Bo Lipari's Weblog

Paper Ballots for NY!!!

2008-01-25T00:34:00.000-05:00

New York State Rejects DREs

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
-Mohandas Gandhi

I'm pleased to announce that after five years of hard work on the part of voting integrity advocates, New York State has rejected DREs and approved only the Automark and the Sequoia ImageCast scanner/marker for use in 2008 polling places. This momentous decision by the State Board of Elections virtually guarantees that New York State will vote on paper ballots and ballot scanners when it finally replaces lever machines in 2009.

Those of you who were with us at the beginning five years ago know what an enormous victory this is. When I first started traveling, presenting and advocating in New York, election officials, political parties, and machnne vendors assumed that New York State was going to be a DRE state. Precinct scanners were not under discussion, and only DREs were offered by vendors. Our experience over these five years reflects the truth of Gandhi's statement - indeed we were ignored, then laughed at, then fought bitterly by the voting machine vendors and their supporters in the election establishment. But finally, truth has prevailed, and what seemed like an impossible dream in 2003 has been made real by our hard work - New York State will be a paper ballot state.

Just yesterday, it seemed like high powered lobbyists had scuttled our hopes once again as they maneuvered to keep DREs in the mix even though they were in clear violation of New York's laws(see my post describing yesterday's events). But this morning, when the Board reconvened it was immediately obvious from the commissioners opening statements that those who were pushing for the DREs had conceded defeat. No small amount of thanks is due to Commissioner Doug Kellner (D), who firmly held the line yesterday and during a long night of backroom political maneuvering, vowing he would never approve the DRE submissions which did not fulfill the requirements of New York State election law regarding accessible voting machines.

While technically it is possible for a DRE vendor to submit and win approval for the 2009 lever machine replacement, this is highly unlikely as at least half of the HAVA funds will be spent on scanner compatible ballot markers. Since all the approved systems are components of a precinct based scanner system the least expensive path, and the only sensible one, is for counties to complete their HAVA implementation with paper ballots and scanners. We've learned to never be complacent, but this time we have reason to be confident that the scanner compatible choices of today will inevitably lead to paper ballots for all New York voters tomorrow.

My deepest thanks to everyone who fought this long, difficult battle. This is only Round One, and I promise you we will have much, much more to do to guarantee that our elections belong to the public, and are transparent and observable. But for today, let's break out the champagne, relax, and celebrate this great victory. What was once only a slogan representing what we fought for has now become a reality - Paper Ballots for New York!

Congratulations friends. Together we have changed the course of New York State election history, and 12 million registered voters in the Empire State will vote on paper ballots, not DREs.

Breakdown at the Board

2008-01-24T04:06:00.000-05:00

Protecting vendors, not voters

As I sit here, I’m embarrassed. I’m 56 years old, I have been a New Yorker for 56 years, and I’m embarrassed on behalf of the State of New York. I write these words tonight and they come from my heart, but I am not the first to say them. Today they come from me because I witnessed an appalling display of how willing are some in the State Board of Elections to represent the interests of DRE vendors, even when this directly conflicts with the interests of voters and the requirements of state law.

Today the SBOE should have approved at least three of six submitted systems to proceed to the next step in the Court ordered HAVA plan. There were also three that should have been flatly rejected based on New York State Election law, and the now expired January 1o deadline for submitting completed systems. This would have been the right thing to do for New York’s voters and county election commissioners who need to make machine decisions by February 8. Approval of machines was the single most important decision the Board had to make at the January 23 meeting.

Instead, in full view of the public and press, one half of the 4 person Democratic and Republican controlled State Board of Elections delayed and impeded, allowing no discussion to take place for seven hours until after 5:30pm press deadlines had passed. At one point, acting like spoiled children, they simply refused to come into the conference room to join Commissioner Doug Kellner (D) so that a quorum could be formed, stonewalling any debate on this critical question. Commissioners Neal Kelleher (R) and Helena Moses Donahue (R) showed no respect for over 100 county commissioners and members of the public by making us wait for over 7 hours before they would even allow discussion to take place.

And why did this happen? Because Commissioners Neal Kelleher (R) and Helena Moses Donahue (R) were desperately searching for a way to keep the LibertyVote DRE from being rejected. And rejected it certainly should be. In Orwellian fashion the LibertyVote DRE had been submitted as “ballot marking device”, even though the Dutch DRE (banned in its home country of Holland) doesn’t produce a legal ballot or a usable way for voters with disabilities to independently verify what’s printed on the grocery receipt style piece of paper it produces.

As a member of New York’s Citizen Advisory Committee, I evaluated the submitted systems on January 18 and made a recommendation to the State Board. Section 7-202(1)(e) of New York State law says that systems approved by the state board must: “provide the voter an opportunity to privately and independently verify votes selected and the ability to privately and independently change such votes or correct any error before the ballot is cast and counted.” Based on this section of the law, it is clear to me that of the six systems we scrutinized, only three provided this capability; three others clearly did not. The LibertyVote DRE clearly did not, as I noted in a separate report submitted with my recommendations.

I wasn’t the only one that felt that way. Commissioner Doug Kellner (D) stated to the assembled public and press that three of the systems, the new Sequoia scanner/ballot marker and two Automarks, met the requirements of state law, and that the three others, two DREs from Avante and the LibertyVote, plainly did not. Describing the serious problems with LibertyVote’s verification design, he repeatedly stated “Based on Section 7-202(1)(e) of New York’s laws I cannot vote to approve the LibertyVote DRE.”

But whether the LibertyVote DRE is even minimally usable by voters with disabilities, produces anything remotely resembling a ballot, or is the same failed DRE technology being rapidly abandoned by other states seemed not to matter to Commissioners Neal Kelleher (R) and Helena Moses Donahue (R). What did seem to matter was finding some way, any way, to try to force Commissioner Kellner (D) to approve the LibertyVote DRE so that the politically connected company could stay in the game of profiting large from New York’s HAVA funds.

To his credit, Commissioner Kellner (D) did not give, and for today at least, profit did not succeed over principle. It’s good to see that some at the Board of Elections still believe that serving the needs of voters is the prime directive. For his fellow commissioners, I am embarrassed and ashamed that they squandered so much time, energy, and good will in order to help ensure that a politically connected company can cash in at the expense of New York’s voters. I found their behavior throughout the day outrageous and appalling, but there was more to come. At the end of this long, long day I witnessed a subtle, but even more upsetting scene. As people were filing out and the room emptied I happened to see Bobby Witko, the president of LibertyVote, gently pat one of the commissioners on the shoulder and quietly say “Good job”. A good job indeed. But not, unfortunately, for the voters of New York State.

Breakthrough at the Board?

2008-01-20T17:26:00.000-05:00

NY Could Vote on Paper Ballots

Pressure from Judge Gary Sharpe’s order for the State to put Ballot Marking Devices in place for the 2008 Election may at last force the New York State Board of Elections to authorize a single state wide paper ballot marker and scanner system. Unquestionably, there are many benefits to using only one voting system throughout the state, and it’s obvious that touch screen voting machines, or DREs, are the worst possible choice for New York in light of huge costs and the number of states rapidly abandoning failed DRE technology. But so far the State Board has refused to do what’s right for New York’s voters and have kept DRE vendor hopes alive, even going so far as to recklessly allow vendors to submit DREs to use as Ballot Marking Devices – a purpose they are not designed for, can’t fulfill (see why here, here, and here) and which was protested by NYVV and a coalition of advocacy organizations.

