Action

Current·
History·
Talking Points·
Letters to the Editor·
State Executives·
State Legislators·
County Clerks·
Newspaper Editors·

Talking Points

Legislators -- from Verified Voting New Mexico

We urge you, as Member of our State Legislature, to promote passage of legislation, badly needed right away, to ensure that votes by New Mexico citizens are counted accurately. Without that assurance, our fundamental American right to vote has been and is in grave jeopardy.

There have been reported numerous incidents of malfunctioning voting machines in our state. Other incidents have very likely occurred, but have gone undetected for lack of an independent paper trail that can be used to double-check.

This unacceptable situation, we believe, requires legislative action in the following areas:

• mandating a voter-verified paper record of the votes counted by every electronic machine, be it optical-scan, push-button or touch screen, so that the machine count can be double-checked for accuracy. Our current push-button and touch-screen machines do not have this capability. Do you support a voter-verified paper ballot trail for all electronic voting machines?
• requiring, for every election, automatic recounts, using the paper ballot trail to check machine accuracy, in a small sample of precincts selected randomly in each county. Recount results to be made public and all discrepancies investigated and corrected
• requiring open source software for electronic voting, to ensure transparency

This is not an issue to be postponed. Bernalillo County, our state’s biggest, is currently considering buying more than a thousand new voting machines. Other counties are interested. There will be a major waste of taxpayer money unless those machines are required to provide the paper trail that makes audits and recounts possible.

Moreover, a Santa Fe New Mexican poll, held just before the November election, showed that nearly a third of the state’s voters believed that the votes in that election would not be counted accurately and more than half said they were concerned that fraudulent votes would be cast. That major loss of voter confidence is bad news for democracy here in New Mexico. Our faith in the counting of the vote must be restored now.

This is not a partisan question. It affects all voters, all candidates, all political parties.

Thoughts on Election Reform -- Bob Walsh

As with any issue, there are 4 steps to election reform, identifying the objectives, diagnosing the problems, finding fixes, and getting the fixes implemented.

OBJECTIVES

1) Elections must be free, open, and fair.

2) Elections must be perceived to be free, open, and fair.

Some people want more access in the form of third-party accommodation and instant runoff voting. I consider that a secondary issue, as compared to the two above.

DIAGNOSIS

1. Fraud) There is a substantial population in NM that thinks that there may be significant fraud in the form of multiple voting, paid voting, voting under false names, or deliberately messing with voter registration. This used to be a problem in NM, but I think it is now minor. However, the perception is out there. These are the folks who are pushing for some kind of voter ID.

2. Barriers) There is another population that thinks there is a significant problem with long lines, voter intimidation, and other barriers to voting. I think this problem is also minor in NM, but the perception is definitely there. These are the opponents of voter ID in most forms.

3. Machines) There is yet another population (including HAR, VVNM, and others) that thinks that the numbers printed by the machines are not an accurate record of the intent of the voters. The perceptions range from voters being intimidated or confused by the process, to inadequacies or bugs in the user interface, to bugs in the software, to conspiracy theories involving either the election machine companies or hackers. The statistical analyses have been persuasive, but they are undercut by the apparent inaccuracy of the underlying data; it would be better if they could be redone with more accurate data. The stonewalling of the recount tends to reinforce conspiracy theories.

Finally, the counties much prefer electronic machines because they think they are much less expensive. Without machines there is a significant expense in printing ballots. Because of setup costs, the printers have a 100-copy minimum. One clerk spoke of frequently discarding over 90 out of 100 ballots. On the other hand, because paper ballots are needed for provisional voting, much of this expense must be incurred anyway.

4. Canvass) There is another population of at least one (me) that thinks that the state canvass is not an accurate total of the numbers printed by the machines. This is supported by the accountant's report and the instances of phantom votes. I think the phantom votes are mostly errors in "total votes," but I would like to know that for sure. I hope to personally redo the Santa Fe County canvass from the machine tapes for the presidential votes, if I can get my hands on the materials.

Another canvassing issue is the level of breakdown of the results. The politicians and we analysts want it broken down as far as possible. However, when it gets down to a very small number of voters, one's vote is no longer secret. This is a particular problem in primary elections or elections with small turnout.

FIXES

1. Fraud) Election fraud is a 4th-degree felony in NM, but as someone pointed out, the prisons are full of people for whom penalties did not deter crime. The real underlying problem is that our system is based on neighborhood voting, with the idea that everyone in a precinct knows everyone else, but that is no longer true in our highly mobile society.

One of the Republican bills requires a voter ID that may be either a photo ID (with or without the correct address), or some kind of government or utility document that shows the correct address (with or without a photo). This includes the voter registration card. This should be amended to require that electors registering in person be provided with a registration card on the spot. The problem is with homeless people who are registered away from the clerk's office by a registrar. This needs better ideas.

Another problem is false registration. Republicans are pushing a bill that would prohibit any organization from paying people to register voters on the basis of the number of voters registered. That is at best only a partial solution. What is really needed are party precinct organizations that can detect false registrations and a procedure for getting them removed. That, however, conflicts with any notion of same-day registration.

2. Barriers) I do not have any ideas here except for paper ballots (next item). Most of the advocacy has been in the form of resistance to any new barriers.

3. Machines) I think we all agree that the solution here is paper ballots with optical scanners for counting, random checks by hand counting, and full hand counts when there are machine problems or the election is close. We have to address the cost. Paper ballots have the advantage that it is easy to expand the number of carrels at a polling place if long lines develop. Sample ballots can be examined in advance at leisure, making paper ballots less intimidating to voters.

4. Canvass) One solution here is to provide for a mandatory audit, with consequences if there are discrepancies. With respect to ballot secrecy, there need to be provisions that allow clerks to combine precincts when small turnouts are possible.

IMPLEMENTATION

It would have been nice to have had a month or two to sort everything out before the legislature met, but that was not the case. I agree with others that the most immediate issue is to forestall purchases of more electronic voting machines.

I hope to closely monitor the various bills as they go through committee. We need to especially monitor the House Voter and Elections Committee, which will likely come up with a package that includes some immediate changes and provides for a task force. We should try to get our sympathizers onto the task force.

So far, legislative committees have accepted audience comments before considering each bill. You can't comment if you aren't there. Commenters should acknowledge the legitimate concerns of others.

Letters to the Editor are suprisingly effective in NM. We should be focusing on stopping the purchase of electronic voting machines. Explain your concerns and BE NICE.

Press releases and press conferences should focus on our issues and how they may be integrated into other proposals. Lay off the state canvassing board until after the session (mid-March).

I plan to go the the Inn of the Governors for a cheap lunch on Tuesdays and Thursdays at about 11:30. Anyone who is interested can join me there.