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from a press release:
At the press conference, Bev Harris of Black Box Voting said she would
be challenging the Florida and Ohio vote counts. Her cell phone number
is xxx-xxx-xxxx.
Below is the press release from today and the fact sheet. Before that is
an exchange between the Kerry campaign and the Nader campaign.
Senator John Kerry’s spokesperson Adam Stone’s responded to a press
query about Ralph Nader’s call on the Kerry-Edwards campaign to make
sure every vote is counted, especially in Ohio, saying:
"Far from remaining silent, John Kerry and John Edwards days ago
demanded that every vote be counted in this election, and built the
17,000 lawyer election team around the country that is ensuring
that every American's right to vote is protected. Why does Ralph Nader
want to create a phony wedge issue between progressives when he should
be working with Democrats to guarantee the right to vote is protected?"
Nader-Camejo responds – this is old news – pre-Election Day. We now,
after November 2, 2004, call on Senator Kerry and Senator Edwards to
renew their commitment to ensure every vote is counted accurately, last
made on the day they conceded the presidency to George W. Bush. Since
that time they have remained silent on the problems in the counting of
the vote despite increasing evidence of anomalies in the vote results
favoring President Bush. Kerry-Edwards should use some of those 17,000
lawyers for good purposes – after using them for the constitutional
crime of preventing voters from having the opportunity to vote for
Nader-Camejo with their phony ballot access challenges – and
aggressively challenge the results in states where issues have come to
the forefront. Rather than creating a wedge between progressives the
Nader-Camejo campaign is standing for the proposition that every vote
must be counted. We continue to urge Kerry-Edwards to join us in this
effort.
----------------------------------
For Immediate Release
November 10, 2004
For Further Information
Kevin B. Zeese 202-265-4000
Amy Belanger 202-265-4000
Ralph Nader Takes on Election Day Problems
“To create a vibrant democracy we must face the irregularities in our
elections – not ignore them after election day.”
Washington, DC – Over 2000 citizens including voting rights advocates
are urging in writing the Nader-Camejo campaign to help make sure every
vote is counted and counted accurately. The Nader-Camejo campaign does
not view the election to be over merely because concession speeches,
which have no legal effect, have been given. Rather they are over when
every vote is counted and legally certified.
Voting-rights groups and others have identified trouble spots and
anomalies in several states meriting further investigation. They are
discovering what Nader warned against throughout this election: because
computers are inherently subject to programming error, equipment
malfunction, and malicious tampering, paperless electronic voting
machines make it impossible to safeguard the integrity of our vote.
Imagine our country turning the technology and software for counting our
votes over to three or four proprietary corporations. With other
obstructions and manipulations, they thereby threaten the very
foundation of our democracy. The Democratic National Committee website
offers no response or advice to voters on where to turn. Senator John
Kerry, thus far, has remained silent.
Regardless of whether it changes the electoral outcome, the Democrats
should follow through on their repeated promises by the Kerry-Edwards
campaign to the people to make sure every vote is counted – in Ohio and
other states discovering similar problems with electronic voting
machines and other irregularities. “It is imperative to find out what
changes are needed in the equipment whether superior system
substitutions should be used,” Nader said. “At a minimum, the Democrats
should put the state on alert to clean up its act. With the extensive
pre-election effort to prevent election fraud, including international
observers, activist poll watchers and attempts to enforce paper trail
backups, the Democratic Party’s silence is puzzling,” said Ralph Nader.
“It needs to wake up from its week of ‘shock and awe.’”
Realities, plausibilities and rumors swirl around at times such as
these. Facts must be separated from fiction if we are ever going to know
what happened.
On November 5, The Nader/Camejo campaign filed a challenge seeking a
hand recount of the New Hampshire ballots at the request of numerous
voting rights advocates. Striking inconsistencies exist between the vote
as reported on the AccuVote Diebold Machines and exit polls and voting
trends in New Hampshire. These irregularities in the reported vote count
favor President George W. Bush by 5% to 15% over what was expected.
Problems in these electronic voting machines and optical scanners are
being reported in machines in a variety of states.
Nader says major electoral reforms are needed to ensure that every vote
counts, including the most unlikely to be counted – those of third party
and independent candidates’ votes. Reforms should ensure that all voters
are represented through electoral reforms like instant run-off voting,
binding none-of-the-above options, and proportional representation; that
non-major party candidates have a ballot access chance to run for office
and participate in debates; and that public elections be publicly financed.
Ralph Nader called upon John Edwards and John Kerry to be serious about
their pre-election and post-election promises: “Our offices are being
flooded with faxes and e-mails asking for assistance in resolving these
irregularities – a lot of them are citizens who voted for you. You must
now take action to give our nation the fair accounting it deserves from
the 2004 election and to protect democratic processes in future
elections. Although your party extended considerable funds and manpower
to unconstitutionally drive us off the Ohio ballot, in the spirit of
good government, I urge you to make this effort now.”
--------------------------------
Fact Sheet 2004 Election
Widespread reports of votes uncounted due to machine failure, absurdly
long lines, voter suppression, voting rules being capriciously applied,
and other irregularities. There are also reports of striking
inconsistencies between the vote as reported on optical scan vote
counting machines and exit polls.
