Election Experts Issue 'Orange Alert' for Massachusetts Special Election

Groups Urge Secretary of State Galvin to Take Action to Detect Election Tampering

LEXINGTON, Mass., Jan. 18 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Representatives of nonpartisan election watchdog groups around the nation issued a last-minute 'orange alert,' warning that tomorrow's Massachusetts special election to elect a successor to the late Senator Ted Kennedy is ripe for manipulation. The groups call on Secretary of State Galvin to take immediate extra security precautions for the Senate race, which has become a high-stakes national contest. Critical national initiatives such as health care reform and financial reform will be influenced by the results of this election.

Unprecedented amounts of out-of-state money has funded a media blitz, and recent seesawing polls -- some highly questionable -- show Republican Scott Brown and Democrat Martha Coakley now reported to be in a virtual toss-up.

Experts are concerned that with the electronic election system in use, its lack of transparency and ease of manipulation, the public has no basis for trust in the accuracy and integrity of the election results. Confidence in election outcome should be based on objective verification rather than government reassurance, particularly when voting systems with so many known vulnerabilities and so little ability for oversight are employed.

"Now is the time for Massachusetts state election officials to act. Now is the time for all citizens to act," said Sally Castleman, Massachusetts voter and co-founder of Election Defense Alliance.

Members of election integrity organizations nationwide urge Secretary of State Galvin to take immediate steps to increase transparency for this electronically tabulated election.

Massachusetts elections are programmed and serviced by New England Diebold affiliate LHS Associates, a private company, located in Methuen, MA, which alone controls the trade secret software and memory cards holding all ballot and voting data. This data must be secured and held by Massachusetts election officials, experts say.

Secretary of State Galvin must immediately institute a policy and practice to ensure that public election officials and not LHS Associates maintain chain of custody over all ballots, voting machines, database files, and memory cards. Only through public possession and scrutiny of all election data can we ensure the integrity of election results.

Alert citizens can help defend against election shenanigans by volunteering as polling center watchdogs.

Election Integrity expert Brad Friedman has warned that the outcome will rely on the accuracy of votes tallied by the easily-hacked electronic Diebold/Premier optical scan voting machines, featured in the film Hacking Democracy.

Friedman, writing in the Gouverneur Times says, "The electronic voting systems used in Massachusetts are notoriously plagued with problems and vulnerabilities, and are in violation of federal voting system standards. Moreover, they are sold, programmed, and maintained by a company with a disturbing criminal background."

Friedman notes with concern, "The machines and cards are often accessed by both election officials and the private vendors who program and maintain them."

The candidates are urged not to concede the election or declare victory until election results can be verified and any bona fide election challenges resolved.

The organizations issuing the alert include:

Americans United for Democracy, Integrity, and Transparency in Elections, AZ

Bev Harris, BlackBoxVoting.org, a national nonpartisan nonprofit elections
watchdog organization

Center for Hand-Counted Paper Ballots, Belmont, MA

Coalition for Visible Ballots

Florida Fair Elections

Massachusetts Citizens for Voting Integrity www

PDA Board Chair Mimi Kennedy www.pdamerica.org

NH Fair Elections Committee

RecallVotingMachines.com

Velvet Revolution

Where's the Paper

Prof. Mark Crispin Miller, election integrity author/journalist, professor of media studies, NYU

SOURCE VelvetRevolution.us

Bill Risner: Full transparency is the answer in achieving solid results – and public trust

ELECTION INTEGRITY: ENSURED OR STILL IN QUESTION?

"Our primary concern by far, however, is future elections." Bill Risner, Pima County Democratic Party Attorney

"Establishing election procedures that are secure, accurate and transparent is fundamental to maintaining public confidence in our democratic process." Read OpEd in the Tucson Citizen by Terry Goddard, Arizona Attorney General.

April 26, 2009, 7:53 p.m.
BILL RISNER
The Pima County Democratic Party is in unanimous agreement that the accurate counting of our votes is fundamental, critical and non-negotiable.

Some 1,500 of our volunteers work at each election to ensure the honesty of those elections.

The recent RTA ballot count by the Attorney General's Office was a byproduct of that effort but by no means a central focus. The central problem is that we use a computer system that makes cheating easy and detection difficult.

The RTA was endorsed by the Democratic Party. Our concerns had nothing to do with the transportation plan. It had everything to do with the sworn affidavit in which the computer operator confessed to rigging the election on the instruction of his county bosses.

That reported confession, combined with our analysis of the database revealing multiple anomalies consistent with such rigging, required an investigation, in our view, to settle a supremely important question.

Local newspapers and the Republican and Libertarian parties joined in our request for a serious investigation.

Since the ballots had been in the custody of Pima County officials for the past 2 1/2 years, it was necessary to resolve whether those ballots were the original ones.

Pima County owns a ballot printing machine, and the "GEMS" election software still contains all the printing instructions for that election.

The original ballots were printed on an offset press by the Runbeck Co., and Pima County's ballot printing machine uses a laser printer. We asked the attorney general to conduct a forensic examination or to allow us to look at the ballots with a microscope to confirm they were all offset-printed. The attorney general refused both requests.

We noted that the simple non-destructive examination of sample ballots would serve our mutual goal of public confidence. Despite the presence of the microscope during the 1 1/2 weeks that the ballots were being counted, the attorney general never permitted the examination of any ballots.

We regret that he chose not to resolve that obvious issue, since it was both important and easy to resolve.

Our primary concern by far, however, is future elections. The value of examining past election practices is to ensure that corrections and safeguards are in place for future elections. The entire election process is dependent on doing it right in the first place.

The common problem shared by all citizens in Pima County is that it is easy to cheat using our computer system and very difficult to do anything about it.

The "easy-to-cheat" assertion is agreed upon by all knowledgeable observers. Interestingly, those who know the most about computers are the least comfortable with them counting our votes using secret software instructions. Some sample quotes explain the problem:

• "Because it can be easily manipulated, the bottom line in this whole thing is we're only going to catch the stupid people, all right, because one could also alter the audit logs. One could do anything." - Chris Straub, chief civil deputy for the Pima County Attorney's Office.

