Election Fraud/Reform

If you vote in the Texas primary (or during early voting), be sure to come back to your individual precinct voting location (not an early voting location) for your precinct convention.

Precinct conventions start at 7:15 PM, or after the last person in line has voted, and are a great place to educate others about issues you care about, and get resolutions on them approved and sent up to the Senate District (SD) conventions and the state convention, so they'll get noticed by a lot more people.

Go to our resolutions list http://paa-tx.org/resolutions and pick out resolutions of interest to you -- just click on the titles of any of them. Download the pdf versions that are formatted for printing, and bring several copies of each to your precinct convention. If you want to write your own resolution on a topic we did not cover, refer to our Resolution-Writing Guidelines (see link at http://paa-tx.org/resolutions ) for suggestions on how to write a good resolution that is likely to be passed.

Some additional resolutions are also on the Burnt Orange Report web site http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/10038/2010-tdp-resolutions-thread -- please see these too.

If you don't vote in the primary, you are eligible to sign petitions to help get the Green Party on the ballot in Texas this year. For at least one state-wide office (Comptroller), there's no Democrat on the ballot, so this is not even a conflict for any Dem. See http://hcgp.org for details.

Again this year, we have some choices between awful candidates from the Republican party, and some less-than stellar Democrats. (I do realize that there are some excellent Dems even here in Texas, though, such as David Van Os and several running for Congress and the state legislature.)

So Who's Wearing the Tin Foil Hat NOW?

Harris County election judges have possession of Hart InterCivic eSlate System Judge's Booth Controllers (JBCs) for up to 72 hours before elections.

Note: This is an old resolution that has been superceded by a later one on voting reform.

WHEREAS voting is the cornerstone of any democratic republic and without every vote having equal weight and every voter having equal rights to free expression there is no democracy but only hypocrisy and dictatorship; and

We have two versions of this resolution.  The original is from the Ad Hoc Committee on Party Governance Resolutions of the Texas Progressive Populist Caucus http://texaspopulists.com/ and the revised version is from the Progressive Action Alliance.  Both ask that the Texas Democratic Party leadership do the same thing -- to promote VVPAT.  Pick the one you like the most -- both versions are available below, formatted for printing, under Attachments.

Progressive Populist Caucus Version:

DRAFT  RESOLUTION ON PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR VVPAT

WHEREAS the Democratic Party is one of just two Political Parties Nominating By
Primary Election (Title 10, Subtitle B, Texas Election Code) in Texas; …

WHEREAS it exercises inherent powers (Title 10, Section 161.001); …

WHEREAS the State Democratic Executive Committee is the general custodian of
records for this party (Title 5, Section 66.010); and …

WHEREAS the State Democratic Convention is the highest authority of the party in
Texas; …

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED by the State Democratic Convention duly
convened in Fort Worth to conduct such business as shall properly come before it, …

1. THAT the people of the TDP direct its leadership, including Chair as well
as all Democratic Party County Chairs, to actively and aggressively
advocate the inclusion of a voter verifiable paper audit trail with all DRE
electronic voting machines in use for all elections.

[Discussion]
13 Texas Counties have such non-transparent voting machines in use and
many more in ’06 will be adding them to comply with HAVA requirements.
Aggressive advocacy for this verified voting technology includes
proactively communicating this urgent need to all Democratic party
officeholders and candidates, especially those in charge of elections,
media interviews, public meetings and news releases stating the Party’s
continuing demand for a VVPAT.

Draft prepared by the TDP governance resolutions committee of the Progressive Populist Caucus, Feb. 22, 2006

To get a copy of this resolution formatted for printing, so you can take it with you to your precinct convention, click on the link in the Attachment box below.

WHEREAS The Texas Democratic Party’s State Democratic Executive Committee is the general custodian of records of the Party; … WHEREAS voter registration and voting history are among the data maintained by the SECRETARY OF STATE of TEXAS and made available to the Party; … WHEREAS national and Texas Republicans are advocating the creation of a national ID for citizens and voters and highly detailed databases of personal, private information on the lives of citizens and voters; … WHEREAS there is substantial evidence provided by the Electronic Frontier Foundation of abuse and privacy “snooping” by the current Republican administration and the National Security Agency (NSA); … WHEREAS Texas Republicans have a proven history of “purging” voter rolls for purposes of eliminating “undesirable” voters from exercising their constitutional right to vote; … WHEREAS the Republican Texas Secretary of State has undertaken a project called Texas Election Administration Management (TEAM) system involving the creation of a highly detailed database of personal information on all Texas voters Due to be put into use in 2006; and … AND WHEREAS the Texas Democratic Party currently has a ‘seat’ on the Secretary of State’s TEAM committee but has not been actively involved; … NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED THAT the highest authority of the Texas Democratic Party, delegates assembled in Convention, direct the State Party Chair and the SDEC to obtain read and write access the Texas Secretary of State’s (TEAM)Texas Election Administration Management system and appoint an SDEC member to actively participate in its activities: … AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the TDP’s access to the TEAM database include the Chair appointing an SDEC DATA SECURITY BOARD of at least two SDEC members to review or draft security politics related to these and other Party voter history data to prevent data mining, unauthorized use of this personal data or its theft.

