The Great Lakes Zephyr - Wind Energy & Hydrogen Journal

Computer Ate My Vote Scores Coast to Coast Wins


Robert Howe, as the "Hungry Computer", with Laramie Crocker on guitar, in this national Associated Press photo of our Sacramento rally last week. The next day, a California panel recommended dumping Diebold's paperless TSx machines.

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.

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