But sources at the State Board of Elections tell me that the small number of submitted systems, and the Board’s inability to agree on what actually constitutes a Ballot Marking Device, could result in only one system being authorized at the Board’s crucial meeting on Wednesday, 1/23/08 – a combination ballot marker and scanner which would virtually guarantee that New Yorkers will vote on paper ballots when lever machines are retired in 2009.

This outcome could potentially please everyone – citizen groups who have long called for a single statewide voting system; county legislatures, editorial boards and citizens across New York State who’ve advocated for voting on paper ballots; even county election commissioners would be glad to have the machine decision be made where it belongs – with the State Board of Elections. One caveat however, the decision to authorize one system for the entire state is being made not because it has been judged the most accessible, user friendly, or accurate, but because a partisan split at the Board leaves only one option left on the table.

Partisan Division on Ballot Markers

The State Board’s Democrats and Republicans disagree about what a Ballot Marking Device must do – specifically, whether New York’s unique full face ballot layout is required only on the paper ballot, or if only the screen display must present the full face layout. This would seem to be a minor point but it in fact determines whether or not DREs will be allowed in New York (two of the six submitted systems are from Avante, but both of these machines should be rejected at Wednesdays meeting because they provide no way for voters with visual disabilities to verify their ballot).

The Liberty/Nedap DRE submission, now banned in its home country Holland, does not create a verifiable paper full face ballot – displaying the full layout only on its touch screen. The AutoMark ballot marker, submitted by both ES&S and Premier, the company formerly known as Diebold, creates a marked full face paper ballot, but doesn’t display one onscreen, using a paging ballot display instead. The State Board Republicans will allow the Liberty DRE to be authorized, but not the AutoMarks. The Democrats will allow the AutoMarks to be authorized, but not the Liberty DRE.

The two parties’ conflicting interpretations can’t be reconciled but could lead them to agree on authorizing the only system left standing – a combination ballot scanner/ ballot marking device submitted by Sequoia. With the Sword of Damocles imposed by Judge Sharpe hanging over their heads the Commissioners must find a way to authorize at least one system this week – partisan divide or not.

Do the Right Thing

New Yorkers have clearly stated that they want accessible voting on paper ballots, and there are many benefits of going with a single voting system for the entire state. The Court has said that New York must move forward now. If the Board of Elections can bring themselves to agree at the January 23 meeting to what everyone else already knows, then New York’s 12 million registered voters have won, and in 2009 we will vote on paper ballots, not DREs.

New York and New Hampshire

2008-01-12T13:14:00.001-05:00

NH has what NY needs

I fully support calls for a recount in New Hampshire. That's why we want paper ballots, so we can audit. As far as I'm concerned, audits are ALWAYS warranted, regardless of the reason. Indeed, this is one of the reasons why NYVV has worked so hard for paper ballots in New York State - so we can audit and recount.

That being said, I personally believe the claims being made by some that fraud was perpetrated in New Hampshire based on polls are premature. The majority of people who look closely at elections know that there’s many reasons why poll results might vary from actual results. The differences in the New Hampshire polls and the results could easily be accounted for by undecideds, people who don't want to talk to pollsters, or simply the inherent inaccuracy of polls. As I learn more about auditing and talk with statisticians I've come to see that polls are not sufficient to use as a benchmark for fraud.

While the majority of advocates in the Election Integrity movement don’t see anything astonishing about the New Hampshire results, others are saying that the primary proves that paper ballots and scanners should not be chosen to replace lever machines in New York State. But there is no evidence to draw that conclusion. What New Hampshire has that New York needs is auditable paper ballots. New Hampshire will be able to recount and audit their election. That’s a very good thing and I hope they do it soon.

Let me repeat this, because it's important: I fully support calls for a recount in New Hampshire, because audits are ALWAYS warranted. Indeed, this is what we've worked for all these years.

The DOJ and New York State – Part 2

2007-12-02T17:23:00.000-05:00

DOJ Calls for Chaos at NYS Polls in 2008
As noted in Part One, the US Department of Justice has filed a motion asking the US District Court to appoint a Special Master to oversee replacing all of New York States lever machines by the November 2008 election. In Part One I discussed how if the Court were to decide in favor of the DOJ and rule that New York State must replace all lever voting machines prior to the November 2008 Presidential election, that paper ballots and precinct based ballot scanners would be the only feasible way to do it. In this essay I’ll discuss why the DOJ’s request is not a good idea and could result in New York State being the next Florida.

A little history
Let’s remember how we got here – in response to the electoral chaos in Florida in 2000, Congress passed the Help America to Vote Act, or HAVA. HAVA has some laudable goals, among them full poll site accessibility for voters with disabilities. But for all its good intentions, HAVA has worked out to be a huge tax payer funded piggy bank for the three primary voting machine vendors – Sequoia, ES&S, and the company formerly known as Diebold.
The media’s extreme focus in 2000 on Florida’s punch card voting machines and chads pregnant and hanging resulted in Congress, forever reacting to the wrong problem, effectively banning punch card and lever voting machines. Never mind that the punch card machines themselves were not the problem – it was the layout of the notorious Palm Beach ‘butterfly ballot’, and improper maintenance of the equipment that caused difficulties. Never mind that improper purges of Florida’s voter registration rolls probably accounted for more lost votes than any voting machine. A careful Congressional analysis would have resulted in a far different law than the HAVA we got. The one we got simply threw billions of dollars to the states who quickly spent the funds on whatever faulty equipment the voting machine vendors were hawking. As we see now, many states who purchased expensive touch screen voting machines (DREs) have lived to regret that choice. Indeed, even Florida has now decided to abandon its multimillion dollar investment in DREs and return to a superior system – paper ballots, ballot markers and scanners.
So now, in order to fulfill HAVA’s goal of preventing chaos at the polls, the DOJ wants New York to take a step that could result in, you guessed it, chaos at the polls.

An IT analogy
A complete replacement of New York’s over 19,000 lever machines with a new technology has much in common with a large IT (Information Technology) rollout of a new computer system in a large corporation. If we look at the way businesses introduce new technology, we see that the DOJ’s plan for New York State invites disaster. Any significant introduction of new technology requires several distinct phases - Planning, Analysis, Design, Construction, Testing, Rollout. In particular, correct execution of the two last steps, Testing and Rollout, makes the difference between success and failure.
The new system must be tested and tested and tested. A small initial test by a limited set of users called the Alpha test will reveal problems both in the system itself and usability issues for users. When these problems are fixed a larger test phase begins, the Beta Test. Hundreds of users will take part in Beta Test which is designed to see how the system performs under conditions similar to the real world environment it will be operating in. The Beta test will also turn up many issues and problems which have to be addressed. Finally, prior to introducing the new system to the entire company a phased rollout, or pilot project, will be introduced. This protects from the dangers of a breakdown of the system by introducing the new system first to a small subset of users, and gradually expanding the rollout until the entire business has switched over.
The DOJ, by demanding that New York State completely replace all lever machines by the 2008 election, is in terms of IT project management, effectively telling the state to do the exact opposite of what best practices teaches us is necessary. Even worse, the DOJ plan essentially calls for no testing or rollout phases – in essence, the very first use of a the voting system would be the Presidential Election of 2008 – an Alpha test with New York’s poll workers and voters as guinea pigs. As any seasoned IT project manager will tell you, this is a recipe for disaster. To rush eyes wide open into a predictable disaster in the important 2008 election with New York’s 31 electoral votes at stake is madness.