• "During testing, it was discovered that the GEMS software exhibits fundamental security flaws that make definitive validation of data impossible due to the ease of data and log manipulation." - iBeta report to the Arizona attorney general.

• "The security mechanisms that are there are in general hopelessly inadequate to prevent manipulation of ballot records or vote totals by anyone with even a very short period of access to the system." - David Jefferson, Ph.D.

• "This is no secret. These issues have been known by not only our office but election offices all over the country." - Arizona Election Director Joseph Kanefield.

The "easy-to-cheat" problem must be combined with the impossibility to challenge any election.

State law requires that an election challenge be filed within five days of the approval of the canvass, with specific details as to why the outcome would have been different.

But the paper ballots cannot be examined. The electronic database cannot be examined within that narrow time frame and can be easily altered in any event.

Finally, the courts have no jurisdiction after the five-day period. Therefore, it is impossible to challenge any crooked election. We know it is impossible, and so do the election computer operators.

The answer is to use a graphic commercial scanner to scan all ballots after they are counted and to make the totality of the ballots publicly available on the Internet or other electronic means. Those ballots can then be counted by any person, candidate or political party using open-source free software.


Bill Risner is a personal injury specialist trial attorney who has represented the Pima County Democratic Party in election matters.

Editorial Comment by 26Dems : Attorney General Goddard credited the hard work of the election integrity advocates and the Pima County Democratic Party in bringing to light the flawed Diebold election system and for their part in instituting reforms within Pima County government that significantly improved security. For his strong support toward achieving transparency, Goddard clearly indicated that public oversight of elections is here to stay.

On the other hand County Manager Chuck Huckelberry in his own Tucson Citizen OpED by contrast primarily stresses unfair scrutiny of the Pima County Election Department in his statement below.

"This remarkable accuracy is a testament to the integrity and diligence of Elections Director Brad Nelson and Computer Specialist Bryan Crane, as well as the elections staff. It was disturbing to see the character of these conscientious county employees falsely maligned. The results of the attorney general's investigation showed beyond any doubt the allegations that anyone tampered with election results were completely false."

Huckelberry credits Pima County with improving security, but gives no acknowledgement to the incredible struggle the Pima County Democratic Party undertook to institute security reforms or the massive effort the County pursued to keep the election system non-transparent evidenced by its intractable resistance to turning over public documents.

It is astonishing that Mr. Huckelberry believes that we should put our trust in election results solely because he places faith in the integrity of his employees, and in Diebold, despite the fact that we recently learned that Diebold/Premier software has a built in DELETE button that wipes out audit logs.

Huckelberry celebrates the "win-win" for the county, but does not acknowledge, as the Attorney General did, that the RTA investigation was warranted given the many suspicious anomalies that were badges of fraud or that any concerns with Mr. Nelson's administration remain.

Election Integrity in Pima County At Crossroads

The RTA: The Unanswered Questions
New Tech Tools for Election Transparency
Party Volunteers Must Oversee Elections, Tighten Chain of Custody in Future Elections

The Election Integrity Committee brought the questionable behavior that has happened in Pima County through the ongoing public records litigation into the full light of public awareness of

Attorney Bill Risner has repeatedly petitioned the Attorney General and the courts to provide transparent remedies that will protect future elections. The case is now on appeal, but public access to the yellow sheets and poll tapes was blocked by a sealed court order. The Attorney General allowed a criminal investigation to languish through many months. His action to seize the ballots, take them to Maricopa County, and not officially disclose the whereabouts of the ballots shows that the office of the Attorney General is pursuing a course of secrecy that invites public speculation rather than public assurance.

How can we know that a secure chain of custody has been followed? Since this is an investigation about elections, we think the Attorney General should deliver on his word by offering some proof that he has custody of the ballots, who is going to count them, whether any one from Pima County will be allowed to observe the count, and when this count will happen? It would be prudent for the Attorney General to answer these questions and solicit support rather than to continue to deny the public's right to know under the cover of a criminal investigation. Criminal investigations rely on preserving a strict chain of custody. Let's persuade Attorney General Terry Goddard to release some of the details of ballot transport that would not compromise the investigation.

Voices of Opposition and Democracy for America co-sponsored the introduction of Fatally Flawed the movie to the wider Tucson community last Monday night on the UA campus. The well-attended event drew a KOLD news crew as well as John Moffatt, who must have been very uncomfortable witnessing himself on the big screen as a major proponent in the County's now debunked mayhem and chaos defense. The 30 minute intro composed of selected clips from the public records trial and local news clips and RTA advertisements highlighted a high stakes election supported by elected officials and the enormous effort and expense Pima County put toward obstructing public records. The take away raised questions about why the County would go to such great lengths to resist turning over public election records. Was it that they had something to hide? The film clearly made this point and was followed by an outstanding panel discussion by Bill Risner, Mickey Duniho, Jim March and John Brakey.

Election Integrity is positive! It is all about about opening up democratic participation through transparency! We have much work to do to educate the public that our work is not a game about carelessly throwing around accusations or besting opponents on one side or the other but about the foundational principles of our participatory democracy---a democracy that rests on public vote counting and oversight. There is no place for secrecy. No matter how many security measures we will be able to put in place, all of us must recognize we must all be vigilant to enforce a secure chain of custody. That means that it is the obligation of public officials to verify the outcome of elections and to follow a consistent secure chain of custody observed by political party volunteers. On the horizon are some exciting new technologies that will overcome some of the stubborn barriers sooner rather than later!

Sandra Spangler
Chair, Pima County Democratic Party Election Integrity Committee

View the First Trailer of Fatally Flawed

Internet Camera Streams Completely Useless as AZ's Criminal Investigation Ballot Hand-Count Begins

Coverage from the BradBlog

We wrote late last week, in some detail, about Arizona AG Terry Goddard's long overdue hand-count of paper ballots from the dubious 2006 Rapid Transit Authority (RTA) bond special election in Pima County (Tucson). The count of all 120,821 paper ballots from the election begins today in Phoenix as part of a criminal investigation, following years of allegations and court cases, in which a trans-partisan group of Election Integrity advocates in Tucson have sought transparency and public oversight following indications that Diebold tabulator databases may have been manipulated by election insiders.