To get a copy of this resolution formatted for printing, so you can take it with you to your precinct convention, click on the link in the Attachment box below.

Whereas an election is a competition for the privilege of representing the people; and

To get a copy of this resolution formatted for printing, so you can take it with you to your precinct convention, click on the link in the Attachment box below.

WHEREAS, computerized voting equipment is inherently subject to programming error, equipment malfunction, and malicious tampering; and

To get a copy of this resolution formatted for printing, so you can take it with you to your precinct convention, click on the link in the Attachment box below.

WHEREAS, the “winner-take-all” awarding of Presidential Electoral Votes from the State of Texas results in disfranchisement of those who voted for the minority candidate; and

Despite movement toward new standards for machines, change may be years away

By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER
Inside Bay Area
http://insidebayarea.com/ci_3268257

SACRAMENTO — For 11 years, most states have relied on voting systems tested to minimal federal standards, the results withheld from public scrutiny and given the green light by a nongovernmental agency working on a shoestring budget.

The era of approving tools of democracy on the cheap is coming to an end, and judging by talk at a national gathering of voting experts here this week, few will be sorry to see it go.

Carnegie Mellon University computer expert Michael Shamos, a state voting-systems certification official for Pennsylvania, is one of the staunchest advocates for new, fully computerized electronic voting systems.

by Freddie Oakley & John Oakley
Published in the Sacramento Bee
[May 2004, forwarded by Pokey Anderson]
http://www.yoloelections.org/news/snews/PO1131035703

The recall election allowed California voters to express fundamental dissatisfaction with the status quo. That's democracy in action. But we should not take it for granted.

By Vickie Karp, BBV Board Member
National Chair, Coalition for Visible Ballots
November 15th, 2005

Last Tuesday, November 8th, voters in the Austin area got to see  Democracy in Action  as 25 or so volunteers for VoteRescue, our local election rights group, held a  Citizens  Parallel Election  with paper ballots, hand-counted.  Our effort was funded primarily through Black Box Voting and was a joint effort, sponsored by BBV and blessed also by the Coalition for Visible Ballots.  We covered twelve precincts in six polling places (each where two precincts were voting) and the experience was both exhausting and exhilarating!  Our county uses the Hart InterCivic E-Slate machines, which provide no paper ballots, so we knew going in that even if we got great data, we couldn t force a recount.  We chose to move forward anyway as an exercise in democracy and to educate the public about the perils of e-voting.

by Margaret Kimberley
November 17 2005
The Black Commentator
(forwarded by Pokey Anderson)

On Election Day in Ohio, four ballot provisions that would have brought greater integrity to the elections process went down to defeat at the polls. Not only were all four defeated, but polls predicted that all four would either win, or be decidedly by thin margins.

I know... preaching to the choir... , but if you haven't seen Baxter the CHIMPANZEE filmed in front of a live press audience hacking a Diebold machine, it's worth a look! Quicktime Player required. Baxter was successfully able to delete the audit log, just by pressing buttons / moving the mouse on the keyboard.

If we don't fix this problem, we have truly lost our Democracy. The right to vote AND for our votes to be accurately counted is the cornerstone of any Democracy.

During the 2004 elections, approximately 65% of the counties in in the country employed the use of electronic voting machines. Of the 65% of total counties to use electronic voting machines, roughly 80% of those machines were made by Diebold. Here's a report from Black Box Voting on the kind of individuals who are employed at Diebold who are directly responsible for the programming of the Diebold voting machines.

Just for a moment, consider that we don't even allow convicts to scan our BAGS at the airport, but apparently, it's no problem getting a job programming voting machines.

How Many Felons Does It Take to Count a Vote?

Excerpt from report by Black Box Voting

A new hack test of voting equipment ... this time in front of the election supervisor of Leon County, Florida. by Pokey Anderson Sunday Monitor, KPFT - HOUSTON, June 5, 2005

See also:

• http://www.leonfl.org/elect/SpecialReport.htm
• http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/5921.html

The investigative team from Black Box Voting, a non-partisan elections advocacy group, got permission to attempt to hack a real voting system this year.

By

Latest: A new hack test of voting equipment ... this time in front of the election supervisor of Leon County, Florida. by Pokey Anderson Sunday Monitor, KPFT - Houston, June 5, 2005See also:

• http://www.leonfl.org/elect/SpecialReport.htm
• http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/1954/5921.html

Whereas; money has power to influence politics and corrupt government that is not available by speech alone; and

Whereas; the use of money to influence government and political processes confers an unfair and undemocratic advantage that is only available in proportion to elite status, economic success and, too often, white collar crime; Therefore, Be it

This hearing is the initiation of a broad survey to review data and hear testimony representing issues with the 2004 Presidential election processes, along with potential causes and recommended improvements.

WHO: A coalition of election stakeholder organizations composed of technical and professional experts, computer engineers and experts, statisticians, researchers, attorneys and journalists who have been  investigating and analyzing problems with election processes in the November 2004 elections will gather from around the country for a citizen-initiated Election Assessment Hearing to deliver preliminary testimony of their findings to an independent panel.