Hero Ion Sancho renews push for HR 550 in DC

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

Ion went to Capitol HIll last week to push for HR 550 again.

Paper vote trail IS coming

By STEVE BOUSQUET
Published December 16, 2006

...Last year, Democratic state Rep. Ken Gottlieb tried to amend a major elections bill to require a "voter-verified paper record suitable for a manual audit." Republicans defeated it....

..Still, a paper trail is coming to Florida because Democrats now control Congress. HR 550, a bill by Rep. Rush Holt, a New Jersey Democrat, has broad support.

That is why Ion Sancho, the maverick elections supervisor from Leon County who supports a paper trail, went to Capitol Hill last week. He met with Holt and congressional staffers to push for the change.
"I'm done messing with the Florida Legislature," said Sancho, who uses optical scan ballots. "Congress is where I'm going to put my effort in."

http://www.sptimes.com/2006/12/16/State/Paper_vote_trail_IS_c.shtml [/div

[philb]

1. To anyone following it, should be clear Florida SOS has been extremely partisan

in recent elections, biased rules for ID, provisionals,etc.; biased voter purges; biased rules for recounts;
partisan "experts" appointed to oversee recounts and audits, etc.

But Florida isn't the only state. Ohio had similar problems in 2004 and 2006, and may do something about it this year
as the voters turned out the manipulators.

But the system is still partisan in Ohio and elsewhere, and thats part of the problem.

Something more needs to done to insure balance and proper checks and balances in SOS and SOE offices everywhere.

There isn't enough focus on this imo.

[Patsy Stone]

2. The SoS position in FL is appointed, not elected.

In 2002 the wool was pulled over the citizens' eyes and in the "downsizing" of the cabinet referendum it was changed from an elected position. In fact, scarily, Cruella was the last elected SoS.

Crist just appointed Kurt Browning (not the ice skater) as SoS. He's been elections supervisor for Pasco County (forever I think) and, until 2002, he was a Democrat. Don't know what will happen now, since he's supposedly changed his tune about being anti-paper -- we'll see.

http://www.sptimes.com/2006/12/15/State/New_sec_of_state.shtml

I'd like to get it back to being an elected position, but I don't know when that'll ever happen.

[philb]

3. There needs to be some rules insuring checks & balances, whether elected or appted

SOS's have been very partisan in recent elections, even being directly involved in partisan campaigning.
And promulgating rules, policies, and making decisions with clear bias.

Its clear that the SOS rather than the voters decide who won in Florida in 2000
and in Ohio in 2004, with a little support from friendly judicial systems.

Is it possible to require and have a non-partisan SOS?
or would there still be partisan manipulation

could you have a 2 person SOS, one from each party, as long as we have a clear 2 party system currently.

[Patsy Stone]

6. Good questions

Appointment carries a sense of partisanship and loyalty with it which election may not, so I would eliminate it as a valid method of filling the position. I would fully support the office becoming non-partisan nationally, and it absolutely should never be that the person (or office) be allowed to participate in any campaign.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

4. Arthur Anderson ran for Elections Sup as pro paper

and then he backtracked his position.

Arthur Anderson (not the accounting agency tied to Enron)
now has faith in the paperless touchscreen machines.

Ion said he has no faith in the Florida legislature
passing a law, and he's tired of waiting.

He knows lots about the machines, and about the process,
so its great to see that he has affirmed his support of
HR 550 (or Son of HR 550), and likely has had input on
it in the new version.

[Stevepol]

5. K&R!!!!!!

[OnTheOtherHand]

7. wow, that story contains some public opinion manure

An Election Day survey of 800 Florida voters taken for the Collins Center for Public Policy found that 73 percent of voters like the system as it is and just 5 percent wanted a paper trail.

Well, not exactly. Apparently one of the questions asked voters how they would "improve the voting experience." (I can't tell exactly what it asked, because as far as I can see, the Collins Center didn't post the questionnaire, just a summary PDF.) It may even have been an open-ended question -- I can't tell. Regardless, that is no way to test support for a paper trail. It's probably a perfectly decent question, but what the St. Pete Times wrote about it won't wash.

I'd like to cite a few more Collins Center numbers, which hint at substantial concerns about fraud -- but some of the numbers come nowhere near totaling 100%, so I think I had better inquire with them first! Also, the report lumps together op-scan and DRE voters, which is too bad. Caveat lector: http://www.collinscenter.org/usr_doc/2006_Vot_Sat_Doc.pdf

Anyway... go, Ion, go!