Goddard's restrictions on political party observers --- just one per party, selected by the AG, not by the parties themselves --- was the cause of criticism by all of the involved parties (Republican, Democratic, Libertarian, etc.). But a letter late last week from the AG's office indicated, at least, that a live, eight-camera video feed would be available on the Internet.

As the count began this morning, that feed is now up and running here.

Unfortunately, unlike Minnesota's recent, very transparent hand-count of 2.9 million ballots from the state's still-contested U.S. Senate race, the video from the Maricopa County Ballot Tabulation Center (BTC) is all but worthless, as critics had previously worried, in determining if counts are being carried out accurately. And here is the rest of it.

Here are recent screen shots from all eight camera-views of the counting, which is underway right now (click a photo to see the live streaming shot)...

As you can tell, the Internet streams are completely worthless as far as observing the accuracy of the ballot count in any way. (The Bradblog link has 8 camera views, but only two show activity).

Goddard had previous specified that there would be strict rules for AG-selected party observers, ensuring that it would be impossible for them to take any notes or document the counting in any way shape or form. "[N]o cameras, no cell telephones, no writing instruments, and no audio or video recorders of any kind will be permitted within the examination room," Deputy AG Donald E. Conrade wrote to all four party chairs in his March 23, 2009 letter [PDF]. Along with additional restrictions, the AG noted: "No representative will be permitted to communicate with anyone outside of the examination room while present in the examination room by signal, voice or other sign."

A limited number of observers would be allowed outside the counting room, supposedly able to view the tabulation through glass windows. However, based on the photos from the live streaming cams, as seen above, it's difficult to figure out where an observer outside of the room would be able to determine if counting was, in any way, being done accurately.

"It's a joke," one of Pima County's tireless election integrity advocates John Brakey, of Americans United for Democracy, Integrity, and Transparency in Elections AuditAZ, told us this morning as the counting began.

Though he traveled 120 miles from Tucson to Phoenix for the counting, Brakey, one of the most vociferous of the local leaders in trying to bring transparency to Pima's 2006 election, was barred by the state AG from the counting room.

While Goddard's office had earlier explained that "this is a criminal investigation, not an elections process controlled by applicable Arizona election laws," it's difficult to fathom what the point is in even streaming Internet video feeds at all, if the AG-selected "observers" are unable to document anything in any way, observers outside the glass are blind to the actual counting, and what's seen above is all that will be made available to the rest of the world.

So much for transparency or public oversight in AG Goddard's ballot count, brought about due to the years-long demand for transparency and public oversight of the disputed 2006 special election.

As more breaks...if it breaks...and as we're able to learn it from our sources at the counting facility in Phoenix...we'll do our best to keep you abreast with what's going on...

Schwarzenegger Vetoes Election Integrity Bills

26Dems Editorial Note: The Voting Vendor industry has consolidated control over 85% of U.S. elections with the sale of Diebold Premier to ES&S. That means that this powerful monopolistic lobbying power is already is being used to defeat election integrity and transparency and saddle states and counties with expensive maintenance contracts for electronic voting and tabulating equipment already demonstrated to be fatally flawed.

The use of power to defeat transparency attacks the fundamental democratic principle that guarantees that voting is secret, but counting ballots is public. Throughout the history of the Republic, the advocates of fair elections have battled the barons of power who seek to profit at the public's expense. This most recent assault on democracy has attracted the attention of Sen. Chuck Schumer who has announced that the Senate Rules and Administration Committee will be investigating the Diebold/ES&S sale. Blackbox Voting has sent a Letter of Complaint to the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission to protest.

The vendors are united against transparency and are working directly with bureaucrats in county election departments and the Secretary of State's office to fight off public records requests and to stay in control of elections, and to count votes secretly with proprietary software. In fact the Election Center funded by vendors has set up a private network of Secretary of State Organizations and Election Official organizations for training. The EAC, a weak federal body that sets up standards for voting machine accuracy is heavily influenced by vendors. Our state legislators face combined pressure to block election transparency and accountability laws from the associations that represent counties and election officials as well as a phalanx of intense lobbyists from Diebold-Premier-Sequoia.

It was thought that Arizona was moving toward greater transparency with the passage of a hand count audit law. However we have seen numerous examples of successful attempts to subvert the intent of election transparency and accountability laws locally and nationally.

Anyone believing that it will be easy to change the vendor control of elections by passing state laws should soberly consider how easily Governor Schwarzenegger with a flick of a pen allied himself with the voting vendor industry against public transparency. California is the nation's leader in the drive for public transparency and accountability. California is the state that elected Debra Bowen Secretary of State, the first in the country to conduct a top to bottom review of voting systems with some of the nation's top computer scientists.

Locally and nationally election integrity is suffering setback after setback even though the Arizona Attorney General declared electronic voting machines "flawed" and even though the general public has learned about the egregious software flaws that allow easy and quick insider access to change vote totals.

Read on about the Governor's vetoes.


By Brad Friedman
10/13/2009 6:20PM
Bradblog

CA SoS Bowen 'laments' rejection of 'common-sense election bills aimed at enhancing government transparency'

So do we. Please help demand Bowen now take corrective action on her own...
According to a press release from CA Sec. of State Debra Bowen [PDF] today, CA Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed one bill for improvement to state election law, while using his veto pen to terminate three other "common-sense elections bills ... aimed at enhancing government transparency."

The one he approved will allow emergency workers in the field, such as fire fighters battling a wild fire, to vote from wherever they may be at the time. That's good. But Bowen "laments" --- as does The BRAD BLOG --- the other ones which she supported, and which he, incredibly enough, vetoed. He said hasta la vista to three bills which would have been very helpful in adding much-needed "common-sense" checks and balances to the nearly unabated rise of the machines in our electoral system...


