Category: Recounts/Recanvasses

Lessons From RI/DC – Hand Recounts & Voter Fraud

The Providence Journal has the story of a very close primary in our neighboring state. There are some interesting lessons here. <read>

First there is a reason CTVotersCount wants manual hand-to-eye counts in close races, rather than reading the votes through a machine. Primarily (no pun intended) any machine errors will likely just be repeated. Also, CT like RI is a voters intent state – we count votes as the voter intended, not as the machine requires – so counting by hand in close races is the only way to really determine voters intent in races where the margin is very small. Lets not be like RI and depend on courts and candidates to do the right thing:

The amended court order mirrors one issued Wednesday in the case of a candidate for state Senate in Warwick, David Bennett, who lost his bid for a place on the November ballot to Erin Lynch in the Sept. 9 primary.

Both orders require the recounting of all provisional, mail and regular ballots cast. In addition, the court ordered the state Board of Elections to examine any ballots rejected by the optical scanning machines to determine which candidate, if any, the voters intended to choose but failed to mark the ballot correctly.

Actually the RI court should have gone further and ordered a full hand count — just because the machines read the ballots, it does not mean they read the voters intent accurately. Having observed 16 post-election audits in Connecticut, from first hand observation, I can attest that sometimes an optical scan ballot is such that the circle that is filled in is crossed out, but the machine cannot determine that. There is also the unlikely possibility that an optical scanner might just not work well. OK so its not so unlikely anymore, given recent tests in a real election in Washington, D. C.

Back to RI, it seems there was also a bit of voter fraud, with a good evidence trail. The only question remaining is, will it be prosecuted? Remember the Attorney General scandal? It was all about prosecuting non-existent voter fraud.

During a hearing involving the Alves protest, West Warwick’s deputy town clerk reported to the state Board of Elections that 13 Republicans had voted in the Democratic primary. Taveras reviewed each of the nearly 2,000 ballot applications, finding the signatures of two more Republicans who apparently voted. Taveras also told the board that there were three more Democratic ballots cast without corresponding ballot applications, creating a total of 18 questionable ballots.

In the Bennett hearing, Taveras said that his comparison of numbers from the Board of Elections and from the Warwick Board of Canvassers showed that 31 ballots were cast without signed application forms. He said that as many as 19 Republicans voted in that Democratic primary.

“This isn’t an isolated mistake,” Lynch, the chairman of the state Democratic Party, said. “There are [many] separate instances where Republicans signed for Democratic blue ballots and voted in the Democratic primary. That’s no mistake.”…

However, Lynch said the law isn’t as lenient. Rhode Island law considers it a felony to vote in any election that an individual “knows or should know” that he or she is not eligible to vote.

“I think if you’re a registered Republican, you know enough not to vote in the Democratic primary,” he said. “I know enough not to vote in the Republican primary.”

******
Update 06/06/2009 Washington Post: Firm to Give D.C. Information About Its Voting Devices <read>

Sequoia agrees to hand over source code and documentation under rasonable terms.  This should be the normal response to every voting discrepancy traced to a voting machine.  It should not require going to court.

Sequoia Voting Systems agreed yesterday to turn over sensitive information to the D.C. Council about how the District’s voting machines work and tabulate results, setting the stage for one of the most comprehensive probes on the reliability of electronic voting equipment.

The agreement is a response to the election night chaos in the September primaries, when Sequoia machines tabulated more ballots than there were voters, resulting in thousands of phantom votes.

Electoral change advocates said the agreement, finalized yesterday in D.C. Superior Court after the city threatened a lawsuit, is one of the first times a manufacturer of electronic voting machines has been forced to endure a public vetting of how its equipment tabulates returns.

“It is certainly going to serve as a precedent not just for further investigations in the District of Columbia, but around the country,” said John Bonifaz, legal director for Voter Action, a national voting rights organization.

The Perils of Dependent Investigation

One of the prime objectives our Petition To Enhance Confidence In Connecticut Elections is “Requiring the Independent Audit Review Board”. Here is an example of the questions that can surround an investigation by an elections entity attempting to investigate itself, in Washington, D. C., from the Washington Post, Primary Vote Still Doesn’t Add Up: <read>

As District officials continue to investigate errors in the early vote tallies from the Sept. 9 primary, one number stands out: 1,542.

