Review: “ES&S lobbyist Sandra Mortham, a former Florida secretary of state and briefly a running mate of Gov. Jeb Bush in 1998, convinced the Florida Association of Counties to endorse the ES&S system in exchange for the association receiving a fee each time the company won a county contract.”
Lani Massey Brown, MARGIN OF ERROR: BALLOTS OF STRAW, political intrigue of a stolen election.