I'd also remind them that Christine Jennings in Sarasota is still fighting for the seat she most probably won in Florida's 13th congressional district last November. Despite having been announced the "loser" on Election Night, even the voting machine company's only expert placed on the stand in the state election contest, admitted that were it not for problems on the touch-screen DREs, Jennings would likely have won the election she was certified as having "lost" by just 369 votes. While thousands of dollars are spent on attorneys to try and reverse the Election Night finding in state court and in a federal Congressional challenge, the Republican Vern Buchanan continues to sit and vote in Congress.
Computer scientists have confirmed to me that "paper trails" added to those DRE voting systems in democratic-leaning Sarasota, where 18,000 electronic ballots failed to report a vote in the race, would have reflected the same inexplicable undervote rate. Nonetheless, Holt supporters point to the election and say over and over again --- without evidence --- that the bill would keep such a disaster from happening again.
With all of that in mind, it seems fair to ask for the name of just one Congress member who would vote against counting the votes actually verified by his or her constituents. Just one. Anybody?
(See the graphic at the end of this article, created by VotersUnite.org, to better understand how it is impossible for a voter to verify their ballot before it is cast and counted on a DRE voting system, and how DRE paper printouts serve only to offer voters a false sense of security that their vote will actually be recorded as they intended.)
Many Election Integrity advocates, such as myself, but even the bulk of those who support the Holt Bill, have argued that DRE voting systems should never be used in American democracy.
Holt Bill supporters such as computer scientists and voting machine experts like professor Avi Rubin of Johns Hopkins and professor David Dill of Stanford, along with Warren Stewart, policy director of one of HR 811's most ardent supporters, VoteTrustUSA, have all gone on record stating that DREs should never be used.
Rubin: "[A]fter four years of studying the issue, I now believe that a DRE with a VVPAT is not a reasonable voting system."
Dill (who has been circumspect in his public comments, but has been more direct in private emails that I reviewed as sent to others): "I would personally prefer to see optical scan machines used nationwide."
Stewart: "While this broad based movement embraces a wide range of proposals and positions, it is unified in the conclusion that the direct electronic recording of votes to computer memory is inimical to democracy."
That's just a small sampling, and only from amongst supporters of the Holt bill.
And yet, with those rather direct pronouncements against the use of DREs, all of those quoted above, have been quoted, time and again, that while they'd rather not see DREs be used, an amendment to require a paper ballot --- one that is actually tabulated after being verified and cast by the voter --- could not be passed by Congress.
Fair enough. But where is the evidence for such a claim?
I have yet to hear the name of even ONE Congress person who would vote against verified ballots.
The line, originally propagated by Holt's office, and widely echoed by the well-financed pro-Holt lobbying efforts by People for the American Way (PFAW) and elsewhere, suggests that a DRE ban could not succeed. The line has subsequently been passed on as accepted gospel by folks like Dill and Rubin and Stewart and the majority of the Holt supporting minions.
Never mind that such a ban has already been passed by the new Republican governor of Florida, Charlie Crist and the Republican state House and Senate down there, Holt supporters at the Federal level (mostly Democrats and their public-advocacy supporters) have taken it for granted that they could not pass a similar ban.
And yet, in all the months I've been trying, I've been unable to come up with a single name of a single Congressional Holt supporter (the bill currently has 216 co-sponsors) who has said they would not vote for the bill if it included such a ban.
With all of those Congressional supporters, I'm sure there must be some of them who would not vote for the bill if it included such a ban, yet I've been unable able to identify any of them, so far, and none of Holt's most ardent supporters have been able to give me a single name.
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