That number appeared in the category for “over votes” in 13 separate races when the D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics released early results on election night. But those votes inexplicably vanished shortly after midnight, when officials posted what they identified as corrected results…

A memo obtained by The Washington Post shows that three of the four members of the elections board task force reviewing the blunders also work for the board: Darlene Lesesne-Horton, data services manager; Mohammad M.B. Maeruf, information technology project manager; and Vialetta Graham, chief technology officer. The fourth member is Clifford Tatum, a Help America Vote Act consultant from Georgia…He said that too often elections boards become the chief investigators when something goes awry.

“Yet again, they are investigating their own mistakes,” Jefferson said. “Time and time again, experience shows we need independent technical investigations of incidents like this. I wish the D.C. Council or whoever has authority would just order it.”

Several years ago, questions arose about the academic background of Graham, the board’s chief technology officer.

In 2003, the District’s inspector general completed a year-long investigation on the board and found that Graham had misrepresented her academic credentials on two city job applications, saying she had received a bachelor’s degree in computer science from American University when she had not.

Update: What Could Possibly Be Worse Than Dependent Investigation? Relying on the vendor to explain discrepancies: The West Palm Beach problem goes on and on <read>

They’ve called in Sequoia Voting Systems, the company that sold the county the machines.

The board says those officials are flying in from California and are expected to look into the issue Monday.

Canvassing board interim chair, Judge Peter Evans, told election workers and reporters Sunday, “At this point we feel its best to step back and get these questions answered before we take any further steps hastily and that’s what we’re going to do.”…

The canvassing board is expected to meet Monday afternoon at 3pm for an update on Sequoia’s findings.

Reference: VotersUnite report on outsourcing.

Its The Voters’ Fault – We Couldn’t Erase Their Vote

Disturbing article from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Following directions counts in vote. Recent recounts show voter errors can change tally <read>

The first disturbing thing is the thrust of the article that the reasons elections get overturned in recounts is the fault of the voters filling out ballots incorrectly. That is one point of view, but another is that the reason we recount close races is to assure that the intentions of the voters are followed. Its not to determine if voters are able to follow directions or if election officials are able to make voting convenient and easy to understand.

With the presidential election and its expected heavy voter turnout right around the corner, municipal clerks must issue a note of caution: If you want your vote to count, be sure to follow the instructions.
In these days of electronic vote counting, it seems a bit unusual for any votes to surface only after a recount.
But, as it turns out, these are mostly all cases of voter error.

But much more disturbing to me is that the “error” mail-in absentee voters make is using a pen, not the specified #2 pencil to fill out the ballot. Do I have to spell this out? Don’t know how to program a computer? Just bring an eraser to the counting room!

More specifically, Rennert said, the problem is the result of voters using a black pen to mark the absentee ballot.
This happens despite very explicit instructions that read in bold type, “Important, please use a No. 2 pencil or marking pen provided only.”
The marking pen is provided to people who vote in their municipal office in person. Voters who mail-in absentee ballots must use a No. 2 pencil.

Ten Myths In The Nutmeg State

Ten Myths About Electronic Voting In Connecticut: Myth #1 – Connecticut has the toughest and strongest audit law in the country because we audit 10%.

Ten Myths About Electronic Voting In Connecticut <.pdf>

Myth #1 – Connecticut has the toughest and strongest audit law in the country because we audit 10%.

Reality

  • Connecticut audits a maximum of 3 or 20% of races in 10% of the districts.  This is adequate only in the case of statewide races which are selected for the audit.
  • Questions, referendums, and special elections are exempt from audits.  Centrally scanned absentee ballots and all hand counted ballots also are exempt from the audits.
  • In a state representative race or municipal race, the probability of detecting an error or fraud is in the range of 2-4%.  This is far from sufficient.
  • Towns with only one district would have municipal races audited an average of once in 20 years.
  • Districts where there is an automatically recanvassed race or a contested race are exempt from audits – a state wide recanvass or contest would block all audits for the election in the entire state.
  • Selection of the races to be audited is not required to be public. Audits are public, yet have no statutory prior public notification requirement. 

