The Machineries of Democracy: Failed Trust, Elections in Courts

As you might imagine, it is hard to choose from the many events of Election Day 2008 to report and reflect on! But I thought that I’d pick a handful of events that show just how vitally important it is the election equipment be designed carefully – and the consequences of products that aren’t, and vendors that don’t seem to care. I have to say, it’s potentially dire, which is why I’ve picked as many as 3 events to support my claims.

Virginia: Secrets, Lines, and Preventing Coercion

The state of Virginia looks like a state-full of Election Day trouble spots, to many elections experts and activists. I agree with one of the main concerns (long lines at the polls) but I also wanted to share the beneficial flip side of the VA scene, recalled to me by the eloquent words of colleague Doug Jones of University of Iowa.

Tennesseeans Confused by Voting Machines' BAR

With early voting continuing apace (often a slow pace with long lines), so does the stream of news on election dysfunction, usually with an e-voting system as a culprit. But today’s news from Knox County TN shows how a seemingly simple question can create some serious – but wholly unnecessary – confusion.

Early Voting: Reliability and Reluctance

The 2009 U.S. Presidential election is now underway, with early voting having started in many states. And pretty much right off the bat, we’re seeing problems with reliability and reluctance. The story in New Jersey is a familiar one writ large, but the contrast with Texas and Florida shows that often the same concerns-- reliability and trust -- lead to similar reluctance about both using e-voting technology, and about avoiding it. The kicker is the reluctance to avoid it, in Florida – read on.

The Dark Side of Voter Registration

I've noticed more coverage of election integrity issues relating to voter registration. It's good to see some focus on VR-related problems, but I don't see much about a deeper issue -- transparency and publc accountability of the (im)proper use of voter registration systems and processes.

Palm Beach Lost Votes: Paper is not the Problem

The dust has settled – sort of – in the “lost ballots snafu” in Palm Beach County Florida, enough that I can correct a very serious mis-reading of the events, and briefly summarize the two completely contradictory “outcomes” of investigation: (1) it’s an accounting problem, not a technology problem, and (2) it’s a technology problem. Either way, the result is a failed election – not just a clouded outcome, but a completely failed election. The very short story: a recount was needed, 3000+ ballots couldn’t be

Out-sourced elections: an about-face?

It looks like there may some movement away from the current situation in which U.S. elections are increasingly outsourced and privatized.

A first: election system vendors admits losing votes

Here is a first-ever admission: a real software bug in a real voting system can drop real votes, and has dropped votes. And perhaps has been doing so for years. I wrote earlier about the wrangle between the state of Ohio and Premier Election Systems (formerly Diebold), in which some real vote dropping was blamed on anti-virus software (which wasn't allowed to be in the machines in the first place!).

Anti-virus and the anti-voting machine

There’s some intriguing and ironic details near the bottom of the on-going legal saga in Ohio.

Why Don’t the Votes Add Up?

A story from election integrity watchdog Mark L. provides yet another example the stark contrast between current election systems vendors current behavior and products, versus the kind of election transparency that’s needed to inspire trust in election results.

At issue the requirement that election systems product should track “undervotes” (the situation where a valid ballot contains no voter selection in a contest or measure) and report on the undervote rate.