From Bowen's press release:

Also yesterday, the Governor vetoed several common-sense elections bills sponsored by Secretary of State Bowen and aimed at enhancing government transparency.

AB 84 (Hill) would have allowed vote-by-mail (VBM) voters to find out if their ballots were counted and if not, why not. VBM ballots cannot be counted if they arrive after the polls close on Election Day or if the signature on the ballot envelope does not match the signature on file.

"A similar law already exists for voters who cast provisional ballots, so letting vote-by-mail voters know if their votes counted would have cost little or nothing," said Secretary Bowen. "If voters knew why their mail-in ballots were not counted, they could make changes that would prevent their votes from being rejected in the future."

AB 330 (Saldaña) would have required counties to provide public notice of the opportunity to review the preparation, testing and operation of ballot tabulating devices. Current law requires this testing be open to the public, but it does not require notice of when the testing will occur.

SB 541 (Pavley) would have enhanced transparency by requiring ballot printers and voting system vendors to notify the Secretary of State when they discover previously undisclosed flaws in their products. This bill was spurred in part by the revelation that a voting system software error caused 197 ballots to be inadvertently deleted from Humboldt County's initial results in the November 4 election. Upon discovery of the software error, Humboldt County corrected its election results.

While all three vetoes here are maddening, and an embarrassment to CA frankly (Really? Tests must be public, but the public doesn't need to be notified that they are happening??) the last one mentioned above should further encourage Bowen to do the right thing on her own by demanding accountability from Diebold for fraudulently and knowingly selling voting systems to the state (and 34 others!) which violate federal voting system guidelines by deleting ballots, allowing audit logs to be deleted without notice, and other epic fails for any voting system.

The Governor is clearly not going to do it. So unless Bowen, who is up for re-election next year, takes clear action, the message here is that voting machines companies can do virtually any damned thing they want and get away with it with little more than a slap on the wrist, if that much. And they can keep doing it, because nobody is actually going to stop them.

Your support of VelvetRevolution.us' DieboldReturnOurMoney.com campaign --- demanding the company return tax-payer money spent on faulty machines, that Bowen decertify those systems across the state, and that AG Jerry Brown (likely to run for Governor next year) investigate and prosecute for fraud where appropriate --- is much appreciated and clearly much needed!

Click here to send emails demanding action be taken by Diebold, Bowen and Brown only if, unlikely Schwarzenegger apparently, you give a damn about a transparent democracy and a government of the people, by the people, and for the people!

[Hat-tip Tom Courbat of SAV R VOTE for the heads up on Bowen's press release and Schwarzenegger's vetoes. DISCLOSURE: The BRAD BLOG is a co-founder of VelvetRevolution.us.]

* * *
UPDATE: This is really pathetic. Here's the veto message from Schwarzenegger on the bill that would have required voting machine companies to inform the Sec. of State of "each defect, fault, or failure" the company discovered in its voting system, as used in the state of California...

BILL NUMBER: SB 541
VETOED··· DATE: 10/12/2009
To the Members of the California State Senate:

I am returning Senate Bill 541 without my signature.

This bill is the result of an unacceptable situation in Humboldt County, where the county was notified of a defect in the voting software but failed to address the problem. This resulted in 197 votes being deleted. Because the Secretary of State (SOS) is not notified when there is a flaw in a voting system, there was no safety net to ensure that voters were not impacted.

The SOS inspects ballot manufacturing facilities before approving them to do business in California. This bill would appropriately include the SOS in a notification of equipment defects during and after this process. However, this bill goes beyond insuring appropriate notification and imposes substantial civil penalties on voting system vendors.

Many of the technical changes in this bill are acceptable, and I look forward to seeing a bill in the future that balances appropriate disclosure, without unnecessarily restricting a company's ability to do business in California.

Therefore I am unable to sign this bill.

Sincerely,

Arnold Schwarzenegger

The comment "this bill goes beyond insuring appropriate notification and imposes substantial civil penalties on voting system vendors" is telling.

The "substantial civil penalties on voting system vendors" that the bill would have required would be for systems that were in VIOLATION OF STATE LAW. Geez, would hate to "restrict a company's ability to do business in California" by requiring them to follow the rule of law and paying a --- rather modest --- fine where they failed to do so.

Apparently former, failed SoS Bruce McPherson's Diebold people have simply moved from the SoS' office to the Governor's office. Appalling.

The State Committee of the Arizona Democratic party will meet in Tucson, Saturday, May 9 at Amphitheater High School, 125 W. Yavapai.

Rep. Raul Grijalva, who leads the House of Representatives Congressional Progressive Caucus is expected to address the Progressive Caucus. The meeting is open to all.

Caucuses meet from 10-12 AM. Check at registration for room number assignments for the caucus you wish to attend. The general meeting convenes in the Auditorium at 1pm.

• Disabilities Caucus 10-11 am
• Native American 11am-1pm
• Veterans Caucus 11am-1pm
  
• Young Dems 10am-12pm
  
• Labor caucus 12pm-1pm
• Hispanic Caucus 10-11:30am
• LGBT Caucus 11:30am-1pm
• Federation of Women 10am-12pm
• Progressive Caucus 12-1pm

For the first time the Arizona Democratic Party will offer Workshops

Introduction to Voter File 10-11am and 12-1pm

Election Integrity 10am-12pm

State Election Integrity Chair former state represenatative Ted Downing will give an overview of the 3-part Election Integrity series to be offered at the summer and fall Arizona State Committee meetings.

Workshop 2 will cover Arizona Election Processes in Flagsgtaff
Workshop 3 will cover Arizona's vote-counting system.

Pima County Recorder the Honorable F. Ann Rodriguez will give an overview of the laws, procedures and mechanics of Voter Registration. The system is uniform statewide but there are some rural/urban variations. The focus is on how you can participate.

Vote probe raises fears '06 Pima County result, electronic system in question

by Dennis Wagner
The Arizona Republic
April 15, 2009 12:00 AM


Under the scrutiny of criminal investigators, election workers in Phoenix have spent the past week in a painstaking recount of 120,821 ballots that were cast three years ago for a Pima County transit tax.

