Dear Denise Lamb - Can our Voting Machines Be Rigged?
posted by Editor on 08-18-2003 18:22

I wanted to know if our Voting Machines are Rigged? 

So I wrote my representatives over at the Secretary of State's Office for the State of New Mexico and I posed the following questions. Now, I know I can be a hard case sometimes, but I am generally tolerable if your paid to do the job. Anyway, I wanted to write an article to update you, but you see I'm having this little problem getting straight answers to my questions from government officials. 

The question that comes to mind knowing that some of these folks seem sincere enough sometimes is that I got the distinct feeling that someone up there is pedaling on this issue and just wishing it would go away. 

The answers I got and the characterizations that came with them left me a little unsettled too. In all fairness, there may be an update if I ever get an answer - stay tuned. 

I wouldn't want to write a bad article so I'll let the messenger tell you the story as it went down and if I get anything more tangible than that - you bet I'll let you know! Dear Ms. Lamb: 

A matter that concerns me is the voting machines New Mexico currently employs and plans to use during the next election. 

In speaking with local officials in Valencia and Socorro I understand that the state of NM uses Shouptronic 1242 machines and that these are vulnerable to corruption as they are old DOS systems and much of the code is in C++, which is easy to foil. 

These machines are currently owned by the Diebold Company and it has been implicated in several corruption scenarios I hope you have been appraised of. What shocks me is that our local Valencia County official has dismissed these machines as "not the touch screen machines implicated" in the New Zealand code study pertaining to other Diebold proprietary hardware. That is not the point - those have been shown to be easy to manipulate, but the older machines are even less sophisticated and are equally vulnerable to political sabotage and manipulation. It is remarkable how many mainline political organizations think they can put their head in the sand on this issue - it is going to be explosive in its impact on election day and corrosive to public sentiment afterwards. I urge you to correct this situation or to further direct my attention to whomever necessary to get the word out. I enclose an recent email I sent on some research I did for Prof. Dill of Stanford University.  I wrote on the subject of the need for Voter Verifiable Auditable Machines and Systems and the Voting fraud possible with the Diebold Machines.  

Go to here to read the article

There are numerous links to professional people who did the research and I challenge any of your computer consultants over there to tell me these men don't know what they are talking about. Significant doubt reasonable enough to justify a voter verifiable system has been presented and the point is why should casinos be forced to disclose their source code and voting machine companies owned by undisclosed corporate officials and an Arab emirate are immune from ethical review when our very national security is at stake. How on earth can public officials want to postpone action on such a critical piece of democratic infrastructure? 

I need to know what machines New Mexico is planning to use in the next election. 

I need to know how many of each and where they are located by manufacturer and date of purchase if possible. 

I need to know who to contact in each county for specifics if necessary.  I need to know which officials have been made aware of this problem on up the chain of command and barring that who to contact that might assist in changing this sorry reality. 

My magazine will continue to feature articles on this subject and to work for change to create fair and auditable elections. I am in contact with numerous commercial and civic groups if I can help with any information.

Below is the content of my latest email involving New Mexico machines and the rest should be contained in the links above. 

Danaher Corp. markets these as ELECTronic 1242's.  Danaher Corporation manufactures the 1242 Voting Machine. It was once known as the Shouptronic 1242 and Danaher merely kept up the sale of these machines after they took over. See final link. 

Corp site is as follows:

http://www.danaher.com/

A brief description of the physical aspects of the machine:

http://www.phillyelection.com/engweb.htm

The software for this machine is produced by Guardian Voting Systems, also owned by Danaher Corp. 

http://guardianvoting.com/gvs/sw2.html 

Apparently this company was called Shouptronic prior to its present form as Danaher Corp. The article below details the State of Virginia's reasons for junking these machines and going to "touch screens" which they extol as state of the art in security features.

The article below ties Shouptronic to Diebold and the following fraud cited in the paragraphs below: 

http://www.ecotalk.org/PressRelease.htm 

Advanced Voting Solutions is the new name of another voting company, Shoup Voting Solutions. Their current top management, Howard Van Pelt and Larry Ensminger, were executives for Diebold-Global until last year. Officers of Shoup Voting Machine Co. were indicted for allegedly bribing politicians in Tampa, Florida in 1971, according to the San Francisco Business Times. 