Accessibility in 2008, Scanners in 2009
There’s an easy answer to this, and one that fulfills the goals of HAVA without causing the electoral chaos it promised to avoid. First, there are two assumptions we must make – 1), that all polling places in New York State must be accessible to voters with disabilities in November 2008, and 2), that DREs, a technology that has failed and is being abandoned in other states, are not an option.
Here’s the plan. New York must place one ballot marking device (demonstrated to be compatible with precinct based ballot scanners) in each polling place in 2008. Then, by the September 2009 primary, the lever machines are removed, and each polling place must have paper ballots for voters to mark and a ballot scanner to count them. This plan eliminates consideration of failed DRE technology, gives New York State sufficient time to conduct certification testing to ensure the State’s high standards are met, provides voters with disabilities the access they deserve, gives poll workers and voters time to adjust to the new voting system, and eliminates the dangers of conducting a high turnout, high stakes election with untested equipment being used for the first time.

The DOJ and New York State – Part 1

2007-11-10T11:38:00.000-05:00

Paper Ballots could solve the problem

The Department of Justice has filed a motion asking the US District Court to appoint a Special Master to oversee replacing New York States lever machines by the November 2008 election. The DOJ maintains the state must forgo the rigorous certification process and source code escrow requirements called for by state law and use whatever voting machines are currently available, potentially even failed electronic touch screen machines, or DREs. I’ve got a lot of problems with the DOJ’s position, particularly because it ignores the fact that so many of the so called ‘HAVA compliant’ voting machines rushed into operation are proving to be expensive, failure prone and not accessible to voters with disabilities, yet they seem willing to force New York voters use them anyway. I’ll write more about that in coming articles, but today I’ll talk about a way that New York State could get an accessible and auditable voting system up and running in relatively short order.

A great many of the disputed issues at the State Board of Elections vanish completely if DREs are eliminated from the mix. But yet, both Democrats and Republicans on the Board keep insisting that they have no choice but to allow the DRE disasters that are wreaking havoc in other states to be used in New York! This is especially egregious because by eliminating DREs and focusing on paper ballots and ballot scanners New York State could have been well along the way to full HAVA compliance, and if necessary, we could do it still.

The State Board of Elections needs to get past their devotion to allowing DREs. This is an easy choice to justify given that DRE technology is being rapidly abandoned by other states – why does the State Board even want to go there given what we know now about the problems with touch screen voting? If the State Board made a commitment to paper ballots, ballot scanners and accessible marking devices, New York State could present a plan to the Court that would satisfy state regulations and make disability organizations, voting integrity advocates and the DOJ happy.

Here’s a plan that New York State could get done by next year. But in order to do so it requires focusing on paper ballots, scanners and ballot markers, and the State Board certifying one single system for use.

1) Eliminate DREs and focus solely on ballot marking devices and precinct ballot scanners. Not only does this simplify certification testing, it eliminates most source code escrow issues as all scanner software can be escrowed.

2) Test the available scanners under New York’s current regulatory standards. The limited number of machines to be tested, and the relative simplicity of the devices make this doable in a far shorter time than if the Board insists on testing DREs as well as scanners.

3) Certify one and only one ballot scanner and one ballot marker which best meet test requirements and the needs of all voters (needless to say, the ballot scanner and marker must be mutually compatible). Note I say only ONE system should be certified. A single statewide system will facilitate rapid training and deployment of the new system as well as significantly decrease related operational costs across the state. There is nothing preventing the State Board from certifying only a single machine, and this is the only way to get everything completed in the available time.

4) Deploy at least one ballot marking device and one ballot scanner to each polling place by June 2008. Training on the new devices, performed by the State Board of Elections, begins immediately upon arrival of equipment in each county.

5) In the September 2008 primary and the November 2008 general election, all ballot markers and scanners must be available in each polling place for use by anyone who wants to use them. Use of the scanners is optional in the September primary, and lever machines can continue to be deployed. By the November election, the lever machines are retired and all voting is done on paper marked by hand or ballot marking devices.

Many in the state believe it’s impossible to get a new voting system implemented in a year’s time. It is only if you insist that DREs are an option, and that counties must have six or seven different systems to choose from, adding great complexity and time to the process. The State Board needs to wake up and smell the coffee before it’s too late. The answer to New York State’s HAVA problems can only be found in paper ballots.

Voting Machine Vendors: We Won’t Comply With NY Law

2007-06-28T15:29:00.000-04:00

My response: Comply with the law, or take your business elsewhere

On June 20, 2007 Rick Gleim, vice president of Avante International Technology sent an email to all New York State election commissioners and officials concerning New York State’s source code review laws. Mr. Gleim argues for relaxation of New York State's escrow and source code review requirements. There are two points made by Mr. Gleim that are necessary to rebut. I will address the first here, and the other, regarding the low level code used in chipsets and microprocessors, in a subsequent post.

In his message Mr. Gleim writes: “It is not possible to design new equipment with new operating systems, new EMS and new hardware all with vendor developed software and source code in less than a couple of years. And that is, if the vendors wanted to do this.”

Mr. Gleim fails to note that voting system vendors have already had 2 years to produce equipment which complies with New York State election law. Section 7-208 of Election law has been in force since June 2005 and states in part, “…shall place into escrow with the state board of elections a complete copy of all programming, source coding and software employed by the voting machine…” It should not be news to anyone in the software industry that Microsoft would never allow their source code to be escrowed -- they have rigorously defended this for many years. Given that New York State election law is clear and unambiguous, why did vendors not begin in July 2005 to develop systems that would comply with New York States requirements? In the two-year period between passage of the law and Mr. Gleim's message, it would have been fully possible to develop systems using open source code systems like Linux. Mr. Gleim acknowledges as much in his statement above. But they chose not to. Why?

I spent 20 years as a software developer, with the latter half of my career spent as a project manager leading world class software development teams. If my boss had come to me in July of 2005 and said, “There is a potential $300 million contract at stake in New York State, and we have to develop products that comply with their laws so we can compete in that market. Your job is to get it done in a year.” I could have done it. Give me a team of five experienced programmers and we could have easily developed such a compliant system. Voting machine technology is after all, not rocket science. It's a basic application of database technology - and open source code tools and operating systems are readily available which could have been easily been used had the vendors chosen to do so.

But, rather than develop a system that complied with New York State law, voting machine vendors chose to use Microsoft Windows as the operating system for their PC based Election Management Systems, and in some cases for their touch screen DREs. As noted above, Microsoft has always made it crystal clear that they would never, ever surrender their source code - they never have and they never will. Microsoft has rigorously defended this for years. However, voting machine vendors, knowing full well that using the Windows operating system could not possibly comply with New York State law chose to market their existing Windows-based products anyway.