Myth #2 – UConn reports of the post-election audits proved that our voting machines count accurately.

Reality

  • In 2010 Registrars reported 29 instances of differences between the machine and hand counts with differences ranging from 6 to 40 for a candidate, in a single district. The highest percentage discrepancies was 22%.  Such differences have continued at unacceptable levels, uninvestigated.
  • Without transparent investigations we can’t attribute the differences to either machine or human counting errors. Evidence for a complete investigation is no longer available as the ballots are no longer under seal.
  • Observations of the actual audits raise questions about the credibility of the data provided to UConn. In Aug 2012 31% of reports by towns did not contain data necessary to determine the outcome of the audit, and an additional six reports were lost or never filed with the Secretary of the State.

 

Myth #3 –Hand counting is prone to human error. Electronic voting is more reliable because computers produce the same result over and over again. We should abandon manual audits and just run the ballots through another similar machine to validate the count.

Reality

  • Computers and memory cards are programmed by humans and just as prone to human error.
  • An improperly programmed computer will miscount the vote over and over again.
  • Since all cards in a district should by definition contain exactly the same information, re-scanning on a similar machine would not detect erroneous or fraudulent programming.
  • People can determine voter intent more exactly.  They can produce an accurate/verifiable count given time, proper procedures, and controls.
  • However, it is likely that publicly verifiable, “software independent”, automated audits will be feasible.

 

Myth #4 – Auditing the paper by hand is too costly and time consuming.

Reality

  • A sufficient hand audit would cost between $0.25 and $0.50 per ballot cast for the largest elections in Connecticut – a small fraction of the cost of conducting an election ($5.00 to $20.00 per ballot cast).
  • The integrity of the vote and public confidence should drive decisions related to the conduct of elections.  Cost, speed, and inconvenience are important, yet secondary, considerations.

 

Myth #5 – We can rely on procedures to catch errors and ensure the integrity of elections.

Reality

  • Procedures are followed inconsistently, at best, sometimes not at all, and there is no enforceable penalty for failing to follow part or all of a procedure. Ballots and optical scanners have been left unsealed and unattended.  Ballots have been unsealed and audits begun before the stated start of “public” audits.
  • Only processes which are codified in the statutes are clearly enforceable.

Myth #6 – Memory card errors cannot affect the outcome of our elections because election officials conduct pre-election testing of our electronic voting systems.

Reality

  • Pre-election testing cannot detect all errors and programming attacks. Pre-election testing of electronic voting systems will detect only basic errors such as ‘junk’ memory cards, wrong candidates, and machines that simply don’t work.
  • Computer science tells us it is impossible to test completely.  Recent academic reports continue to outline many ways that clever programming can circumvent detection during basic pre-election testing.

 

Myth #7 – We don’t have to worry about memory card problems because UConn tests the memory cards before and after each election.

Reality

  • UConn’s program is useful program, however, the trend is for fewer and fewer districts to send in cards for testing before and after the election. Selection is unlikely to be random.
  • Many districts fail to send memory to UConn cards for pre- and post-election testing. In the 2012 Presidential Primary, compliance in submitting cards by local officials ranged from 8% to 18%.
  • UConn reported that cards indicated that pre-election testing procedures continue not be followed consistently. How can we be sure the procedure for random selection of cards was followed?
  • Over the years the number of cards tested per election have declined and reports have been delayed.

 

Myth #8 – If we can trust our money to ATMs and online banking, we can trust our votes to computers.

Reality

  • Banks lose billions in online banking fraud every year. The savings ought weigh the costs to banks. Errors can be easily detected because the customer receives a receipt and the bank must account for all funds by double-entry bookkeeping.
  • Memory cards for elections are programmed differently for each town and every election because the races on the ballot and the candidates are different in each town and in each election.  In addition, voters cannot be issued any receipt to take with them because it would open the door to vote buying and intimidation.
  • The only public security test of an Internet voting system, in Washington D.C., was quickly compromised.
  • The only way to be sure the machines count correctly is to count enough of the paper to ensure that if fraud or error were to occur it would be detected. Secret voting precludes paper records for online voting.