Ransom Shoup was convicted in 1979 of conspiracy and obstruction of justice related to an FBI inquiry into a lever machine-counted election in Philadelphia.  Shoup got a three-year suspended sentence. Meanwhile, &br;Philadelphia has bought new voting machines from Danaher-Guardian, which appears to only sell voting machines formerly known as the "Shouptronic." 

Danaher-Guardian is owned by billionaire brothers Steven M. and Mitchell P. Rales, who were described by columnist Jack Anderson in 1988 as "a pair of corporate raiders out of Washington DC." Again, Danaher-Guardian appears to only sell formerly Shouptronic voting machines.

Diebold-Global's current president, Bob Urosevich, was the co-founder of &br;American Information Systems which became ES&S. As mentioned before, Diebold-Global's top managers, Howard Van Pelt and Larry Ensminger, recently moved to Advanced Voting Solutions-Shoup. 

George Luis Dewey Editor@libertysteward.com

Denise Lamb writes back in response:

George, I'm very familiar with this issue.  It is unfortunate that so much of the information published has been misleading.  Without going into great detail, please understand that none of these voting systems in use are ever allowed to be accessed by anyone other than election officials, under the scrutiny of political parties and candidates.  The problem we are facing is that the new federal law requires us to provide voting machines that allow the blind and visually impaired to vote in secret, and unassisted, with equal access like any other voter.  Only DRE's with audio assist can accomplish that. A voter verified paper receipt is of no use to a blind voter and immediately puts us in violation of the federal law. 

Denise 

Dear Ms Lamb:

Then I suppose the answer is the paper ballot for everybody else but the blind and those machines are watched by election officials and auditors for possible fraud. I understand that Federal Law is the biggest impediment to good sense, but this is not an issue that is dismissible as I see it.  Anything less than perfect just won't do.  Also your assurances that none of these machines can be accessed is not true. If you read the article by Dr. Ariel Rubin he clearly shows how a smart card can be circumvented.  He also shows three separate invasion windows or tiers in the software where the individual voter, the precinct worker or the final official or administrator could potentially corrupt the vote as well as a system architecture that posts two totally separate yet interactive sets of books to tally the vote.

There was a conference last month in Colorado about new voting machines that the vendors have for sale - Did New Mexico send anybody to that meeting? 

Please my questions are important and I need further info to follow this up the ladder of responsibility. 

George Luis Dewey

Ms. Lamb responds: 

George, I have read every article, by everyone of these folks and there are holes so big, you could drive a truck through them.  I'm afraid we will just have to agree to disagree on this issue.  Avriel Rubin looked at 3% of the software program and wrote his paper based on that....not exactly academic excellence.  Yes, we went to the meeting in Colorado.  I also met last week with the National Institute of Science and technology.  They do not agree with the research methods or conclusions reached by these folks, because they assume the entire process has no administrative security and that simply isn't so. 

Denise 

George returns with:

Also, your statements that these articles have been misleading is disturbing. I am an educated man and have read these articles.  I know something about computers as I have been in a engineering capacity and have been exposed to code and pushbutton machines from original punch code to Basic and some familiarity with general programming.  These articles all had some essentially disturbing points, which I have gone into some detail to share with you. If you are going to take exception to articles on the grounds that they are misleading I invite you to make a point by point specific rebuttal of the issue at hand, but a dismissal with a wave of the hand I do not consider a very tangible response.  I do not mean to criticize you, but if you wish to argue a point do so, but give me the intellectually fair opportunity to counter that with a more complete erudition on the subject.  This is not a light weight issue - I consider Centrism evil and corrupt and a voting system that is lockstep with economic interests that could care less about fair elections can only be instrumented by means of corrupt and unconcerned public officials. I have no reason to presume you are one of those types of officials.  I would love to have specifics - thank you.

George Luis Dewey

To which Ms. Lamb replied:

George, NIST is going to call a meeting and get these folks together, so I'm sure you'll be reading about it in the near future.  In the meantime, we have a federal law that tells us what we have to do.  It is unfortunate that you are already inclined to distrust. 

Denise 

George writes back still unsettled: 

Are we talking about the NIT based in Orissa or is there another one here in the US?  I will read the rebuttal, however I seriously question the personal integrity of the players and I would be inclined to distrust anything they said judging by all the moves they've made in their ""market". 

Please give me an address on the Internet for this National Institute of Science and Technology. 

Who funds them? Thanks 

George Luis Dewey editor@libertysteward.com 

Denise Lamb's last email was: 

George, Unfortunately, I don't have unlimited time to carry on this conversation.  For a point by point rebuttal of the Rubin "study", I suggest you visit the Diebold web page where they have prepared an excellent rebuttal.