It is incumbent upon the voting machine vendors to produce products that comply with New York State requirements. Rather than do that however, they chose to ignore our requirements, and worked instead on attempts to weaken the letter and the intent of our law. Today, rather than focusing their efforts on developing systems that comply with New York’s laws, they focus on lobbying attempts to weaken our extraordinarily strong source code provision, one of which all New Yorkers can be proud.

This decision to attempt to weaken our law rather than comply with it is extraordinary, and flies in the face of the basic tenets of Capitalism. Businesses exist to serve their customers, and they do so by meeting their customer’s needs. In theory, the business that best meets customer needs will prevail in the marketplace. I can't think of another business which faced with a potential $300,000,000 contract would not do everything in their power to make a product compliant with New York State’s requirements. Typically the first step in developing software products is to define the customer’s requirements, and then design the product to meet the customer’s needs. But in this case voting machine vendors would prefer to place the cart before the horse. They want New York State citizens to change our requirements to meet their needs!

I note that Mr. Gleim says as much when he comments “And that is, if the vendors wanted to do this.” Excuse me? If a vendor wants to compete for New York State's multi-million dollar voting machine contract, then they damn well better “want to do this.” If you prefer not to comply with New York's requirements, that is certainly your right, but then you'll have to take your business elsewhere.

Our laws are supposed to represent the will of the people. In June 2005 the people of New York State expressed their will regarding voting machines and the escrow and review of source code. In June 2007 the State Legislature reaffirmed their commitment to this law. It is clear and unambiguous. It says that all source code must be escrowed and may be subject to review by appointed independent reviewers. The vendors have known this for two years. To be claiming now that there isn’t sufficient time to produce products which comply with our law seeks to hide the fact that for 24 months they have chosen to not only ignore, but to actively undermine the will of the people of the great State of New York.

Citizens 1, Microsoft 0

2007-06-22T12:07:00.000-04:00

New Yorkers win Round One in fight for source code protections

I’m pleased to report that due to a huge outpouring of calls from citizens, and three intense days and nights working the Capitol halls by New Yorkers for Verified Voting and the League of Women Voters/NY, New York States’ voting machine laws were not weakened or tampered with in any way. Neither the Microsoft amendment nor any other proposals being pushed by voting machine vendor lobbyists made it into any of the thousands of bills passed in this last crazy week of the session. The citizens of New York State stood up to these powerful private interests and won.

A rapid response of citizens to this threat to our essential protections resulted in over 3000 calls to legislators in just over two days. This huge outpouring from the public averted the threat of a stealth amendment slipping into law unnoticed, as so often happens in this last hectic week in Albany. Every legislator I talked to over the last three days was impressed by the volume of calls and the passionate reaction, promising they would watch the bills carefully for back door changes, and adding their eyes to ours. They reaffirmed their commitment to keeping New York’s voting machine laws among the strongest in the nation, and in the end, they came through. The public’s response to this threat has kept our representatives vigilant and committed to keeping New York State’s voting machine laws among the strongest in the nation.

Keeping our strict laws intact was an essential win for us, but this is only Round One. The next battleground will be the New York State Board of Elections, where the four commissioners are discussing how to interpret the New York State law. And yes, you guessed it, one of the interpretations being promoted by some of these decision makers would allow the voting machine vendors to use Microsoft and other source code in voting technology that would not be subject to review in the event of election problems. Our next task will be to make sure the State Board of Elections understands what we’ve told the State Legislature, that the public’s will is expressed precisely in the letter of our election law – ALL source code must be handed over, not just some pieces of it. Our elections, and the technologies we use to conduct them, belong to us. And we the people aim to keep it that way.

But today, let’s celebrate. Congratulations friends, we did it!

Microsoft Muscles the NYS Legislature

2007-06-16T09:58:00.001-04:00

Software giant moves to weaken NY Election law

The 800 pound gorilla of software development has moved forcefully into New York State, supported by voting machine vendors using Microsoft Windows in their touch screen voting machines and other systems. Over the last two months Microsoft and a cadre of high paid lobbyists have been working a full-court press in Albany in an attempt to bring about a serious weakening of New York State election law. This back door effort by private corporations to weaken public protections is about to bear fruit.

On Thursday, June 14, I recieved a copy of proposed changes to New York State Election Law drafted by Microsoft attorneys that has been circulating among the Legislature. These changes would gut the source code escrow and review provisions provided in our current law, which were fought for and won by election integrity activists around the state and adopted by the Legislature in June 2005. In an earlier blog I wrote about Microsoft's unwillingness to comply with New York State's escrow and review requirements. Now the software giant has gone a step further, not just saying “we won't comply with your law” but actively trying to change state law to serve their corporate interests. Microsoft's attorneys drafted an amendment which would add a paragraph to Section 1-104 of NYS Election Law defining “election-dedicated voting system technology”. Microsoft’s proposed change to state law would effectively render our current requirements for escrow and the ability for independent review of source code in the event of disputes completely meaningless - and with it the protections the public fought so hard for.

Adding insult to injury, these changes are being slipped into a bill that may be voted on Monday or Tuesday, June 18 or 19. That bill's stated purpose is to make “technical changes” to the recent law moving the date of New York's presidential primary to February. Because this bill involving the new primary date must be passed next week before the Legislative session ends (New York has jumped on the bandwagon to be part of the super presidential primary in February 2008) this grave weakening of the public’s right to review software would come along part and parcel with the primary date change. The players promoting this behind the scenes are relying on the fact that this reprehensible eradication of citizen protections won't be noticed until it's too late. If Microsoft and the vendor lobbyists had their way, the public would have known nothing about this until after the law passed. Well that much at least, didn't work. We’ve found out about this secretive move, albeit only four days before the bill containing this poisonous provision is to be voted on. The question now is will the Legislature approve this appalling weakening of our law?

Up to now, New York State has been rightfully proud to have adopted some of the strictest regulations regarding the new electronic voting systems in the entire nation. The Legislature has been patting themselves on the back for two years now for passing such an excellent set of laws. For the most part, they had a right to be proud. But now these powerful private companies are working the Legislature behind the scenes trying to quietly change New York Election Law to remove the public’s protections and to serve their private interests.

The big question is, will the New York State Legislature give in to these powerful corporate interests or will they stand up for transparency, security, and the public's right to know?

Take Action Now - It’s urgent that you call your State Senator and Assembly representatives on Monday, June 18, at their Albany offices, and tell them they must not weaken New York State’s escrow and review requirements. Remind them that the Legislature passed a strong law 2 years ago - they must not give in to pressure by voting machine vendors to undermine those protections.

Find your Assembly member’s contact information here:
http://www.assembly.state.ny.us/mem/
(Not sure who your Assembly member is? Click here to search by Zip Code)

Find your State Senator’s contact information here:
http://www.senate.state.ny.us/senatehomepage.nsf/senators?OpenForm
(Not sure who your State Senator is? Click here to search by Zip Code)

Vendors Try an End Run Around NYS Election Law

2007-04-25T20:49:00.001-04:00

Uncertified DREs to be used in Troy School Election on May 15

In a brazen attempt to get their uncertified DREs used in New York State, Liberty Election Systems and their Dutch partner Nedap made the City School District of Troy New York an offer they couldn’t refuse – use of 10 of their DREs in the upcoming May 15, 2007 School District Election at no cost to the district. Unfortunately, the LibertyVote/Nedap DRE has not completed New York State testing or met any of the State’s regulatory standards, and is not certified for use in the State by the New York State Board of Elections.