The primary objective is to determine whether someone rigged the election by tampering with the optical-scan polling machines in Pima County, transforming "no" votes into "yes" votes.

The ballot measures wound up securing a half-cent increase in sales tax to provide cash for roads, buses and other transportation projects.

But ramifications of the ballot review may be even bigger than the $2.1 billion spending package: Voting machines in Pima County, which includes Tucson, are similar to those used in 12 of Arizona's 15 counties and in hundreds of jurisdictions across the country.

If it turns out the election was rigged by manipulating the computer programs, some fear, it will show weaknesses in electronic balloting that could endanger the democratic process.

Independent analysts and academic experts already have assailed Diebold Elections Systems, now known as Premier Election Solutions Inc., which manufactured the devices used in Tucson. They contend the electronic-voting machines are ripe for fraud.

And, no matter what happens with the recount, state Attorney General Terry Goddard said he is convinced the equipment jeopardizes election integrity.

"These (Premier) systems are very, very bad," Goddard said. "(They) are not state of the art in terms of security. They are not state of the art in terms of transparency."



Chris Riggall, a spokesman for Premier, said his company uses the most advanced technology available and urges clients to establish security protocols. Although there are internal safety features to prevent and detect tampering, Riggall added, those must be supported by external controls over election workers who handle the equipment.

"You can manipulate any voting system devised by man," he said, noting that even paper ballots are subject to fraud.

The Premier machines tabulate elections in about 1,700 U.S. cities, counties, states and other jurisdictions. Riggall said Pima County has a GEMS mainframe linked to AccuVote TSX touch-screen voting terminals. Grand jurors are reviewing allegations that an election technician in Tucson tampered with software, reversing the outcome of a funding vote for Pima County's Regional Transportation Authority.

Premier's machines showed a 60 percent vote in favor of a measure for the transit plan and 58 percent in favor of another measure imposing a half-cent sales-tax increase.

Officials with the Democratic and Libertarian parties alleged the financing measure, which failed four times previously and was far behind in pre-election polls, succeeded in 2006 because of fraud.

During an initial investigation, the Attorney General's Office hired an independent company to analyze the machines. Experts at iBeta Software Quality Assurance found a number of "irregularities" and determined that the Premier system had "fundamental security flaws."

They reported that a trained technician could have altered the vote and removed all evidence of the crime. However, they concluded that human error was a more likely culprit than fraud because evidence of tampering had not been erased.

The Attorney General's Office dropped the case in 2007, but the Democratic and Libertarian parties continued private investigations and filed lawsuits for election records against the Pima County Board of Supervisors, whose members all endorsed the RTA measure. During the case, county lawyers complained in a brief that they could not put up an adequate defense because of a concern that every employee who worked on the election computer might assert a Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.

Jim March, a Libertarian Party officer in Tucson, said he and John Brakey of the Pima County Democratic Party discovered that chief election technician Bryan Crane ran computer checks five days before the polling date to determine the vote tally based on more than 16,000 mail-in ballots.

Although it is not illegal to conduct such a check, it is unlawful to divulge the results because partisan activists could use pre-election tallies to decide on campaign finance and advertising strategies.

Something 'squirrelly'

March said testimony in the open-records case showed Pima County election staffers "were basically passing these results around like baseball scores."

"They were peeking into where votes were going," he added, "and there was something particularly squirrelly about the RTA election."

Brad Nelson, elections director for Pima County, said he does not believe there was any wrongdoing by employees. Crane did not respond to an interview offer made through Nelson. He has not been charged with any offense and continues overseeing Pima County's election technology.

Former Pima County employee Zbigniew Osmolski filed an affidavit in July alleging that he was in a Tucson lounge when Crane admitted that he had "fixed the RTA election on the instructions of his bosses" and was fearful of indictment.

That same month, Democratic Party attorney Bill Risner submitted a letter to Goddard asking that the criminal probe be reopened. Risner offered new evidence and complained of a cover-up during the first investigation, which was assisted by Pima County election officials.

Risner noted that, according to sworn courtroom testimony, Crane routinely took voting data home during elections and had his office computer connected to the GEMS system. He also claimed that Crane purchased a hacking device before the election, one with "no other purpose than to illegally alter the programming of precinct voting machines."

No county employee has been disciplined, Risner said, despite criminal and policy violations.

Goddard said he agreed to reinvestigate based on the "worrisome number of puzzling coincidences." To establish whether a crime took place, he added, the state must first learn whether the election outcome was bogus. That is why poll workers are hand-counting 105 boxes of ballots at a cost of over $12,000. The review is being done in Maricopa County, where Premier machines are not used, to avoid a conflict of interest.

Yet even the review, expected to end today, has been controversial. Critics questioned ballot security before the count and complained that Goddard's office limited their ability to observe the tabulation.

'Plenty annoyed'

"They're doing it in a way to make sure that the political parties don't know what's going on," Risner complained. "We're plenty annoyed with the secrecy."

The RTA has collected about $210 million since the sales-tax increase began three years ago.

If the recount shows that the measure should have failed, Goddard said, election results will not automatically be overturned. However, he said, such a finding could lead critics to seek court orders overturning the outcome.

But Nelson, the Pima County elections director, said he is convinced the original vote count was right. He said no new security has been added to the Premier system, "one of the best out there."

However, Nelson added, the county has instituted external safeguards to reduce the risk of tampering. The list includes a password system so no single employee can access the computer and 24-hour video surveillance of computers, beamed live on the Internet.

Risner's letter to Goddard portrays the more sinister image of election-fraud, adding, "Anything less than an honest count of the ballots is a crime that strikes at the heart of our democratic system."

Exclusive: Diebold 'Nukes' Humboldt County!

Terminates all contracts - including voter registration system - following California county's discovery, disclosure of major flaws in Diebold/Premier voting systems...

