While the bill did a lot of positive things, it also enabled the electronic voting machines that a lot of people don't trust. Do we know if that was the reason for her opposition?

That would place a burden on lower-income people.

Overall, I think the bill did more good than harm but I can respect her reasons for opposing it. It is strange that she and Schumer were the only ones who did.

They've since been replaced with opaque, secret-source-code digital voting machines.

I'm not a Hillary fan, but that was a good vote for their constitutents.

about it in NY?

HAVA is a long and awful story.

NY had levers. They were better off than they are today.

...their old lever machines, which were all paid for and worked very well and very efficiently and were almost unriggable.

She was currying favor with New Yorkers at the time.

It's an odd fact, but I'm pretty sure that that explains her vote on this and Schumer's.

She otherwise has never seen a "privatization" scheme that she didn't like.

New York has since been Diebolded. They were one of the last holdouts. But they do have somewhat better auditing rules than the rest of the country.

Let me just reiterate, for those who don't know this, that the "Help America Vote (for Bush) Act" of 2002 resulted in a plague of these privatized vote counting systems spread all over the country. The systems are run on 'TRADE SECRET' programming code--code that the public is FORBIDDEN to review--with half the states doing NO AUDIT AT ALL (comparison of electronic results to ballots)--last I checked-- and the other half doing a miserably inadequate 1% audit (the states that actually have a ballot to compare the electronic totals to).

The 'TRADE SECRET' code is owned and controlled by a handful of private corporations. One of the biggest is ES&S (which bought out Diebold), a far rightwing-connected corporation which was initially funded by far rightwing, 'christian' nutball, Howard Ahmanson, who also gave one million dollars to the far rightwing, 'christian,' nutball Chalcedon foundation, which touts the death penalty for homosexuals!

I'm quite certain that the new e-voting systems were one of several methods used by Karl Rove to steal the 2004 election. (The others were purges of black voters from voting rolls, the 'Swift-boating' of John Kerry and other such tactics.) I'm also quite certain that these machines are responsible for giving us a Congress with an EIGHT PERCENT APPROVAL RATING. In short, many of them were NOT elected and are NOT representative of the American people. I think they were used to s/elect Schwarzenegger as governor of California. And everybody in the election integrity movement knows that they stole the Senate election in Georgia from Max Cleland in 2002 (the first trial run of riggability).

All I can say is: VERIFY your local vote counting in every way you possibly can. Do your own exit polling. Monitor the whole process. Demand transparency. Do the best you can, cuz our vote counting systems are extremely vulnerable to electronic election fraud.

against TARP.

I knew she was against making it easier for voters to vote!!

Without knowing why she voted that way. What's her explanation versus the real story?

Sorry for the awful formatting, but here is her comment from the Senate record.


Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, I want to express my views on the Help America Vote Act of 2002.

The Help America Vote Act of 2002 has many strong provisions that will improve our Federal election system. This legislation requires that election districts across the nation provide provisional voting and post sample ballots and other voter information. It allows voters the opportunity to verify and change their vote before casting their vote . The act implements a statewide voter registration system to help reduce fraud and ensures that individuals are not wrongly refused the right to vote . It authorizes $3.9 billion in Federal funding to help states improve voting systems, make the polls more accessible to the disabled, train poll workers, and educate the electorate.

Despite these positive provisions, however, I cannot vote for this bill because the voting rights of New Yorkers will be negatively affected by this legislation.

For many years, the State of New York has had provisional voting and what is called signature verification. In the 1980s, New York City put in place a digitized signature verification system. When a New Yorker registers to vote , his or her signature is scanned into a computer and placed in the election board's files. Then on election day, the voter signs the book of registered voters in that election district. If the signatures do not match, the poll worker has the right to prevent the voter from casting a ballot on the machine, but the voter is permitted to cast a provisional ballot. The board of elections later determines whether the provisional ballot is valid and should therefore be counted.

Because of New York State's system, there is no need for a voter to present a form of identification at the poll. In fact, the poll worker manual in New York explicitly states that poll workers cannot ask prospective voters for identification. This system was implemented in New York City and across the State of New York more than a decade ago. This system has worked in New York and should be a model for the Nation.

Unfortunately, the Help America Vote Act would reduce the rights of New Yorkers who are first-time voters in a federal election by requiring them to present a valid photo identification, utility bill, bank statement or government identification that verifies the name and address of the voter. If a first-time voter filled out a registration form and included either her driver's license number or the last four digits of her Social Security number, then she would not have to present a form of identification to a poll worker before voting. While this may serve as a step in the right direction for other States, this is a new restriction for New York.

This provision will repress voter participation among those New Yorkers who are in fact eligible to vote . Moreover, it will disproportionately affect ethnic and racial minorities, recently naturalized American citizens, language minorities, the poor, the homeless, the millions of eligible New York voters who do not have a driver's license, and those individuals who otherwise would have exercised their right to vote without these new provisions.

Many civil rights groups who oppose this legislation have compared these provisions to poll taxes and literacy tests that were used to repress voter participation in the past. I do not believe this is an unfair analog because I believe this bill may indeed reduce voter participation. When voter participation numbers hover at 50 percent, I believe that we should make every effort to increase voter participation, not reduce it.

I know this bill will pass the Senate today and will shortly become law, no matter what I do. But despite the many provisions in the bill that may increase voter participation in some states across the country who do not currently have provisional voting, I cannot support this legislation because it will negatively affect the rights of voters in the state that I am proud to represent--the State of New York.

New York is a state with 19 million people and 11 million voters; a state that is home to the world's cultural and financial capitals. It is the gateway for millions of people from different countries and ethnicities. New York represents one of the best things about our country--it's diversity. In America , the birthplace of modern democracy, we should do all we can to ensure that the right of every voter is not unduly hindered unnecessarily. Unfortunately, I believe the provisions in the Help America Vote Act will do just that.

I applaud the work of Senator Dodd, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, for all of his work on the bill, and the other members of the election reform conference committee. I also want to give a special thanks to the Rules Committee staff of Senator Dodd, especially Kennie Gill and Veronica Gillespie, who have worked from the first inception of the Senate's election reform bill to the final words in this election reform conference report. I know many members of the conference committee and their staffs have done their best to produce legislation that will try to improve our federal election system.

I am also proud to have worked with Senator Dodd on a provision included in the conference report that calls
upon the new Election Assistance Commission to study and report to Congress on the extent of residual votes. These are over votes, under votes, or ``spoiled'' votes that are created when a voter, unintentionally, makes a mistake in casting her ballot, either because she doesn't understand the ballot or the voting machinery I have fought hard to support the voting rights of the disenfranchised voter. But I cannot in good conscience, representing the State of New York, support legislation I believe will hurt the voting rights of New Yorkers. I will continue, however, to do all I can to ensure that our Federal election system and our democracy will be as strong as possible