[Contrite]

8. But HR 550 auditing protocol is insufficient to prevent fraud

http://electiondefensealliance.org/hr550auditflawsPR

(SNIP)

In response to this unacceptable risk, Rep. Rush Holt(D-NJ) recently re-introduced HR 550, "The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005." HR 550 is a bill currently pending in Congress that mandates a paper record for each vote and also calls for an audit of a fraction of the paper records of all electronic votes cast in federal elections. According to Representative Holt, HR 550 has received "bipartisan endorsement from one-third of the members of the House of Representatives, and has been endorsed by good-government groups as the 'gold standard' in verifiability legislation."
(See June 12 press release at http://holt.house.gov/list/press/nj12_holt/061206.html)

The authors of this HR550 audit critique, and of the UPS alternative, believe otherwise.

More at link...

[BeFree]

9. What?

You saying that 550 isn't gonna save our votes? But there are so many people trying to sell it to us..... could they all be wrong?

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

10. I guess they don't trust Ion Sancho. N/T

[Contrite]

11. I don't know if you were being flippant or not, but

maybe read the article linked in my post and see what O'Dell and Simon have to say

[BeFree]

13. Flippant?

Hell, I was doing a backflip I was being so flippant.

Read the article, again. It says it pretty clearly: this half assed auditng ain't gonna save our votes.

Good stuff. Thanks, Contrite! Welcome to DU. Some folks don't quite know how to take me, but my take on you is looking pretty good. Welcome to ER.

[Contrite]

15. Thought so

Great minds:toast:

Thanks for the welcome!

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

12. things changed since June, and "Son of HR 550"

We need to see what "Son of HR 550" looks like - it hasn't been
revealed yet.

We may or may not like it.

We have been told that the clause to involve the EAC in the audits
is gone.

We have been told that the paper ballot or record has to be durable
and not on a reel. This would render all current DREs obsolete,
and there is no DRE that will produce a viable and secret paper ballot.
AccuPoll was as close to it as there is, and they went bankrupt.

DREs have created a stench across the country.

However, I believe that at this point in our travels, and with 08 presidential
election breathing down our necks - we need to consider:

- 37 states having NO audits at all,
- 23 states are paperless,
- 27 states that have paper, but some toilet paper VVPAT

That we can't leave FL, GA, SC, MD and others - paperless.
We can NOT do that. Not for 08.
And time is running out.

New Mexico started out with one audit amount, and then they
went back for MORE.

Right now, NC's law regarding audits is stricter than federal law,
because there IS no federal law requiring any audits at all.

Right now, we have no national requirements for audits.
Nothing, NADA.

We still have forces lobbying against us as hard as can be.

Lets see what "Son of HR 550" looks like, and go from there.

And remember, we have very little time, and lots of paperless machines.
We all know that touchscreens are the great disenfranchiser.

By not funding them, by regulating the Hell out of them,
they will dry up. I would like a ban on them, but if the standards are strict
enough, a ban has been created.

New York is an example of regulating the hell out of voting machines -
their standards are so strict - that no vendor can meet them, yet
they haven't literally banned anything.

[BeFree]

14. Believe it or not...

I don't disagree with you. Now that's saying something, eh? <grin>

[Contrite]

16. I know but for 200 years we hand counted ballots.

Now we are being TOLD by "our government" that we CAN'T do that? Why not? Because some Republicans said so?

This is nonsense. We need to get the state legislatures to give us back our votes.

[OnTheOtherHand]

18. "for 200 years we hand counted ballots"?

Who are "we"?

In 1980, when Election Data Services conducted its first voting equipment study for the FEC, it reckoned that just over 10% of registered voters lived in counties that used hand-counted paper ballots. Another 12% lived in counties that used mixed systems (which typically means hand counts in the smallest jurisdictions and something else in the large ones). So, at that point, maybe 15% of voters were using hand-counted paper ballots. The dominant technology at that time was lever machines, used (exclusively) in counties with about 43% of registered voters. Punch cards covered another 29%. Op-scan and electronic voting had a few percent apiece.

http://www.edssurvey.com/images/File/VotingEquipStudies%20/ve1980_report.pdf

If people want to demand hand counts, fine, but it's wildly ahistorical to posit that "we" relied on them for 200 years.

[Contrite]

21. No it isn't wildly ahistorical at all.

http://www.infoplease.com/spot/campaign2000ballot.html

As the country developed, ballots known as "papers" came into use. The word "ballot" was adopted around 1676. The British colonies in America were the first to use a secret ballot, which later became widespread.