The voting machine vendors have been frustrated by their inability to meet New York’s high certification standards and source code escrow requirements. They’ve found a way to get around the testing halt instituted in January by NYS Board of Elections when the New York Times revealed that Ciber, the agency conducting New York’s tests, had lost federal accreditation six months earlier. Liberty Election Systems is preying upon cash strapped school districts, offering them free use of machines and support personnel to run their elections. Of course, Liberty doesn’t mention that their DREs haven’t passed state certification, have documented security vulnerabilities, and will be supported by Dutch technical staff working for Nedap.

Dutch Technicians to Oversee DREs in US Election

Liberty Election Systems is a privately held New York State corporation that markets the Dutch DREs here in the US. Liberty doesn’t do tech stuff; they handle the sales and marketing end. The Dutch company “Nederlandsche Apparatenfabriek”, known as Nedap, provides the technical expertise; designing, writing and supporting all software and hardware. So far in New York State Nedap engineers have provided all technical oversight and support of the LibertyVote/Nedap DRE during tests, demonstrations, New York State Board of Elections meetings, you name it. But the election on May 15th isn’t a demo, it’s a real election with an $88.3 million dollar budget at stake. The technical advisors running the LibertyVote/Nedap DREs on Troy’s Election Day will be foreign citizens. Do we really want foreign nationals running voting machines in American elections?

In an article in the Albany Times Union, Liberty/Nedap dodges, implying this election will be as American as apple pie. It’s more like baloney - pure spin. Liberty should immediately provide the public a complete list of the names, companies, nationalities, and responsibilities of all personnel who will be in attendance and providing any form of support for the LibertyVote/Nedap DREs on the May 15th election.

False Claims in a Public Election Notice

Liberty has posted a troubling brochure on the Troy City School District website. The brochure contains numerous misleading statements and false claims (the biggest Big Lie – “The LibertyVote is not a computer...”) which we refute in this document. It’s outrageous that a private company can be given a role in a public election and then lie through their teeth on materials they distribute to the public. And for a taste of things to come as we increasingly put private vendors in charge of our elections, note the intermingling of private company promotion with official School District election information – a disturbing combination of public elections and corporate advertisement.

It Can Happen Here

In New York State, where citizens have fought with some success for a voice in the machine selection process, strict voting system standards, and independent oversight of voting machine vendors, it’s tempting to think that we have the hard work behind us. Not so. This back door effort to get around our hard won protections shows the voting machine vendors have no interest but their private interests, no interest in Election Law except in how it can be bypassed, and worst of all, absolutely no interest in the truth.

Citizens around the state are joining together right now to fight this in every way we can. I’ll be posting more to this blog in the next few days, and NYVV will be posting actions you can take to help prevent this end run around state regulations.

For starters, you can visit NYVV’s Troy School District Election Resource page, where we’ve posted much to help you understand what’s at stake. You can also join NYVV’s mailing list so you’ll receive updates and alerts as we face this new crisis in New York State’s struggle for secure and verifiable elections.

Microsoft Says – We Won’t Escrow

2007-04-16T14:53:00.000-04:00

Software giant tells New York - “Forget about it”

On Friday, April 13, 2007, the New York State Board of Elections notified vendors hoping to certify voting systems in the state that Microsoft would not comply with the source code escrow requirements of state election law. Microsoft Windows operating systems and applications are used by several DREs, Ballot Marking Devices, and all Election Management Systems (EMS) currently submitted for New York State certification. With Microsoft unwilling to place source code in escrow, voting systems which use Microsoft products are not eligible for certification and use in the state.

New York State Election Law, Section 7-208 states that the voting system vendors "shall place into escrow with the state board of elections a complete copy of all programming, source coding and software employed by the voting machine, system or equipment." Voting system vendors are also required to file a waiver with state and local Boards of Elections "which shall waive all rights of the vendor or manufacturer to assert intellectual property or trade secret rights in any court of competent jurisdiction hearing a challenge to the results of any election.", and must also file "a consent to having and cooperating in the testing of any programming, source coding, firmware, or software, pursuant to an order of any board of elections or court of competent jurisdiction."

The State Board had been holding discussions with Microsoft in order to determine how compliance with State Election Law would be met. The Board also submitted a list of questions to Microsoft about the escrow issue. In these discussions and answers, the software giant indicated that it does not and will not put its source code in escrow accounts, and it does not and will not escrow source code through any third parties or the National Institute of Standards and Technology. In other words, the Redmond behemoth is telling New York State, and any other states that have a high legal bar for escrow and review of software source code, “Forget about it.” Microsoft, which has only recently begun to weigh in on voting system software proprietary claims, is taking the same stance that voting machine vendors have always taken – the public cannot have access to the software we vote on.

In its notice, the State Board of Elections told voting system vendors “Be advised that you should prepare to take whatever actions you deem necessary to comply with the requirements of Election Law Section 7-208 in order to obtain certification.” If the State Board enforces the law, that means Microsoft software must be removed from voting systems, or the system can’t be certified for use in New York State. Of the systems submitted so far to the state, the Avante and Sequoia Advantage DREs and the Automark ballot marking device use MS Windows operating systems. The same goes for submitted EMS systems from all vendors – Sequoia, Avante, ES&S, Diebold, and Liberty – which use not only Windows but MS Access, SQL Server, and Office products such as Word and Excel.

But an operating system, or a database system as used by the EMS products, is not something you just casually change – it means a complete and total rewrite of all software. We’re not talking about going back to Square One; this is going back to Square Zero. It simply can’t be done within a few months, and none of the systems using these products is likely to be used in New York State as long as the State Board of Elections and the Legislature remain firm on protecting New York voters.

But will they? One of the questions the State Board of Elections asked Microsoft was: “If there are significant problems with the law as written and those problems would preclude us from agreeing to an escrow arrangement, are there any changes to the law that Microsoft would suggest?” Ah yes, let’s be sure to let the private corporations of the world have their say in how our election laws can be changed to better serve their interests. Stay tuned.

The Voting Integrity Movement and HR811

2007-02-19T16:56:00.000-05:00

Internal debate for a young social movement

HR 811, the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2007, has created quite a bit of controversy within the national voting integrity movement. While there are several controversial areas in the bill, one of the key disagreements revolves around whether or not touch screen DREs should be banned. There are those in the movement who strongly maintain that the current version of HR811, which does not ban DREs, is the best legislation that we’re going to get right now, and it would benefit states that currently have paperless DREs. And those on the other side argue equally firmly that adding VVPATs to DREs in a quest for reliable verification of the vote is a fool’s errand, and not likely to accomplish much more than another round of taxpayer money being thrown at badly designed, untested DREs.

Passions are certainly running high right now, but while the nascent voting integrity movement hasn’t seen this kind of internal debate before, there is nothing new under the sun. What we have here is an age old debate among reformers - do we work for everything we want and accept no less, or do we compromise with the powers that be, letting them define what is 'possible', in order to get at least a part of what we want? In any successful historical social movement, you find that both approaches are necessary. There is a group of advocates working from within the system, and a group of activists pushing the envelope from without. Ultimately, both elements are necessary for a successful movement.

