National Summit to Save Our Elections--"Scoop" Mon. 3 Oct. 2005

National Summit to Save Our (US) Elections – Day 1

Monday, 3 October 2005, 12:32 am
Article: autorank

The National Summit to Save Our Elections Convenes in Portland, Oregon

Report By DU & PI Poster autorank
On special assignment for
"Scoop" at the conference

Day 1: A Clear Outline and Rationale for the Ongoing Voting Rights Movement

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0510/S00003.htm

In this report:
Activist Attorney Paul Lehto Makes a Strong Case
VotersUnite.Org's Theisen Explains How Citizens have "Outsourced" the Voting and Tabulation Process to Corporations
A Huge Opportunity in New Mexico and Three Weeks to Raise the Money
Green Presidential Candidate and Litigant in Ohio 2004 Suit Presents
Media Participation
Other Presentations (Marybeth Kuznik, Rady Ananda, Blair Bobier, Penny Little, Kat L'Estrange, Warren Linney & Steve Chessin)

Portland, OR. 9/30/05: The National Summit to Save our Elections is the logical follow up in a process begun at the Nashville Conference on Election Reform in April of this year. Organized by activist Bernie Sanders, that meeting featured Rep. Cynthia McKinney, Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, among others. The emphasis was on blatant fraud discovered in the 2004 Presidential Election. Journalist Bob Koehler said, "I had a rebirth in outrage" as a result of attending that event.

Largely a reaction to the irregularities in 2004 Presidential elections, the voting rights movement has matured significantly in the five months since Nashville. The current meeting agenda looks more like a professional or trade association meeting than a political function. The messages are offered with conviction and passion yet the approach seems to be addressing consistent themes based on extensive research. These themes appeared in every presentation on the first day of the conference. The conference is jointly sponsored by Alliance for Democracy, Portland; Democracy for Oregon; the First Unitarian Church, Portland; Campus Pacific Greens; and Democracy Matters.
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Activist Attorney Paul Lehto Makes a Strong Case

The initial day's activities centered three key themes: the political rationale behind the voting rights-election-fraud movement; the technical rationale; and getting the message out through available media. Activist and attorney Paul Lehto of Snohomish County Washington framed the core rationale for those challenging the legitimacy of the 2004 election and seeking solutions to prevent future electoral travesties.

Lehto is currently suing Sequoia voting systems as a result of clear failures to produce an accurate vote count during the 2004 presidential election. He outlined a simple syllogism: the software used by voting machine companies to capture votes on electronic voting machines is "proprietary" software developed and owned by the companies; these companies keep the software and methods a trade secret; therefore, the results of our elections can no longer be trusted or accepted as legitimate since we have no way to review software, performance, and security guarantees.


"Whenever there is electronic vote counting, there is no basis for confidence in the results of elections. You have no right to believe in those elections." - Paul Lehto, Attorney.

The presentation was powerful and well received by the audience.

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VotersUnite.Org's Theisen Explains How Citizens have "Outsourced" the Voting and Tabulation Process to Corporations

Ellen Theisen, Executive Director of www.VotersUnited.Org provided the second half of the rationale for the voting rights movement. A technical writer in the software industry for 20years, Theisen now devotes her full time efforts to the cause of free and fair elections. She noted that in most districts using electronic voting, vendors install, maintain, and repair voting machines and software. The vendors also reconcile errors.

In one instance cited, a district in New Mexico's 2004 Presidential Election had inconsistent data on votes. The vendor for that district removed the memory card, took it to company headquarters outside the state, and the elections results were essentially recreated. All of these technical functions were and continue to be handled, for the most part, by private vendors, usually from one of three major firms: Diebold, ESS, and Sequoia.

County election officials employed by the board lack the sophistication to handle any of the technical aspects of the vote process, and have ceded effective control of the voting, reporting, and tabulation process to private vendors. None of the major vendors allow any inspection of software or hardware using the argument that the equipment and software are "proprietary" to the company and not for outside review.

Theisen reviewed the problems arising out of the 2002 Help America Vote Act (HAVA). HAVA was quickly moved through both houses of Congress and signed into law in 2002.

The law has been interpreted by some - either through intent or lack of understanding - to favor a rapid conversion from paper ballots, punch cards, and lever voting machines to electronic optical scanning machines and DRE's , sophisticated voting machines that provide touch screen voting, vote totaling, and reporting through self contained hardware-software system.

Theisen pointed out factual misstatement by vendors and county Boards of Elections (boards) used to justify conversion from paper to electronic voting.

Boards and vendors argue that HAVA requires dropping punch cards. Theisen argued the opposite, that punch cards are acceptable under HAVA given certain safeguards.

Boards and vendors argue that HAVA requires electronic tabulation of votes cast. Theisen countered that hand counts can be justified under HAVA.

A glaring contradiction arose with regard to cost. Some boards and the parent county governments seem to think that HAVA funds, generous at the equipment purchasing phase of electronic conversion, are a source of permanent support. This is not the case. Maintenance, upgrades, supplies, and other support costs are all carried by the county as time goes on. The costs can be considerable and have gone unnoticed.

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A Huge Opportunity in New Mexico and Three Weeks to Raise the Money

Voter Action Co Director Holy Jacobson brought the summit up to date on a critical legal action in New Mexico. The scene of clear wide spread election problems, Jacobson discussed the suit brought in behalf of eight citizens of New Mexico, each of whom "wishes to have their vote properly counted and weighted in any forth coming elections" (from plaintiffs filing).

Initial research and depositions have revealed significant and wide spread problems with "under votes" for president. There were 24,000 of these, predominantly from Hispanic and Native American voters, more than enough to change the result of the presidential election.

Jacobson described this case as the very best opportunity the voting rights movement has to expose problems with equipment, the conduct of elections by states and counties, and other barriers to free and fair elections.

So far, lead attorney Lowell Finley of Berkley, CA (one of the few attorneys to litigate successfully against a voting machine manufacturer) and his legal team have uncovered significant findings in depositions. A voting machine vendor admitted under oath that machines used throughout the state erased presidential votes unintentionally. The state of New Mexico seems incapable of conducting a reliable post-election canvass failing to detect clear errors found by Voter Action attorneys and consultants.

Voter Action (www.voteraction.org) has only three weeks to raise approximately $250 thousand to complete depositions. Sworn depositions could include demands to review vendor hardware and software, examination of the state-county-vendor relationships and any problems created, and significant statistical inconsistencies that make "under votes" many more times likely in predominantly minority precincts

(more at http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0510/S00003.htm)

Thanks for the coverage! However, the organizations listed as being the sponsors are not correct. (Having worked tirelessly on the Summit for the past several months, I'm a little sensitive to incorrect credit.....) The event was sponsored/ organized by the Oregon Voter Rights Coalition (www.oregonvrc.org) and the Alliance for Democracy-Portland (www.afd-pdx.org/). Also, see the Summit website at www.summit.oregonvrc.org. The other organizations you have listed were NOT sponsors. The First Unitarian Church, Portland State Univ. Campus Pacific Greens, and Portland State University Democracy Matters HOSTED the event, and Democracy of Oregon was a supporting organization.

It's terrific to get the coverage, but I hope the credits can be corrected.

This is a must have item in my opinion

We had professionals video all the sessions. There will be 19(?) DVD's, each covering different sessions, and 1 DVD with the complete set. They're hopefully going to be available soon -- check our website (www.oregonvrc.org) for more info, including how to order. We're also hoping to have the sessions available for free download from the website, if we can work that out.