Lawsuit Challenges Florida Ballot Recount Rules

[Mithras61]

Lawsuit Challenges Florida Ballot Recount Rules


Wed Jul 7, 5:43 PM ET


By Jane Sutton

MIAMI (Reuters) - Voting rights groups sued Florida election administrators on Wednesday to overturn a rule that prohibits manual recounting of ballots cast with touch-screen machines, a lawsuit with echoes of the state's disputed 2000 presidential election voting.


The lawsuit said the rule was "illogical" and rested on the questionable assumption that electronic voting machines perform flawlessly 100 percent of the time. It also said the rule violated a Florida law that expressly requires manual recounts of certain ballots if the margin in an election is less than 0.25 percent of the votes cast.

Just another fiasco in Florida's voting process. Almost everyone who has had experience with these electronic voting systems knows they're prone to error, just like any other method. To specifically prohibit a recount suggests that they intend to rig the system (whether or not they really do is a different question).

[For PaisAn]

1. What's their justification for prohibiting manual recounts?

"They have said previously that manual recounts were not required for the touch-screen machines because the machines do not permit the types of errors that are subject to ballot recounts."

"Not required" and "specifically prohibiting" are two quite different things.

Yes, they will be rigging it and what are we all going to do about it? I'd say we're screwed.

[dolstein]

2. Because there's nothing to manually recount

The electronic voting machines in Florida, like nearly all of those elsewhere, do not create a paper trail. So there really isn't anything there for the canvassing boards to manually recount.

[bullimiami]

3. so by their twist of logic.

they select machines which do not produce anything to manually recount.
thus the law to manually recount is invalid.

so

either the law is invalid or
the machines are illegal.

which is the contention of the lawsuit. that the machines violate the law unless they can be manually recounted.

I think this law is part of the state constitution and cannot be changed by legistlation but only by amendment.

we will see.

[For PaisAn]

4. Enough to drive one crazy.

They're proceeding with a lawsuit to overturn a rule that is irrelevant since there can be no recount if the machines don't print receipts/paper ballots.

Take it a step further and why did Dept of State create this rule of prohibiting recounts in the first place if there can be no recounts with these machine.

And how do they get away with approving machines that violate their own laws. "It also said the rule violated a Florida law that expressly requires manual recounts of certain ballots if the margin in an election is less than 0.25 percent of the votes cast."

The article said there are other lawsuits that are seeking to require printouts from these machines. It appears that those lawsuits need to be decided before this one can. Or maybe they should have been combined in one lawsuit.

What a disaster. I somehow doubt this will all be resolved in time for November as I'm sure was the intention. After November it won't matter much, will it?

[Sharpodotcom]

5. Exit Poll Paper Trail

I want to express my dissatisfaction. Am I still allowed to?

[For PaisAn]

6. Exit polls are always correct

That's why they won't be doing them for Presidential elections anymore. Nice, huh?

Speak now or forever hold your peace. Contact your Senators and Congressperson and urge them to sign on and sponsor the Bills to require a paper receipt/printout. I can get you the Bill numbers if you don't have.

Welcome to DU
:hi:

[AirAmFan]

7. Great news! Lawsuits are needed at EVERY step on the way to COUNTED votes

By law, Florida keeps a high proportion of its voting age population from even registering (step 1). And you can be sure Florida Homeland Security will be outside the polls in uniform, to deter people who aren't caught at prior stages from crossing polling place thresholds. I predict "Homeland Ballot Security" efforts that Lee Atwater types will brag about for years.

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According to an AP story today quoting Tom Ridge, Homeland Security Secretary, "officials are considering how to secure polling places come November." (See http://www.indystar.com/articles/3/161068-7433-010.html ) But, in addition to fending off "terrorists", will some of the actions being set in motion for Election Day target Democratic voters who have good reason to fear Republicans in uniform?

When elections are close, a time-worn GOP playbook draws on tactics from banana republics. Armed thugs are posted at polling places to harass and discourage minority and poor voters. Because of discrimination in the criminal justice system, a MAJORITY of minority and poor men in many inner city neighborhoods, and skyrocketing proprtions of women, are on probation or parole. Police generally are free to "roust" those under "criminal justice supervision" whenever they want.

When Loretta Sanchez defeated Crazy Bob Dornan for a California House seat eight years ago, it was despite the presence of "ballot security" officers in special uniforms. The uniforms closely resembled those of immigration officials, well known for harassing naturalized and born-here citizens as well as undocumented foreign workers. (See http://www.ocweekly.com/ink/97/33/news-moxley.php )

And how did 911 Commission chair Tom Keane get to be ex-governor of NJ? From http://www.prospect.org/print-friendly/print/V13/23/mcdonald-l.html :

'Americans might like to think that discrimination against minority voters ended with the civil-rights movement, but it's been going on in many parts of the country ever since. And BALLOT-SECURITY programs have been the usual vehicle. A notorious "anti-fraud" initiative was implemented before the 1981 gubernatorial election in New Jersey. The Republican National Committee formed a National Ballot Security Force.... On election day, the security force dispatched armed off-duty police officers wearing official-looking armbands to heavily black (and Democratic) precincts in Newark, Camden and Trenton. The Republicans also posted signs warning that the polls were being patrolled by security-force members and offering a $1,000 reward for anyone giving information leading to the arrest and conviction of election-law violators....

The Democratic National Committee filed suit against the New Jersey and national Republican parties, and it was eventually settled. The defendants agreed not to post security forces at polling places or allow any other election tactics that targeted minorities or deterred them from voting. Despite the agreement in the New Jersey case, the Republicans resorted to similar maneuvers in Louisiana in the 1986 U.S. senatorial campaign involving Democrat John Breaux and Republican Henson Moore. ... Republicans ... launched still another ballot-security program in North Carolina in 1990, during the heated U.S. Senate contest between Republican Jesse Helms and Democrat Harvey Gantt.... After the election -- which Helms won -- the Justice Department sued the North Carolina Republican Party and the Helms for Senate Committee. The defendants, without admitting any wrongdoing, entered into a consent decree in which they agreed not to undertake similar ballot-security programs in the future without court approval.... Copyright © 2002 by The American Prospect, Inc.'