Right now, as voting integrity advocates debate the Holt bill, there’s a lot of harsh rhetoric and insults being tossed about on mail lists and blogs from both sides in the HR811 debate. Ironically, many of these same folks are simultaneously concerned about the growing ‘split’ in the voting integrity movement. Well, I’ve got news for you – if your goal is keeping the movement together, insulting each other is not helpful - so cut it out.

I happen to agree with those who feel that HR811 has unacceptable shortcomings. I’ll go into those reasons in a subsequent post. But to my friends and colleagues on the other side of the debate, let me say this - I respect your opinion, I believe you are as smart as I am and have analyzed the bill and reached a conclusion about how to respond based on your best assessment of the available facts. The fact that we have reached different conclusions doesn't bother me, because HR811 is only one event on the way to our common goal – secure, accurate, and auditable elections.

We humans seem to have a natural inclination to believe that only we possess the ultimate truth, and those that disagree with us are fools, or worse. But if anything threatens this young voting integrity movement right now, it is this all too human attitude, not the fact that we disagree over a piece of legislation. It’s important as we discuss this and other controversial issues in the future to keep in mind that it is possible, even necessary, for us to have disagreements about particulars while pursuing parallel paths towards the same ultimate goal.

Secrets of Voting Machine Testing Exposed!

2007-01-31T15:32:00.000-05:00

NY forces the dark world of voting machine testing into the open

The outrage at the New York State Board of Elections was palpable after the news broke that CIBER, the company conducting New York State’s voting machine testing, had failed to receive accreditation from the EAC, and neither CIBER or the EAC had bothered to inform anyone about this failure. But faced with a threatened subpoena by New York, and growing public and Congressional criticism, CIBER released the EAC reports documenting the serious problems found with CIBER’s testing practices. The EAC quickly followed suit and posted the report to their website.

The report exposes in damning detail what voting integrity activists have been saying for years – testing labs have operated in a closed loop system with the voting machine vendors and have used the lack of independent oversight to give us the disaster that is our nation's voting machine testing process.

The report’s findings are damning and will surely cause other states which have purchased and used machines “certified” by CIBER to question the security and reliability of their voting systems. Anyone who knows even a bit about what it takes to test hardware and software to minimally acceptable standards will be shocked by the revelations in the report. Here are some quotes from the EAC Assessment Report:

“CIBER has not shown the resources to provide a reliable product. The current quality management plan requires more time to spend on managing the process than they appear to have available and it was clear during the assessment visit that they had not accepted that they have a responsibility to provide quality reviewed reports that show what was done in testing.”
“CIBER’s reports provide limited or no descriptions of the testing performed so a reader or reviewer can not tell if all the testing was completed. Cross checking between CIBER and Wyle reports has revealed at times that neither [voting machine test lab] has performed certain tests, expecting that the test was done by the other.”
“In addition, during the review, [CIBER] indicated that the testing for a product tends to either use vendor developed tests or new tests developed specifically for the product—they have no standard test methods defined. This makes their testing dependent on vendor input and vulnerable to unique vendor interpretations rather than a core validated set of internal references for training and testing.”

This last statement validates what the voting integrity community has said for years. The testing labs and voting machine vendors are operating a closed loop system whose purpose is to give an appearance of thoroughness when exactly the opposite is true. In reality, no attempt is made to achieve the level of comprehensive testing that would even begin to give voters an assurance of confidence in the machines we use to exercise our most precious right – our right to vote.

New York State’s requirement for an independent security review of CIBER’s work, fought for and won by New York activists, has exposed the dark underbelly of the Testing Lab/Machine Vendor cabal. New York is in a unique position having set a high bar for certification and by making CIBER answerable to the State, not the voting machine vendors. The New York State Board of Elections must seize this moment to make a strong statement to the vendors, the testing labs, and the EAC. New York State voters will not accept half measures and bogus tests. The New York State Board of Elections must cancel the contract with CIBER now.

New York, Ciber and the EAC

2007-01-25T11:07:00.000-05:00

Ending the Veil of Secrecy

At the New York State Board of Elections meeting on January 23, 2007 Commissioners Kellner and Aquila came out strongly for issuing a subpoena to the EAC and Ciber to force them to give up any information and paper work they have related to Ciber's failure to be accredited. This has resulted from Ciber and the EAC's refusal thus far to offer any information to the State of New York about the problems reported by the New York Times. As I've reported earlier, the State Board had told Ciber earlier this month to officially halt New York's certification testing until the situation is clarified. Unfortunately, Commissioner Helena Donohue would not support issuing a subpoena this week, asking instead that the Board give Ciber until the next Commissioner's meeting in two weeks.

Ciber has further shown their indifference to full disclosure - they recently claimed proprietary confidentiality rights on a four page document they presented to the State Board concerning their interpretation of the COTS software testing requirements, another point where New York State is demanding strict compliance to regulations.

Voting integrity advocates have long called attention to the fact that the so-called "Independent Testing Authorities" are neither independent, conduct rigorous tests, or are in any sense of the word authorities. Rather, they have operated in a closed loop system with the voting machine vendors, and have used the lack of independent oversight to give us the sham that is our country's voting machine testing process. But here in New York State, Ciber is working not for the vendors, but for citizens. And Ciber has consistently shown that they are incapable of providing the level of competency we demand. New York State, by requiring compliance with the highest current standards and through the oversight of a truly independent security review team, has exposed the dirty little secret of the voting machine vendors and the testing labs - their shoddy work does not serve the interests of voters or the public good.

New York State Commissioner Douglas Kellner has issued an email to the public detailing much of what New York has found out. His outrage at the failures of Ciber and the EAC to provide essential information to New York is evident, and at yesterday's meeting he announced that New York must consider immediately terminating Ciber's contract. I concur with Commissioner Kellner when he concludes:

"New York should take a stand to end the veil of secrecy that shrouds the testing process."

The voting machine vendors and testing agencies have had the run of things too long. It's time for a change.

Commissioner Kellner's email to the public follows.

From: Doug Kellner
Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2007 12:46 AM
Subject: New York, Ciber and the EAC

On January 4, 2007, the New York State Board of Elections voted to suspend Ciber from further testing of voting systems submitted to the New York State board for certification pending a thorough review of Ciber’s accreditation status. We also addressed requests to both the Election Assistance Commission and to Ciber for all of the relevant documents and reports concerning Ciber’s application to the EAC for accreditation as a testing laboratory.

Much to our surprise (well, maybe I’m not really surprised), EAC has still not provided any of the background documentation that we have requested. While giving lip service acknowledgement of our request, Tom Wilkey, now Executive Director of the US EAC and former Executive Director of the New York State Board of Elections, has completely stonewalled us. The New York State board felt compelled to make a formal Freedom of Information Act request. Mr. Wilkey’s only response so far is that the EAC is reviewing the issue and is deciding how to respond.

This failure to provide relevant information to a state agency, the first in the country to require testing to the 2005 standards, is truly outrageous and scandalous. Not only does it further delay New York’s efforts to come into compliance with the Help America Vote Act, it seriously prejudices the five voting system vendors who have made such a substantial investment in trying to obtain certification to the rigorous standards set by New York. In addition to requiring compliance with VVSG 2005, New York law requires a voter verifiable paper audit trail, prohibits devices or functionality potentially capable of internet, radio or wireless data communication, requires escrow of all software including source codes and authorizes disclosure in court proceedings; our regulations require full disclosure of all political contributions by vendors and their executives and set several other standards that are more rigorous than the VVSG.

