A bad electronic voting bill
A New York Times editorial of Sunday, August 3, 2008.
Congress has stood idly by while states have done the hard work of trying to make electronic voting more reliable. Now the Senate is taking up a dangerous bill introduced by Senators Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, and Robert Bennett, Republican of Utah, that would make things worse in the name of reform. If Congress will not pass a strong bill, it should apply the medical maxim: first, do no harm.
Voters cannot trust the totals reported by electronic voting machines; they are too prone to glitches and too easy to hack. In the last few years, concerned citizens have persuaded states to pass bills requiring electronic voting machines to use paper ballots or produce voter-verifiable paper records of every vote. More than half of the states now have such laws.
There is still a need for a federal law, so voting is reliable in every state. A good law would require that every vote in a federal election produce a voter-verifiable paper record…
A New York Times editorial of Sunday, August 3, 2008.
Congress
has stood idly by while states have done the hard work of trying to
make electronic voting more reliable. Now the Senate is taking up a
dangerous bill introduced by Senators Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of
California, and Robert Bennett, Republican of Utah, that would make
things worse in the name of reform. If Congress will not pass a
strong bill, it should apply the medical maxim: first, do no harm.
Voters
cannot trust the totals reported by electronic voting machines; they
are too prone to glitches and too easy to hack. In the last few
years, concerned citizens have persuaded states to pass bills
requiring electronic voting machines to use paper ballots or produce
voter-verifiable paper records of every vote. More than half of the
states now have such laws.
There
is still a need for a federal law, so voting is reliable in every
state. A good law would require that every vote in a federal election
produce a voter-verifiable paper record, and it would mandate that
the paper records be the official ballots. It would impose careful
standards for how these paper ballots must be “audited,” to
verify that the tallies on the electronic machines are correct.
The
Feinstein-Bennett bill does none of these. It would permit states to
verify electronic voting machines’ results using electronic records
rather than paper. Verifying by electronic records — having one
piece of software attest that another piece of software is honest —
is not verifying at all. The bill is also vague about rules for
audits, leaving considerable room for mischief. The timeline also is
unacceptable. States might be able to use unreliable machines through
2014 or longer.
This
bill goes out of its way to placate voting machine manufacturers and
local election officials, two groups that have consistently been on
the wrong side of electronic voting integrity. Reform groups like
Verified Voting, which have done critical work in the states, say
they were not allowed to provide input.
The
bill would do some good things, including reducing the conflicts of
interest that plague the process for certifying voting machines. But
the damage it would do is much greater.
Ms.
Feinstein introduced a better bill last year, which would have
required a paper record of every vote, but she could not get enough
support to pass it. If Congress cannot pass a good bill, it should
let the states continue to do the hard work — and be prepared to
explain to voters why it cannot muster the will to protect the
integrity of American elections.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/opinion/03sun2.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