Guest Blogged by Parke Bostrom of the Humboldt Transparency Project

At the California Secretary of State's public hearing regarding the possible decertification of Diebold's tabulator systems, GEMS v1.18.19, in relation to the "Deck Zero" covert deletion of 197 ballots in the November election, the audit log's magical "clear" button, and the GEMS audit logs failing to report when ballots were manually deleted by the operator, Diebold/Premier representatives tried to shift blame for the 197 deleted ballots onto Humboldt County, CA's Registrar of Voters Carolyn Crnich.

Crnich responded, "If you're saying that your system needs to be checked every damn time we turn it on, I agree with you."

Crnich's use of an expletive seems to have pushed Diebold/Premier's legal counsel over the edge, causing them to reach for and firmly press the "nuke" button in response, by petulantly informing the county of termination of licensing for the use of any of the company's products. Click here for rest of the story.

Note:
The Humboldt Transparency Project is a nonpartisan citizens group dedicated to election integrity and accurate elections. The group worked with the Humboldt County Registrar of Voters to develop a system to scan ballots and use software to conduct an independent count. The group discovered what is known as the Humboldt Anomaly when the Diebold optical scan election system deleted 200 ballots from the initially certified election count. First Diebold tried to place blame on the Registrar of Voters, then finally admitted that the software has a 'DELETE' button for erasing audit logs in every version of its software. Yes, that means the ''DELETE' button existed on every version of Pima County GEMS software system used in past elections in Pima County. Diebold's retalitatory action against Humboldt County means that the County will no longer be able to operate its purchased optical scanners with GEMS software after California's May 19 election. A cost-effective system similar to the one developed by the Humboldt Transparency Project is being proposed for Pima County, although any change may require a new state law.
-----Sandra Spangler, Chair, Pima County Democratic Party Election Integrity Committee

The Tucson Weekly: RTA: OUR WAY OR NO WAY

The Skinny

by Mari Herreras, and Jim Nintzel

RTA: OUR WAY OR NO WAY

About a week after the Attorney General's Office took procession of the 2006 Regional Transportation Authority ballots, election-integrity activists made it clear that they were unhappy about the lack of security and oversight during the move.

They were also peeved about the fact that the ballots were going to land at the Maricopa County Elections Department—since the activists are even more suspicious of ballot security issues in Maricopa County.

Reaction from the AG's office was kind of like: "Hey everyone, it's going to be OK. Once we catch our breath after trucking those ballots to Phoenix, we're going to sit down and make a plan everyone will know about and be happy with."

Last week, that plan went public when representatives of Pima County's four political parties received a letter from Donald E. Conrad, chief counsel of the AG's Criminal Division. And to no great surprise, not everyone was happy with what was outlined in the letter in preparation of ballot-counting kickoff day, which will be Monday, April 6.

According to the letter (which you can read yourself at The Range, the Weekly's newly named blog), the hand-count will take place over the course of five days, and the Maricopa County Elections Department will indeed handle the process. It also asked that each party nominate three people, one of which the AG's Office will select from each party to witness the ballot examination.

However, the parties didn't just have to hand over the name of each person nominated; the parties were required to include birth dates and Social Security numbers for a background check. The deadline was Tuesday, March 30, giving party chairs less than two weeks to find people who have experience observing elections, can pass a background check and can spend five days in Phoenix.

Election-integrity folks and Jeff Rogers, the Pima County Democratic Party chair, raised concerns about the time commitment and complained that the three-nominee requirement could be a way for the AG's Office to keep outspoken election peeps out of the way. You know, people like John Brakey and Jim March.

Rogers contacted the AG's Office regarding his concerns and eventually talked to the man himself: Attorney General Terry Goddard. Rogers says Goddard gave him the OK to allow each party to instead provide one or two names, rather than the requested three. Rogers also asked Goddard if observers could bring in magnifying glasses to look at ballots more closely, which was also given the OK. (The letter said observers would not be allowed to bring in paper, pencils or even guns.).


Rogers told The Skinny that the Dems were nominating attorney Roger White, who is between jobs at the moment, and Ben Love, a U.S. Air Force retiree. (Both have participated as observers in the past.)

Bob Westerman, the Pima County Republican Party chair, says he'd rather not reveal the names of his nominees. However, Westerman—like Rogers—says he thought it was peculiar that each party had to submit three names.

"As far as the process, I find it a little odd that we have to submit three names," Westerman says. "... I don't see how it would matter who it is. It is an extra step I don't understand. And for me, as a chairman, it makes it tough to find three people qualified, but who can also spend five days in Phoenix."

If you didn't get a chance to be nominated, but want a seat for the count (which is not a "recount" in the sense that it could change the election results, but a count as part of the AG's criminal investigation), the AG will have an area set up to accommodate a limited number of people interested in watching through a glass partition. And Maricopa Elections has made arrangements to put the process on the Internet via live streaming video.

Those Internet addresses, and details on how to get access to the viewing area, are forthcoming from the AG's office, according to the letter

Election Integrity: VoterACTION Video Points to Electronic Election Threats

Voter Action has filed lawsuits in 13 key states, (including Arizona) to promote public control of public elections and challenged the uncritical adoption of fatally flawed election systems sold by unaccountable private companies. Experts say that electronic voting produces unverifiable results.

The German High Court recently declared election computers unconstitutional.

CIA cybersecurity expert Steve Stigall recently described to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission attempts to use computers to undermine elections in developing nations. Stigall told the Commission that computerized election systems can be "manipulated at five stages, from altering voter registration lists to posting results." Stigall warned that "whenever the vote becomes an electron and touches a computer, that's an opportunity for a malicious actor potentially to ...make bad things happen." Must read why we must NOT adopt Internet voting!

Tucson Citizen: Hand count of the 2006 RTA election ballots begins Monday

TO VIEW

The public can view the hand count proceedings online at http://recorder.maricopa.gov/elections/Live_Feeds/south_view.aspx


April 5, 2009

GARRY DUFFY
Tucson Citizen
A hand count of the 2006 Regional Transportation Authority election ballots that begins Monday won't necessarily impact the official election results, regardless of what it reveals.