While there is general agreement at the New York State Board that we should be looking to the EAC to assist and guide us in our investigation, we also made a formal request to Ciber for the same information. After all, they do hold a $3 million contract from our agency. There has been nothing but similar stonewalling from Ciber. Ciber’s last communication regarding our information request was that they were trying to co-ordinate a response with the EAC.

What’s going on here? Both the EAC and the unaccredited testing lab are refusing to open the curtain that hides their soiled laundry. Co-ordination of the response suggests that we are only going to receive a laundered version of the facts.

I have also become increasingly annoyed with Ciber’s use of the label “confidential competition-sensitive” on reports that they have prepared for our agency at our expense. You may recall that in November I circulated for comments Ciber’s first draft of their report to explain New York’s interpretation of the exceptions to the exemption from testing of Commercial Off the Shelf (COTS)software that is used in the voting machine itself as opposed to election management software that does not generate code used in the actual voting process. (Yes, “exception to the exemption” is a double negative that means that the COTS source code must be tested in those cases.)

Ciber was apparently miffed that I dared to subject the advice that they furnished to New York to public scrutiny. They added the “confidential competition sensitive” label to the second draft. I objected and requested that they remove the label. Ciber said they’d think about it, but ignored my request. When I received the final document that had been approved by both Ciber and our independent security review consultants, New York State Technical Enterprise Corp. (NYSTEC), I insisted that I be allowed to make the document public. Ciber balked. When I renewed what had become demands, Ciber’s attorney—yes their attorney—revised the technical report that the “experts” at Ciber and NYSTEC had determined to be final and said that he would not object to release of that report. (I have distributed that report, known as COTS Testing Version 4 to many). I then asked for an explanation why Version 3, the “final” report was still labeled confidential. I also gave formal notice that I would ask the commissioners to release the report. Last night Ciber’s in-house attorney wrote me that he agreed that there was nothing in the “final” report that was properly labeled competition sensitive. The New York commissioners voted the make the Version 3 “final” COTS report public today. I will send copies of Version 3 to the technical blogs and anyone else who requests it. I am still distressed, however, at Ciber’s efforts to stiffle discussion of the issue by improperly claiming confidentiality.

At today’s meeting of the New York State elections commissioners, while everyone deplored the stonewalling by EALC and Ciber, I requested authority to issue a subpoena to Ciber for all of the documents that we have requested. Republican Commissioner Helena Donohue blocked the subpoena by arguing that we should give Ciber additional time to respond to our request voluntarily. She said that she would reconsider issuing a subpoena at our next meeting scheduled for February 7.

In view of the collaboration between the EAC and Ciber, I am determined that we should not accept partial disclosure. New York should take a stand to end the veil of secrecy that shrouds the testing process.

Douglas A. Kellner
Co-Chair
New York State Board of Elections

An Alternative Plan for New York State’s Voting Machines

2006-12-19T13:40:00.001-05:00

New Voting Machines, But No Earlier Than 2009

It is now all but official that New York State’s current plan to replace lever voting machines by September 2007 is not going to happen. Certification testing of new voting systems has been delayed due to the vendors’ inability to meet the New York’s rigorous standards, and their irresponsible practice of submitting continuous bug fixes and changes, requiring that testing be continually restarted. I’ve written in detail about the problems and issues encountered in New York’s testing process here.

On December 18, 2006, New York State Board of Elections announced at a meeting of County Commissioners of Elections that the State will undoubtedly miss the September 2007 deadline, without elaborating on what plan might replace the current one.

It is time for New York to discuss alternatives. But simply delaying it one more year until 2008 won’t do. I propose that New York State must delay any introduction of new voting machines until at least 2009.

Is Full Implementation by 2008 a Good Idea?

The natural assumption is that if the State does not change voting systems by 2007, then full implementation would simply be delayed one year to 2008. But New York State must consider the risks of the first time use of new voting systems in a Presidential election, where high voter turnout will stress the system to its limits and beyond.

In general, it is a good principle to avoid introducing a new voting system during major election years. The likelihood that insufficient training, machine breakdowns, lack of experience with new procedures and high voter turnout will lead to long lines, frustrated voters, questionable results and subsequent legal challenges is high, and should be avoided at all costs.

Even under the best of circumstances , the 2008 Presidential election would be a bad time to roll out a new system—but given their track record thus far, it is valid to question whether the State Board of Elections’ current approach can be relied on for adequate planning and preparedness for a 2008 rollout.

An Alternate Plan –Implementation by 2009

Given the dangers of rolling out new systems in a Presidential election year, a sensible alternative is to delay a complete switchover to new voting machines until at least September 2009 - a full two years from the current target date. This plan would call for a replacement of lever machines with precinct ballot scanners to be in place by 2009. An interim step for 2007 and 2008 would require that accessible ballot marking devices be in place in each polling place to provide fully accessible voting and to meet HAVA accessibility requirements. It is important that the State Board of Elections require that any ballot marking devices used accessibility in 2007 and 2008 be fully compatible with precinct ballot scanner systems. They must not allow counties to choose ballot marking devices that won’t work with scanners – as many counties did last year, wasting precious HAVA funds.

There are many benefits to waiting until 2009 to fully replace the State’s lever machines:

Sufficient time allowed for a thorough certification process and security review.
Allows necessary time for voting machine vendors to achieve compliance with New York State statutory requirements.
Allows needed time to fully develop plans and procedures for new systems at State and County levels.
Provides needed time for adequate training of staff, poll workers, and voters in use of new systems.
Interim implementation of ballot marking devices in each polling place by 2007 meets HAVA accessibility requirements.
Avoids using an entirely new voting system for the first time in a Presidential election year.

The Department of Justice Lawsuit

New York State Election Law will need to be modified to allow a later implementation, but given the circumstances, the State Legislature is likely to cooperate fully. However, the Department of Justice (DOJ) lawsuit resulted in a Remedial Order calling for New York State to replace lever machines with new voting systems by September 2007. It is clear that in order to implement an extended implementation plan as I have outlined here, a change to the requirements of the Remedial Order must be negotiated. I leave this to legal experts, but note that the original target date for HAVA implementation was 2006, and in accepting the eventual compromise the DOJ acknowledged that the risk of voter disenfranchisement and substantial disruption to smoothly run elections caused by rushed introduction of new voting machines outweighed the necessity to meet the deadline. It would seem that the same logic could apply here.

In any case it seems clear that the original target date of September 2007 will not be met. No matter what happens, New York State will again be in non-compliance, and will need to renegotiate schedules. We must press for a generous schedule that allows sufficient time to guarantee a well run election with well tested equipment. New York State must get new voting systems right the first time. A two year implementation plan helps assure that we do.

Election Problems, What Election Problems?

2006-11-10T16:26:00.000-05:00

The Media Narrative and Public Perception

If you watched the cable news coverage on Election Night it was easy to come away with the impression that few problems were experienced with electronic voting - the predicted ‘train wreck’ had not materialized. But out in the real world, the HAVA mandated changeover of voting systems resulted in real failures that resulted in long lines and lost votes. Just like the fancy new high tech voting machines, the mainstream media has failed us yet again.