Denise 

George finally requested the information again: 

Dear Ms. Lamb: 

I have repeated the questions I posed pertinent to an article pending on the voting machines in New Mexico. 

1) Which machines does New Mexico use Now and are they universally used throughout the state? 

2) I need to know what machines New Mexico is planning to use in the next election.

3) I need to know how many of each and where they are located by manufacturer and date of purchase if possible. 

4) I need to know who to contact in each county for specifics if necessary. 

5) I need to know which officials have been made aware of this problem on up the chain of command and barring that who to contact that might assist in changing this sorry reality. 

I question authority when I know there is a reason. I would not ascribe the acronym "unfortunate" to the act of understanding an issue clearly and asserting my democratic rights. 

What NIST cannot assert is that there is no citizen purview over the process of implementing and selecting and qualifying an electoral machine system. 

Secondly, the code is proprietary and the government (Congress) has seen to it that we cannot verify it's integrity. 

Furthermore we are not considered worthy enough to know who really owns and operates the company (in the Case of Diebold) and yet what we do know of it shows a clear line of deceit and illegality in the acts of its Corporate figures, as well as foreign (Arabian) ownership of the company. 

Then, we also know that when they (Diebold's precursor) purchased Shouptronic they continued to market outdated machines without modifying them or updating them. In the market place that was considered rather deceptive, since they kept selling them to individual buyers who really were not up to date or fully informed. 

Also, we do know that they produced a machine for which we can clearly see (with admittedly only 3 percent available to us - fortuitous nonetheless or we would have never been made aware of ANY problem) that these machines were structured for potential fraud. 

And furthermore, I see the idea that Diebold or NIST is going to comfort us with their version of the truth, as rationally insufficient and out of context with the central point - which is that the voter is entitled to a fair and auditable voting system that is verifiable and because he has full disclosure of the code involved (through a correct public procedure of verification by qualified individuals). He can have increased confidence that he is not being ripped off for his vote! 

Finally - this is not a test of my confidence in the current government of the State of New Mexico or the US Federal Government - it is merely a matter of citizen purview and participation in the process. I am nobody's partisan - I vote for the best qualified individual and the value and merit of the issue.  If politicians even care to impress me, they better just do a good honest job, but to dig in their heels and hide under the mantle of partisanship or bi-partisanship, to continue with business as usual, when they know there is a problem, will not fly with me.  I know I can be insistent, but my motive is my loyalty to my country and my countrymen and I answer to them, not some rich Arab's pet US corporation, its dictates or needs monetarily. 

I think even the venerable Sherlock Holmes would agree there a little something I should not trust in this matter until it is settled. 

Demonizing or branding constituents that won't accept insufficient answers, by whatever acronym or diminishing "handle" is unfair tactics from a person in public office. Yes, I know some constituents will be a real pain, but in the end they just might win out. You never know. I was very disturbed when a dear friend of mine, somewhat of a social activist, but essentially highly motivated and sincere, was branded by Domenici's office as a "hacker" contacting him too many times about a certain woman's issue. She was laboring with breast cancer and going through literal hell on earth with the social service sector and access to reasonable health care. I, subsequent to this event, stopped trying to communicate with that Senator as I concluded that he was clearly not objective, reachable or even remotely interested in her plight or that of the others she represented. I know that to this day she feels the pain of that act by her government representative and Senator. Let's just try and communicate on this issue and get the job done right. I don't think anybody is going to be able to put enough spin on Diebold to convince me that I can just go back to napping now.

Sorry if this is taking more time than you would have wanted to spend on it, but I would appreciate the answers to the questions from the correct authority. 

Sincerely, 

George Luis Dewey editor@libertysteward.com

Denise Lamb wrote back the next day with the following information on our voting machine situation:

George, Here are the answers to your questions. 

1) We have no universally used voting machine throughout the state. New Mexico has never mandated one machine for use.  The currently certified systems are: 

The Shouptronic 1242, the AVC Advantage, The AVC Edge, the Optech Eagle, The Optech 4C and the Optech 3P (the manufacturers are Shoup and Sequoia Pacific, respectively. I will send by attachment the counties where each system is located.

2) These same systems will be used in the next election 

3) See attachment -- date of purchase should be obtained from county clerk and a roster of county clerks is located on our web page at www.sos.state.nm.us 

4. 4)The secretary of state is aware of this concern.