 

Myth #9 – If there is ever a concern we can always count the paper.

Reality

The law limits when the paper can be counted.

  • Audits can protect against error or fraud only if enough of the paper is counted and discrepancies in the vote are investigated and acted upon in time to impact the outcome of the election.  See myths #1 and #2.
  • An automatic recanvass (recount) occurs when the winning vote margin is within 0.5%. The local Head Moderator moderator or the Secretary of the State can call for a recanvass, but even candidates must convince a court that there is sufficient reason for an actual recount.
  • Recounting by hand is not required by law. In early 2008 the Secretary of the State reversed her policy of hand recanvasses.  We now recanvass by optical scanner.
  • In 2010, the Citizen Recount showed huge discrepancies in Bridgeport, never recognized by the ‘system’.

 

Myth #10 – The only way to ensure that all the votes are counted and that every vote counts is to count 100% of the paper.

Reality

Properly programmed scanners do a reasonable job of counting ballots.  The key to safe elections is to:

  1. Appoint an independent Audit Board with expertise in auditing and statistics to oversee the audits.
  2. Count enough of the ballots to detect and deter error or fraud.
  3. Investigate discrepancies and determine their cause, then take corrective and preventative action.
  4. Expand the audit when discrepancies are uncovered that have the potential to impact an election outcome
  5. Start and complete audits quickly so that data is preserved and the winners reflect the intent of the voters.
  6. Codify and enforce the process so violations can be prevented or surfaced and corrected.

 

West Hartford GAE Hearing

 Update:  View Hearing at <CT-N>

There were about seventy five people at the West Hartford Government Administration and Elections Committee hearing. It was standing room only, with just a handful need to stand. Unlike the other hearings it was taped by CT-N.

The vast majority of attendees were registrars, moderators, and other election officials. It is hard to believe that this was not an orchestrated turn-out. In fact, before the hearing began, one disappointed registrar left – he told us he had been told it was some type of training, he had not expected a hearing – he had changed his plans to come, cancelled a meeting, and was leaving to go to another obligation.

Continue reading “West Hartford GAE Hearing”

Bysiewicz Prepared To Eliminate Manual Recounts

Update: The word “prepared” does not not necessarily imply “will”.   Apparently no decision has been made.  However, we now have a member of the GAE committee who has suggested machine recounts, the Secretary has mentioned it before, and the GAE leadership mentioned the possibility at the press conference announcing public hearings.  This remains a bad idea which we hope will be quickly rejected.

*****

The Secretary of the State of Connecticut is prepared to discontinue manual recounts in close races. In an e-mail to advocates, good government groups, and the leadership of the Registrar of Voters Association, Deputy Secretary of the State Lesley Mara wrote:

From: Lesley Mara [Deputy Secretary of the State]

Subject: Memory Card audit report

I have received questions from some of you regarding recounts. As you all know, our regulations regarding optical scan machines call for a review of every ballot in the event of a recount. Where all parties agree that a ballot is clearly and properly marked in a way intended to be read by the scanner, that ballot is put in one pile. All “questionable ballots” are placed in another pile and, of course, are hand counted. Those properly marked are run through a new scanner. This procedure was used most recently in the Courtney/Simmons recount.

The Secretary exercised her authority to specify another procedure this past November during the first statewide use of optical scan technology, given that we had not finalized all of the pieces we now have in place with [the University of Connecticut] UCONN (e.g., post-election audits of memory cards). Since November, we have spoken to legislators and election officials and UCONN and we are prepared to return to the original procedure. Of course, we welcome your thoughts on this issue as well when we meet tomorrow.

Continue reading “Bysiewicz Prepared To Eliminate Manual Recounts”

Bysiewicz To Consider Elimination Of Manual Recounts

Last year the Legislature passed PA 07-194 mandating audits of the optical scan machines. Last year, Secretary of the State, Susan Bysiewicz promised advocates that regulations would mandate that recounts be manual counts and did not need to be included in the law. Now with less than half the mandated audits complete, according to the New London Day she is reconsidering that promise. Just one example of why it is not safe to rely on regulations and procedures to accomplish what should be in the law: <read>

Bysiewicz said if those results continue, she would recommend that future recounts be done by feeding the ballots into a different optical scanner from the one used during the election. Election workers would have to count only ballots that could not be read by the machines.