The Nader-Camejo campaign has received more than 2,000 faxes and e-mails
asking for help investigating and challenging these irregularities.
- In his introductory remarks to John Kerry’s concession statement, John
Edwards said, “In America it is vital that every vote count, and that
every vote be counted.” The Nader-Camejo campaign challenges Democrats
to stand behind this principle.
- Nader-Camejo has requested a hand recount of the vote in New Hampshire
because of reports of anomalies favoring President Bush in towns that
used the Diebold AccuVote optical scan machines. We are examining the
evidence in other states as well.
- Regardless of whether investigations show a changed outcome in the
Presidential election, paperless voting machines threaten democracy.
Every voting system includes a key component, called the ballot
definition file (BDF), that is never subjected to an outside review or
independent audit and undergoes very little testing. BDFs tell the
voting machine software how to interpret a voter's touches on a screen
or marks on an optical scan ballot (including absentee ballots), how to
record those selections as votes, and how to combine them into the final
tally.
Examples of machine irregularities:
<caron> In Columbus, Ohio – Elections officials admitted that a voting machine
cartridge error gave Bush 4,258 votes and John Kerry with 260 in a
Gahanna precinct 1B where only 638 voters cast ballots and only 365
people voted for Bush.
<caron> In Cuyahoga County, Ohio – 29 precincts cumulatively reported 93,000
more votes than voters.
<caron> In Broward County, Florida – Election officials noticed at the end of
the day that the numbers of votes cast had gone down, not up. Officials
found their software could handle only 32,000 votes per precinct before
counting backward. The glitch affected 97,434 absentee ballots.
<caron> In Jacksonville, N.C. – More than 4,500 votes were lost in one North
Carolina County because officials believed a UniLect Corp. computer set
to handle only 3,005 votes could handle 10,500. Expecting the greater
capacity, the county used only one unit during the early voting period.
Officials said 3,005 early votes were stored, but 4,530 were lost and
there is no way to retrieve the missing data.
Voting Problems in Ohio
- Warren County, Ohio – The county administration building was locked
down on election night and observation of the vote count blocked (no
other Ohio County closed off its elections board).
- Lake County, Ohio. Some voters received a memo on bogus Board of
Elections letterhead informing voters who registered through Democratic
and NACCP drives that they could not vote. Election officials referred
the matter to the sheriff.
- Before Election Day, Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell (a
Republican who co-chairs President Bush’s statewide campaign) was
challenged by voters-rights organizations for denying citizens their
voting rights on the basis of a rule (later rescinded) requiring voter
registration forms be printed on 80 pound paper stock. Voter
registration forms were submitted on newsprint in Cuyahoga County after
being printed in the (Cleveland) Plain Dealer.
- Mahoning County. The glass on top of one electronic screen was too far
from the screen, making it difficult for people to use their fingers to
cast ballots. A screen went blank on a Youngstown voter while he cast
his ballot. Also, in Mahoning County. 20 to 30 machines that needed to
be recalibrated during the voting process because some votes for a
candidate were being counted for that candidate's opponent. About a
dozen machines needed to be reset because they essentially froze.
- Cincinnati. Problems with punch card voting machines delayed the start
of voting for up to an hour Tuesday morning at a suburban precinct.
Voters were unable to slide their punch-card ballots all the way into
any of the six voting machines that had ALL evidently been damaged in
transit.
- In Columbus, Ohio, overcharged batteries on Danaher Controls
ELECTronic 1242 systems kept machines from booting up properly at the
beginning of the day. The resulting delays, combined with higher voter
turnout, resulted in lines of several hours – in one case, 22 hours –
led to some citizens’ voting rights being taken away by administrative
default.
This is not new. Serious problems with electronic voting were reported
in 2000 and 2002, including
o New Mexico, Nov. 2000 – 67,000 absentee and early-voting ballots were
counted incorrectly.
o Texas, April 2002 – A difference in ballot data on different machines
resulted in miscounts in 18 races.
o Florida, Sept. 2002 – 2,642 Democratic and Republican votes were
counted as Republican.
o North Carolina, Nov. 2002 – 5,500 party-line votes, both Republican
and Democrat, were uncounted.
o A national voting rights group - Count Every Vote 2004 -- documented
hundreds of voting irregularities affecting poor and minority voters in
seven Southern states — from long lines and faulty equipment to
deliberate voter intimidation. The group listed a shortage of early
voting locations in Duval County, Fla., the largest county in Florida in
area and voting-age population, the failure of electronic voting
machines in three South Carolina counties, and the loss of votes at a
North Carolina precinct when too much information was stored on a
computer unit.
Regardless of whether it changes the outcome, the Democrats should
follow through on their promise to make sure every vote counts. It is
imperative to find out whether changes are needed in the equipment. At a
minimum, the Democrats should put the state on alert to clean up its
act. Major electoral reforms are needed to ensure that every vote
counts, including the most unlikely to be counted – third party and
independent candidates’ votes. Reforms must ensure that all voters are
represented through electoral reforms like instant run-off voting,
binding none-of-the-above options, and proportional representation; that
non-major party candidates have a chance to run for office and
participate in debates; and that elections be publicly financed.
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