Friends:
We're making waves
and the tide is turning. The last week has been a big one for the
Computer Ate My Vote campaign, and I wanted to share with you some
of the progress we've been making.
In California,
50 TrueMajority members filled a Sacramento sidewalk last week calling
for accountability from paperless electronic voting terminals. It
was a fun event -- our "hungry computer" prowled around
for votes to eat and TrueMajority balladeer Laramie Crocker sang his
ode to paperless voting, "Little Black Box," while the crowd
urged state officials to dump California's unverified voting machines.
The very next day California's Voting Systems and Procedures Panel
said that's exactly what should be done. The panel recommended to
California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley that he revoke the certification
of the model TSx paperless electronic voting machine, made by Diebold
Election Systems.
This is big news.
California is the biggest market for election equipment in America.
A rejection of paperless electronic voting terminals there will have
ripple effects throughout the country, and we expect California Secretary
of State Kevin Shelley to issue that decertification any day. We continue
to work in California to extend the decertification of the Diebold
TSx machines to *all* paperless electronic voting machinies.
TrueMajority's Mark Floegel re-enacts the California primaries outside
Diebold's shareholder's meeting. The mockup voting machine, a 50-foot
banner and dozens of TrueMajority members all told the company to
stop opposing paper trails.
On the day of the California announcement, TrueMajority members in
Canton, Ohio gathered outside the annual shareholders' meeting of
Diebold Corporation. Ironically, Ohio is considering buying the very
same Diebold TSx machines recommended for decertification in California.
A banner reading
"Diebold Devours Democracy" floated from three helium-filled
weather balloons outside the auditorium where Diebold CEO Walden O'Dell
addressed shareholders and media. Activists gathered around a smoking,
flashing mock-up of a malfunctioning Diebold voting terminal as TrueMajority
organizers detailed the long list of failures by Diebold's machines
in states across the nation. The event made news not only in Ohio
newspapers and on Ohio television and radio but also throughout the
country due to coverage by the national wire services.
Our work continues
in Ohio, where the legislature is still debating a bill to require
a paper trail (a TrueMajority organizer testified in favor of it).
The bill doesn't go as far as we'd like -- some counties would still
be able to purchase paperless machines this year, and retrofit them
later -- but it's still a turnaround for a state which had been on
the verge of locking *every* county into paperless voting for the
foreseeable future. Diebold, meanwhile, seems to be changing it's
tune. Instead of claiming that paper trails are difficult to produce,
as they did at the beginning of our campaign, company spokespeople
said last week they'd be happy to make paper-capable machines for
states who want them.
We reported to
you earlier that eight states have required paper trails for their
electronic voting terminals. Here's more good news -- Maine just joined
the club April 22, when Governor Baldacci signed LD1759 into law.
State Rep. Hannah Pingree, the chief sponsor of the Maine bill, tells
us that your messages to the secretary of state there softened the
ground and were important in getting the law passed.
We're not stopping
there, though. In addition to pushing on in Ohio and California, we'll
soon be taking on the new federal Election Assistance Commission.
That's the new board tasked with writing the standards for electronic
voting machines. We'll be asking them to write "voter verified
paper trail" into the federal standards, so all those states
who are waiting until next year to buy voting machines will buy the
right ones. Look for an alert soon on that topic.
More and more
news outlets are waking up to this nationwide movement, and elected
officials are listening. I'm glad to be able to work with all of you
to protect our democracy.
Ben Cohen
President, TrueMajority.org