That there were widespread problems with electronic voting equipment all around the country is well documented. Thousands of citizens took part in a first time nation-wide effort monitoring polling sites and reporting problems. The reports are still coming in, but it’s clear that hundreds and hundreds of problems occurred. But the mainstream media has thus far barely mentioned this, leading one to ask what vast scale of voting disaster would it actually take for the media to report on it?

The Election Night Narrative

News organizations used to report the news, but nowadays they’re more concerned with telling their viewers a story. This story, the theme of the day as it were, is called the ‘narrative’. On Election Night 2006, the media narrative was “The Great Tsunami”. The story was about the Democratic tide as it moved from East to West, sweeping away Congress in its path. As soon as the first totals started coming in from the East Coast the news networks started framing everything solely in the context of this narrative. There was no room here for voting machines failures, long lines of voters, or anything else. The story was about the horse race, about devastating loss, about the great wave sweeping across the nation. Voting machine problems had no place here as they would distract from the narrative, even worse, maybe even undermine it. Raising the possibility that votes were lost? How are you going to sell soap with that?

The Unspoken Narrative

Underlying the Great Tsunami story was a subtler narrative, one that the media has consistently fed us on Election Nights for years. This narrative is expressed by the often repeated mantra “Even if there were problems, it wasn’t enough to affect the outcome of the election.” It seems vitally important to the media that the public believe that no matter what, no matter how bad the problems, no matter how many lost votes and machine breakdowns, the results are still basically correct, your vote still counts, or at least close enough.

We’ve been told this story before, in 2000, in 2004, and now again in 2006. Nothing to worry about folks, just a little glitch, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. This seems to be an essential narrative for the media, one that we must be told and reminded of each and every Election Day. Because imagine what would happen if the media told the public the real story, and showed the real impact on real voters. Why, you might not have just thousands of activists around the country demanding change, you might have hundreds of thousands. If the real story about broken voting machines and lost votes got out, you might even have millions. Imagine, millions of citizens demanding that their right to vote is sacred and not for sale to voting machine vendors, demanding real accountability, demanding accurate elections with results that we can have real confidence in.

Now that would be a tsunami.

Sequoia Tries Pulling the Wool over New York’s Eyes

2006-10-10T12:57:00.000-04:00

If the facts don’t fit, make something up

Recently, Sequoia distributed a press release to New York State legislators and election officials implying that the DREs it hopes to sell New York had received top ratings in the recent Brennan Center Usability Study. Unfortunately, this extremely misleading press release makes statements which directly contradict the actual conclusions of the Brennan Center Study. Using such deception in a widely distributed press release at a critical moment in New York’s voting system certification and selection process is not only false advertising; it assumes that New York officials who received the release won’t look at the facts behind Sequoia’s spin.

In almost every sentence the claims made in Sequoia’s press release are misleading, if not unabashedly false. To understand the context you need to take a look at the three statements made right at the top of the press release:

Sequoia Voting Systems' AVC Edge Receives Best Rating
in New Brennan Center Report on Usability
Wednesday September 20, 3:04 pm ET

Used in Nevada for 2004 Presidential Election, Sequoia's DRE With VVPAT Produces Lowest Residual Vote Rate of All Voting Systems

Full-Faced DRE Most Secure, Reliable, Accessible and Accurate Voting Solution for New York

NEW YORK, Sept. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- Sequoia Voting Systems' AVC Edge, a touch screen Direct Record Electronic (DRE) voting system, received the top usability rating of any voting machine in the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law's recent report…

Let’s take a look, line by line, at these statements.

The Big Lie – Want Fries with that Whopper?

Line 1 – “Sequoia Voting Systems' AVC Edge Receives Best Rating in New Brennan Center Report on Usability”

They start right off with a whopper. The Brennan Report doesn’t rate voting machines. It evaluates how different types of voting systems affect a voter’s ability to accurately record their votes. It’s not some Consumer Reports style “Top Ten Voting Machines” article that gives 1 star to this DRE and 5 stars to that ballot scanner. So right off the bat they’re implying the report is something that it’s not - a contest, and one that they have won. And as we’ll see, if it had been a contest, Sequoia would have lost - big time.

Line 2 – “ Used in Nevada for 2004 Presidential Election, Sequoia's DRE With VVPAT Produces Lowest Residual Vote Rate of All Voting Systems”

Here we have an example of using selective report data in order to give a false impression. The report has a table which shows the percentages of lost votes for a type of voting system which cannot be used in New York - scrolling DRE systems. This particular table does not include optical scanners or full face ballot DREs, just scrolling DREs. Indeed, the report later concludes that scanners result in far fewer lost votes than full face ballot DREs, something which New York officials might want to know since scanners and full face DREs are their only two options.

The table lists the scrolling Sequoia DREs used in Nevada (the AVC Edge) as having the lowest percentage of “residual”, or lost, votes. But Sequoia ignores the Brennan Center report’s clear statement that the low percentage for the AVC Edge is not to be trusted (emphasis added):

“Only one state, Nevada, used a DRE system with VVPT in the 2004 election. In addition, Nevada is the only state in the country that includes a “none of the above” option on the ballot for federal and statewide elections. This option reduces undervotes, regardless of the voting system being used, because it allows voters who wish to cast a protest vote to do so without registering a “lost” vote. Because no other states used comparable systems or ballot options, the data are too limited to draw any conclusions regarding residual vote rates. […] but this figure is not directly comparable to that produced by other jurisdictions with different ballot options.”

The Brennan Report explicitly notes that AVC Edge results are NOT VALID because of Nevada’s unique ballots! But Sequoia neglects to mention this key fact, misleading the reader by cherry picking data.

Line 3 – “Full-Faced DRE Most Secure, Reliable, Accessible and Accurate Voting Solution for New York”

In the context of the first two statements, this statement implies that the Brennan Report has found the full face ballot DREs which Sequoia is pitching to New York to be the best of the bunch. But this is the exact opposite of the truth – the report concludes that full face ballot DREs result in more lost votes than any other type of voting system – including ballot scanners, New York’s non-DRE alternative. That’s right; the report finds that full face DREs have significantly higher rates of lost votes rates than other electronic voting systems! And, as noted, New York requires full face ballots on any DREs used in the state. The only other available choice is precinct based ballot scanners, which the Brennan Report concludes result in fewer lost votes. But from the blather spewing from Sequoia’s spin machine you wouldn’t know that full face ballot DREs are the worst alternative available to New York.

Some might say that Line 3 is just an opinion about full face machines, not a statement about the Brennan Report conclusions. But in communication, context definitely matters. And the prior statements lead the reader to incorrectly believe that Sequoia’s full face DREs have won the endorsement of the Brennan Center for Justice. And this of course, is the exact opposite of the truth.

Maybe a lawyer would say Sequoia’s claims are not technically ‘false’, or are just ‘opinions’. But even without reading the rest of the press release (which continues in the same vein) it’s plain to see the intent to hoodwink the reader. In my opinion, the Sequoia press release obscures the truth – making statements that are deceptive where they are not outright fabrications.

Sequoia must think we’re a bunch of rubes out here in the Empire State. It’s pretty audacious for a company hoping to make hundreds of millions in profits on the backs of New York taxpayers to be lying to our officials, and by extension, to we citizens.

Hey Sequoia, next time, try a little truth.