Rep. Rush Holt on New Jersey's Delayed Move to Verified Voting
Cross posted at Daily Kos, Open Left, and firedoglake.
Three and a half years after New Jersey's Legislature enacted a law to require voter-verified paper records, the Legislature is poised to undo it. After 37 states have managed to take concrete steps toward transparent and verifiable elections, New Jersey has not gotten the job done.
Bills moving fast in both houses of the Legislature to undo the three-year-old requirement for voter-verifiable paper records.
Now it looks like the state Senate could vote as early as Monday. New Jersey Congressman Rush Holt spoke eloquently today at a hearing of the Senate State Government Committee.
Here are excerpts from Holt's testimony:
"First, as you know, I am a physicist, and so I am not arguing in favor of paper-ballot-based voting out of some fear or lack of understanding of the technology we vote on. Second, the original group of experts who helped me draft my legislation when I first introduced it in Congress in 2003 were computer security experts - among the best and most highly-credentialed computer security experts in the country. Therefore, I would also like to think it is obvious that the driving force behind my legislation is not a lack of understanding of computer security risks, but rather a long experience and familiarity with computers, computer security and computer experts. And finally, as you may recall, I have personally experienced human error in vote counting: in my very first run for the seat I now hold, one of the county clerks in my district ascribed my vote totals to my opponent, and newspapers reported that I had lost the race. In fact, you might even say it runs in my family, because my own father was the apparent victim of the theft of paper ballots when he ran for office. So I am not operating under the assumption that human beings are automatically more reliable than computers, nor that paper ballots are fraud-proof and computer tallies are not. The point is - voting must not be an act of faith, it must be an act of record, and independent audit records (voter verified paper ballots) must be required...
...New Jersey enacted such a requirement [voter-verified paper records] in 2005. But inexplicably, although more than half of the country has succeeded in implementing such requirements since I first commenced this effort in 2003, New Jersey - once a national leader - is slow to act...
...Based on what other states are doing, New Jersey could certainly have implemented its paper record requirement as of the original implementation date of January 2008. And it could and should do so now, without further delay."
If you live in New Jersey, take action.
With paperless electronic voting, there is no ability to perform a meaningful recount or audit of the results. The ACCURATE Center, a think tank consisting of computer scientists and technologists with an interest in voting technology, summed up the problem (p. 23 of the pdf):
"In today's purely electronic systems, there is no "fixed record" for voters to review, or for officials to review as a check against the system or in the case of a recount. If votes were incorrectly recorded by the system there is no possibility of a meaningful recount."
The inability to perform an effective recount creates vulnerability to small and large-scale error and tampering. As I have written too many times before, the Brennan Center Task Force on Voting System Security concluded that a close statewide election on paperless electronic systems could be manipulated successfully by as few as one to three people. And the mere existence of paper ballots is not enough; systematic and robust hand count audits are necessary after each election.
And improve the situation we must. By my count, 164 electoral votes in the 2008 Presidential election were determined by votes cast on purely electronic systems. Georgia (15 electoral votes), Maryland (10 EVs), Delaware (3), Louisiana (9), New Jersey (15), and South Carolina (8) use paperless e-voting at all polling places statewide. Based on voter-registration figures and county voting systems, it's safe to say that a majority of ballots in Indiana (11 EVs), Kansas (6), Kentucky (8), Pennsylvania (21), Tennessee (11), Texas (34), and Virginia (13) were paperless. Maryland and Tennessee should convert to paper ballot/optical scan systems by 2010, though counterattacks by election officials who don't want to lose their paperless machines are to be expected. New Jersey passed a law requiring voter-verified paper records in 2005, but you just read about that;)
Three and a half years after New Jersey's Legislature enacted a law to require voter-verified paper records, the Legislature is poised to undo it. After 37 states have managed to take concrete steps toward transparent and verifiable elections, New Jersey has not gotten the job done.
Bills moving fast in both houses of the Legislature to undo the three-year-old requirement for voter-verifiable paper records.
Now it looks like the state Senate could vote as early as Monday. New Jersey Congressman Rush Holt spoke eloquently today at a hearing of the Senate State Government Committee.
Here are excerpts from Holt's testimony:
"First, as you know, I am a physicist, and so I am not arguing in favor of paper-ballot-based voting out of some fear or lack of understanding of the technology we vote on. Second, the original group of experts who helped me draft my legislation when I first introduced it in Congress in 2003 were computer security experts - among the best and most highly-credentialed computer security experts in the country. Therefore, I would also like to think it is obvious that the driving force behind my legislation is not a lack of understanding of computer security risks, but rather a long experience and familiarity with computers, computer security and computer experts. And finally, as you may recall, I have personally experienced human error in vote counting: in my very first run for the seat I now hold, one of the county clerks in my district ascribed my vote totals to my opponent, and newspapers reported that I had lost the race. In fact, you might even say it runs in my family, because my own father was the apparent victim of the theft of paper ballots when he ran for office. So I am not operating under the assumption that human beings are automatically more reliable than computers, nor that paper ballots are fraud-proof and computer tallies are not. The point is - voting must not be an act of faith, it must be an act of record, and independent audit records (voter verified paper ballots) must be required...
...New Jersey enacted such a requirement [voter-verified paper records] in 2005. But inexplicably, although more than half of the country has succeeded in implementing such requirements since I first commenced this effort in 2003, New Jersey - once a national leader - is slow to act...
...Based on what other states are doing, New Jersey could certainly have implemented its paper record requirement as of the original implementation date of January 2008. And it could and should do so now, without further delay."
If you live in New Jersey, take action.
With paperless electronic voting, there is no ability to perform a meaningful recount or audit of the results. The ACCURATE Center, a think tank consisting of computer scientists and technologists with an interest in voting technology, summed up the problem (p. 23 of the pdf):
"In today's purely electronic systems, there is no "fixed record" for voters to review, or for officials to review as a check against the system or in the case of a recount. If votes were incorrectly recorded by the system there is no possibility of a meaningful recount."
The inability to perform an effective recount creates vulnerability to small and large-scale error and tampering. As I have written too many times before, the Brennan Center Task Force on Voting System Security concluded that a close statewide election on paperless electronic systems could be manipulated successfully by as few as one to three people. And the mere existence of paper ballots is not enough; systematic and robust hand count audits are necessary after each election.
And improve the situation we must. By my count, 164 electoral votes in the 2008 Presidential election were determined by votes cast on purely electronic systems. Georgia (15 electoral votes), Maryland (10 EVs), Delaware (3), Louisiana (9), New Jersey (15), and South Carolina (8) use paperless e-voting at all polling places statewide. Based on voter-registration figures and county voting systems, it's safe to say that a majority of ballots in Indiana (11 EVs), Kansas (6), Kentucky (8), Pennsylvania (21), Tennessee (11), Texas (34), and Virginia (13) were paperless. Maryland and Tennessee should convert to paper ballot/optical scan systems by 2010, though counterattacks by election officials who don't want to lose their paperless machines are to be expected. New Jersey passed a law requiring voter-verified paper records in 2005, but you just read about that;)
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