But the ballots Americans would recognize today, which contain the names of all candidates, had still not made its appearance. Until the 1880s, there was no single ballot. Political parties issued long "tickets" listing all the candidates running for office on that party. Voters were urged to "vote a straight party ticket."

New York became the first American State to adopt the paper ballot for statewide elections in 1889.

Although they were once common, as of 1996, paper ballots were still used by 1.7% of the registered voters in the United States. They are used as the primary voting system in small communities and rural areas, and quite often for absentee balloting in other jurisdictions."

[OnTheOtherHand]

22. that is completely unresponsive to the content of my post

If you would care to reread my post and see whether you have a response, that would be fine. Otherwise, I guess we're done.

[Contrite]

23. No, it isn't.

You cite statistics from 1980. What about before then? When were machines introduced into voting? What about machine tabulation? This country is 230 years old, officially, and voting went on before then as well. How do you think people counted the ballots? By machine?

[OnTheOtherHand]

24. why are you asking these questions?

Really. Why don't you know the answers already? Why do so many HCPB advocates seem to rely on the skeptics to do their research for them?

Lever machines were introduced before 1900. This brief summary may help: http://www.fec.gov/pages/lever.htm

[Contrite]

25. Yes but other ballots were still being hand counted

as they had been before. The levers came to New York only in 1892. Prior to that, ballots were all hand counted. And following that ballots continued to be handed in many, many places. In some places, they still were until HAVA came along.

[OnTheOtherHand]

26. in some places they still are!

According to EDS's 2006 survey, there are still 57 counties that use hand counts countywide, plus many "mixed" counties that use hand counts in some jurisdictions. HAVA doesn't ban hand counts, although it mandates accessibility.

But I assume that you aren't really satisfied with HCPB being used by some fraction of one percent of the nation's voters. (According to EDS, these 57 counties average under 6,000 registered voters apiece.) So I'm still mystified by the problem definition that "for 200 years we hand counted ballots" and now the "government" is telling us that we can't. It's sort of like saying that for 200 years we got along with horse-drawn buggies and now the government is trying to force them off the roads (and, no, I'm not disparaging horse-drawn buggies).

[Contrite]

27. You know perfectly well that the movement is away from hand counting

the percentages have shrunk since HAVA. And, no, I am not satisfied with some fractional use of HCPB. I want to use it for all races but realizing the difficulty therein, at least for top federal and state races in a public nonpartisan precinct count.

[OnTheOtherHand]

28. and you know perfectly well that they shrank _before_ HAVA

If you want to find someone or something interesting to blame for the decline in HCPB, you will have to go back quite a bit past 2002. We agree about this, yes?

I don't especially object to hand counts for "top" races. I just don't regard them as a sine qua non of democracy. If you want to work for 100% HCPB -- but not in a way that actually impedes election integrity audits in the meantime -- that's fine with me.

[flyarm]

19. LOOK NJ HAD PROBLEMS IN THE NOV 7TH ELECTION AND HOLT KNOWS

ALL ABOUT THEM...

and remember this about Holt..he won election on a recount his first time i believe it was..he held out a long time for a recount and he won by a very very samll margin his seat in congress...and only after a recount...and audit ...of the lever machines..at the time..

this is a man who listens..

and look he couldn't even get his first watered down bill on the floor with the republicans in a majority in congress..

it is a new day..and it will be fixed and it will be right now!!

I trust Holt ..

and yes the problems in NJ were glaring..some raceswith real problems were lost by 10-20 votes!!

( and most likely not lost..but machine stolen)

( one town..where iam at had 75 votes sent to the machines 30-35 miles away!!) i was there for the court case..and i was there for the entire opening of machines..Holt knows that the vote flipping From Barnegat NJ to Lakewood NJ..occured..and he knows the supervisors do not know how it happened..his office was appraised of everything...

and he damn sure knows with proprietary laws in Hava..we could not audit the software!and the machine audits were worthless ..

Holt knows..and Holt listens...

and Holt will listen to Ion Sancho

and he is listening in NJ to a large group of people who are working very hard for Voter verified Paper Ballots

fly

[troubleinwinter]

20. This sounds good, fly! Thanks.

[kster]

17. WillYourVoteBCounted,

not as long as they are counted in secret, A hell of allot of people, got the game figured out, secret vote counting and people that try and convince us, that secret vote counting is the way to go, are embarrassing themselves.

[Febble]

29. Who is trying to convince you

"that secret vote counting is the way to go?"

I don't see it on this forum. What I see is every single poster, whatever they think about what method should be used, advocating transparency, not secrecy.

I think you may be misunderstanding the position of a lot of people on this board.