The Arizona attorney general is investigating complaints by critics of electronic vote systems that the election results might have been criminally tampered with to ensure its success.

The hand count by the Maricopa County Elections Division will be observed by a single representative from each of the Democratic, Republican, and Libertarian parties in Pima County.

"The intent of the count is not to change or confirm the election results," Anne Titus Hilby, the department of law press secretary at the Attorney General's Office, said Friday.

"The information learned from this will determine what the next steps will be," Hilby said.

Arizona election laws do not address what should follow if vote or ballot tampering is uncovered. The allowable timeline for challenging the official results has long since passed.

The investigation is a criminal probe, "not an elections process controlled by applicable Arizona election laws," Donald E. Conrad, criminal division chief counsel, wrote to leaders of Pima County political parties last month.

Conrad outlined the procedures that will be followed during the ballot examination process, which can be observed in person by one representative of local political parties.

Party officials were told to submit three names each as potential observers. The Attorney General's Office is to select the actual observers from the parties.

The observers will be subject to searches. They will not be allowed to bring cameras, cell phones, writing instruments, or audio or video recorders into the areas where the ballots will be examined.

Party officials said the requirement to submit three names to the office as potential observers was hard to meet because the selected observer would have to commit to five work days next week at the Maricopa County Elections Division.

"It was difficult. It is up there in Phoenix," Jeff Rogers, chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party, said.


The Pima County Republican Party also submitted three names as potential observers, Paula Maxwell, executive director, said.

Pima County Libertarians submitted a single name. That person was rejected by the Attorney General's Office after a background check showed that elections integrity activist Jim March pleaded guilty in California in 1993 to misdemeanor traffic charges. He did so "to make it go away," March said Friday.

"The real goal here is to prevent anyone from keeping an independent tally of the vote," March said.

Attorney General Terry Goddard's office did not immediately release the names of selected observers.

The issue over electronic vote and ballot tabulating by the Pima County Elections Division arose in 2007 when the local Democratic Party filed a lawsuit in Superior Court seeking access to the vote and ballot tallying databases for all elections conducted using the computerized Diebold-GEMS electronic system dating to the late 1990s.

Democrats said they wanted experts to look at the databases to see if the system was vulnerable to manipulation that could alter vote totals.

County officials refused and the case was tried last year.

Superior Court Judge Michael Miller in December 2007 ordered the county to turn over some of the electronic vote records, but solely from the May 2006 special election.

It was the first court ruling in the nation where a jurisdiction was ordered to release such records to a political party.

The Pima County Board of Supervisors later directed that the RTA and all other electronic vote records be released to the Democrats.

One Wisconsin Now Exposes Voter Suppression Plans Between Republican Party of Wisconsin, Americans for Prosperity, Tea Party Group

September 20, 2010

Coordination on Voter Caging, Targeting Minorities, College Students Outlined in Documents, Tea Party Meeting Recording

Madison – A coordinated plot by the Republican Party of Wisconsin, Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin and organizations in the so-called Tea Party movement targeting minority voters and college students in a possibly illegal “voter caging” effort for voter suppression has been uncovered in evidence obtained by One Wisconsin Now, a statewide advocacy organization in Madison, Wisconsin.

“Based on what we have heard, the Republican Party of Wisconsin, the Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin and leading Tea Party organizations are in collusion in an effort to suppress the ability of minorities and university students in Wisconsin to exercise their right to vote this November,” said Scot Ross, One Wisconsin Now Executive Director. “We will be providing all of the evidence we have received on this wrongdoing to federal and state authorities so that they can investigate to ensure justice and democracy prevail.”

Ross said One Wisconsin Now will today be filing formal requests for investigation with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, as well as the Wisconsin Attorney General’s Election Integrity Task Force and the Government Accountability Board demanding a full investigation to ensure the right to vote is not stolen by these plans.

The non-partisan Brennan Center for Justice outlines the process of voter caging:

Voter caging is the practice of sending mail to addresses on the voter rolls, compiling a list of the mail that is returned undelivered, and using that list to purge or challenge voters registrations on the grounds that the voters on the list do not legally reside at their registered addresses. Supporters of voter caging defend the practice as a means of preventing votes cast by ineligible voters. Voter caging, however, is notoriously unreliable. If it is treated (unjustifiably) as the sole basis for determining that a voter is ineligible or does not live at the address at which he or she registered, it can lead to the unwarranted purge or challenge of eligible voters. …Moreover, the practice has often been targeted at minority voters, making the effects even more pernicious. [Brennan Center, “A Guide to Voter Caging,” 6/29/07]

One Wisconsin Now obtained an audio recording it has verified as authentic from a June 16, 2010 meeting between the leaders of the state’s Tea Party movement, led by Tim Dake, head of the GrandSons of Liberty. Dake serves as a regular spokesperson for Wisconsin’s Tea Party organizations and is widely viewed as the movement’s Wisconsin leader. The full audio, available at One Wisconsin Now’s voter protection website, www.SaveWisconsinsVote2010.org, details the plans for a coordinated voter suppression efforts, which is anchored in challenging voter eligibility on Election Day this November 2.

THE PLOT

According to the statements made on the recordings, Dake lays out the plans, detailing contact between himself and Reince Preibus, the Republican Party of Wisconsin Chair and Mark Block, state director of Americans for Prosperity-Wisconsin:

• The Republican Party of Wisconsin will use its “Voter Vault” state-wide voter file to compile a list of minority and student voters in targeted Wisconsin communities.
• Americans for Prosperity will use this list to send mail to these voters indicating the voter must call and confirm their registration information, and telling them if they do not call the number provided they could be removed from the voter lists.
• The Tea Party organizations will recruit and place individuals as official poll workers in selected municipalities in order to be able to make the challenges as official poll workers.
• On Election Day, these organizations will then “make use” of any postcards that are returned as undeliverable to challenge voters at the polls, utilizing law enforcement, as well as attorneys trained and provided by the RPW, to support their challenges. 
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Continue reading here:

Blue Dogs Fill Their Bowls with Cash

Moderate Democratic Coalition’s Leverage Draws Interest Across Spectrum
By Josh Israel, Aaron Mehta
Center for Public Integrity
July 22, 2009

Whether the subject is health care reform, climate change, or pay-as-you-go budgeting rules, almost everyone, it seems, suddenly wants to talk with the Blue Dogs. President Obama’s White House meeting with members of the fiscally conservative Democratic coalition earlier this week is but the latest indication that the Blue Dogs — 52 members strong — have deftly turned themselves into a key voting bloc at the nexus of power. With them, the Democrats do not need a single Republican to back their legislation; without them, the Democratic agenda would be in serious peril. And as their clout has expanded, fundraising has grown accordingly, not just from traditionally Democratic contributors, but from unexpected quarters as well.