It seems she may not recommend that change for audits, just for recounts. But don’t voters have even more interest in seeing that their votes were counted as intended in a recanvass?

The audits were specifically designed and specifically mandated to answer the question, how does the voter know the machine counted their vote the way they intended,” Bysiewicz said. “The only way to do that is to hand-count them.

Recall that races involved in recounts are currently exempted from audit. So, without action by the legislature, the most important races to verify would by law be exempted from a hand verification.

Also the current state law does not give audit observers the right to visibly see the ballots such that they can visibly verify that the marks on the ballot are counted correctly. Indeed, how is a voter to know. Maybe by ‘faith’ when the ballots are ‘independently’ counted by the local election staff conducting the election?

“It is important voters have faith that their vote will be recorded accurately,” Mrs. Bysiewicz said, “and that’s why the independent audits are so vital.” <source>

Remember the election might be overturned in a recount and the reason might be because the people failed to accurately program and test the optical scanner: <recently in Riverside>

Recount Reaffirm’s Wisdom of Recounts in Close Races

That’s not the tittle of article, nor what it says. It says:

with 14 towns holding recounts. New Canaan is included in that and held a recount on Tuesday to reaffirm the 25-vote difference between Town Council candidates Beth Jones and John Emert. That recount showed Jones edging Emert by seven votes.

No. It reaffirmed the winner, not the difference. If Jones had won by 17 votes, perhaps the article would not be so rosy. Then we might have Emert winning by 1 vote. What has been reaffirmed is the wisdom of recounting close races!!!

Read the entire article which includes some thought provoking quotes by voter Jody Eisemann, Secretary of the State Bysiewicz, and George Cody, President of the Registrars Of Voters Association Connecticut. <read>

Why Bother Recounting and Auditing Manually?

For those who question the value of manual counting in audits and recounts, here is an example from Greenwich, where despite pre-election testing an error apparently slipped through.

It is time for improving the process, surfacing problems, and strengthening the audits. It is not the time to call for weakening the audits and replacing manual counting with machine recounts that can only confirm erroneous results and provide false confidence.


For those who question the value of manual counting in audits and recounts, here is an example from Greenwich, where despite pre-election testing an error apparently slipped through. <read>

While the new optical scan voting machines won raves from poll station managers on Election Day, a machine error nearly cost a newly elected Representative Town Meeting (RTM) member his seat.
When results became official in the RTM races on Nov. 6, it initially appeared that Randall Smith from District 5 in Riverside had not been elected. With a vote total of 424, he was one of three candidates from the district not to be elected to the 19 seats District 5 has on RTM. However, a recount in the district found that votes that had been cast for him had mistakenly been given to write-in candidates by the machines.
By the time the hand recount was done, Mr. Smith had enough votes to make it and will begin his first term next month. This was the first year the optical scan machines were used in Connecticut and now Mr. Smith’s hoping for the state to make improvements to keep the problem from repeating.

 

Lets hope that it will not take errors discovered in their own elections to have State Senators, Representatives, and other politicians see the need to strengthen the election system and strengthen the audits. Rather than calls to weaken them <read> <read>

There is more good news and not so good news. Continue reading “Why Bother Recounting and Auditing Manually?”

The Middlefield Recount Experience

Different officials gave differing opinions on what was permissible and what was not, but none were willing to make a decision and say with authority what process should be followed…

A story worth reading: <read>

We were chagrined to learn of the proposed ‘second recanvass’ as there was no basis in law for the recanvass, just the Democrat desire to have another one.
This issue of check off list numbers not matching up with ballots is nothing new in any town, as there are a variety of factors at play…
The Secretary of the State’s office is a busy one, no doubt, but their actions in this case left many exasperated. Different officials gave differing opinions on what was permissible and what was not, but none were willing to make a decision and say with authority what process should be followed…
The next day, the Secretary of the State’s office expressed appreciation to the Middlefield Republican officials for not participating in the ‘recanvass’ and told them that it would have been a bad idea.