Lawsuit Challenges Florida Ballot Recount Rules

[NNN0LHI]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=615&ncid=703&e=5&u=/nm/20040707/pl_nm/campaign_florida_dc

MIAMI (Reuters) - Voting rights groups sued Florida election administrators on Wednesday to overturn a rule that prohibits manual recounting of ballots cast with touch-screen machines, a lawsuit with echoes of the state's disputed 2000 presidential election voting.


The lawsuit said the rule was "illogical" and rested on the questionable assumption that electronic voting machines perform flawlessly 100 percent of the time. It also said the rule violated a Florida law that expressly requires manual recounts of certain ballots if the margin in an election is less than 0.25 percent of the votes cast.


Court disputes over how to conduct manual recounts of punch card and absentee ballots delayed Florida's results in the 2000 presidential election, which George W. Bush won after taking the state by 537 votes.


The lawsuit was filed against the Florida Department of State, which oversees elections and which issued the rule in April. snip

The plaintiffs said in their suit the electronic voting machines were "known to malfunction and to be subject to malicious tampering."

more

[Judi Lynn]

1. They've GOT to know we're all watching by now......

Plaintiffs included the American Civil Liberties Union (news - web sites) of Florida, the nonpartisan political group Common Cause and other voter education and civil rights groups. The suit will be heard by the Division of Administrative Hearings in Tallahassee, the state capital.


The plaintiffs said in their suit the electronic voting machines were "known to malfunction and to be subject to malicious tampering."
(snip)

I pray this suit actually gets a clean hearing and judgement. Is that so much to ask?

Thanks for the news!

[cthrumatrix]

2. clean hearing?....... does this happen with the bush mafia

[D-Notice]

5. Yep...

That's why they'll try it in another state!

Anyone know if similar cases are happening elsewhere?

[Racenut20]

3. July response to April ruling?

To be heard by Jeb appointees.

[ejcastellanos]

4. What about early voting?

Is that an option in Florida? An early voting ballot would be paper and would HAVE to be hand counted. I realize it would add more expense to the election but what does American democracy go for these days?

Can anyone in Florida explain how to get an early or absentee ballot? Would it affect the outcome?

It may be one way of forcing the issue with black box voting.

[Judi Lynn]

6. challenges recount ban

Posted on Thu, Jul. 08, 2004

Suit challenges recount ban

Voter advocacy groups sued to overturn a state rule barring counties with touch-screen voting machines from doing manual recounts.

BY MARY ELLEN KLAS
[e-mail]


TALLAHASSEE - A 3-month-old state rule prohibiting counties with touch-screen voting machines from doing manual recounts should be thrown out before the Aug. 31 primary, voter advocacy groups said in a lawsuit filed Wednesday against state election officials.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida warned that the rule adopted April 9 by the state Division of Elections could inadvertently keep election officials from discovering defects in malfunctioning machines, or errors due to tampering, because it bars county officials from using the backup audit systems in the machines to verify the votes cast in a close election.

''You cannot ride on the premise that all machines are infallible and there will never be a mistake and never be a programming error,'' said Alma Gonzalez, the ACLU attorney who filed the suit.

The groups claim that election officials exceeded their authority when they adopted the rule allowing the 52 counties with optical scanning machines to conduct a recount of the overvotes and undervotes in a race, but prohibiting the 15 counties with touch-screen machines from doing the same.

The lawsuit alleges that the rule sets up a system that allows for unequal treatment of voters.
(snip/...)

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/state/9102631.htm
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