So far this year, the Blue Dog Political Action Committee is on track to shatter all its fundraising records; in fact, the total for the first six months of 2009 — more than $1.1 million — is greater than what was raised in the entire 2003-04 fundraising cycle.

Furthermore, according to analysis by the Center for Public Integrity of CQ MoneyLine data, the energy, financial services, and health care industries have accounted for nearly 54 percent of the Blue Dog PAC’s 2009 receipts (up from 45 percent in 2004).

These contributions poured in as President Obama and the Democratic Congress have been making a major push to reform health care, develop a new energy policy, and restructure oversight of the banking sector. Clearly, these Dogs are having their day.

FROM SMALL PAC TO TOP DOGS

Their beginnings were humble. The Blue Dog Coalition was formed in 1995 following elections the previous fall that cost Democrats control of Congress. One of the co-founders, then-Alabama Representative Glen Browder, says the original members — 23 in all — “were unhappy with the direction of our own party and felt we needed to chart our own course.” Drawing from a combination of a famous series of paintings of blue-colored dogs by George Rodrigue and the notion that they were “yellow dog democrats” who had been “choked blue” by the liberals who dominated the party, they became “The Blue Dogs.”

Over time they evolved into what former Texas Representative Nick Lampson calls “a close-knit group.” Today, they hold weekly meetings with no staffers and focus on voting as a bloc. One issue above all others unifies them: a commitment to fiscal discipline. For instance, the group has successfully pushed for President Obama to endorse a pay-as-you-go requirement for Congressional budgeting; a PAYGO bill passed the House on Wednesday. The group’s website describes the coalition as “a policy-oriented group [formed] to give moderate and conservative Democrats in the House of Representatives a common sense, bridge-building voice within the institution,” and notes their relentless pursuit of a balanced budget.

As the coalition grew, it quickly sought to raise money to protect and expand its ranks, forming a political action committee in August 1995 just for Blue Dogs.

THE POWER OF THE PAC

As individuals, the 52 Blue Dogs have received the plurality of their 2009 campaign contributions from a traditional Democratic ally: organized labor. Labor political action committees have filled the Blue Dog Coalition members’ campaign committee coffers with more than a million dollars so far this cycle.




Click for larger view




But it’s the Blue Dog PAC that is most illuminating for spotting trends. The Blue Dog PAC raises money mostly from other PACs and automatically disburses the maximum possible contribution to each of its members for their re-election campaigns. This helps preserve their ranks, especially since many of them represent swing districts and are among the most targeted incumbents at election time.
There is much more! For the rest of the story, click here.

60 Minutes: Cyber War: Sabotaging the System

Nov. 8, 2009

Former Chief of National Intelligence Says U.S. Unprepared for Cyber Attacks


(CBS) Nothing has ever changed the world as quickly as the Internet has. Less than a decade ago, "60 Minutes" went to the Pentagon to do a story on something called information warfare, or cyber war as some people called it. It involved using computers and the Internet as weapons.

Much of it was still theory, but we were told that before too long it might be possible for a hacker with a computer to disable critical infrastructure in a major city and disrupt essential services, to steal millions of dollars from banks all over the world, infiltrate defense systems, extort millions from public companies, and even sabotage our weapons systems.

Today it's not only possible, all of that has actually happened, plus a lot more we don't even know about.

Watch VIDEO


Watch CBS News Videos Online

26Dems Editorial Note.Election Integrity Advocates, aware of the vulnerabilities in electronic voting machines, have urged successfully in Pima County that voting equipment be disconnected from the internet. Other jurisdictions, including Maricopa County still are connected. The reality is that security has already been breached at CENTCOM, the power grid, and our banking system. If it is easy to get a generator to destroy itself, or to rob a bank of 10 million dollars in 24 hours with a click of the mouse, it would be just as easy for a foreign entity to hack into our voting systems and interfere with American elections.

Federal Prosecutors: Kentucky Officials Manipulated Clay County Elections for Decades

By Brad Friedman
The Bradblog
1/05/2010

The BRAD BLOG has long endeavored to fight back against the disinformation being put forward by the GOP "voter fraud" charlatans and fraudsters contending that massive fraud is being carried out by voters at the polls, requiring the institution of disenfranchising Photo ID restrictions at the polling place which would result in some 21 million Americans being unable to cast their legal votes, according to the League of Women Voters and most other serious experts on these matters.

Once again, a story out of Kentucky helps us highlight that it's election insiders, not voters themselves, who are, by far, the greatest threat to the integrity of elections.

We reported early last year on the passel of election officials in Clay County, KY, arrested for buying and selling votes, manipulating ES&S electronic voting machines without the knowledge of voters, and otherwise fixing elections from 2002 to 2006.

As their January 19 trial date nears, more motions are being filed by federal prosecutors. The latest, filed last week, alleges that two of the top officials charged --- one, a circuit court judge and the other, the county school Superintendent --- had been fixing elections for decades before their recent indictments...

Click on the text block to read more about vote-flipping ES&S machines.

More on votes disappearing FL-13: GAO Finds Prior Tests Do NOT Offer 'Reasonable Assurance' That Touch-Screen Machines Were Not at Fault in Sarasota's November 2006 Election

Continue reading here.