Last night,
Black Box Voting launched the first in a massive series of Freedom of Information Requests to conduct an audit of the voting machines using internal audit logs and other documents. You can see this request at
http://www.blackboxvoting.orgI just got a call from Luci Botzek, of the MN Association of County Officers, telling me they will stall the response at least 30 days, probably longer. She wanted me to retract or reduce the public records request (all of which we are entitled to by law). She concluded by saying they would not process the request "for 30 days or longer" and when I said "We will proceed according to the law" she said "That's fine, but you're not going to get any help from us."
The first set of records we obtained, from an election held six weeks ago in King County, contained records consistent with manipulation of the election system, including an internal audit log in which 3 hours was deleted from Election Night.
This set of records requests, which we sent out to every county in the U.S. (except some that lack easily obtainable contact information), is not negotiable. They must comply.
We need volunteers for basic Internet and phone research. We have a list of counties for whom we need to dig a little deeper than normal for fax numbers and e-mails. Please e-mail bev@blackboxvoting.org if you can help, so we can make sure EVERY SINGLE COUNTY is served with public records requests for internal audit logs from all voting systems counted by computer (that includes optical scan, punch card, and DRE systems).
We have a smattering of counties in each state that will require quick phone calls to the county office to get this information. The faster we get ALL contact information for ALL counties and townships, the better, as we have two more Freedom of Information actions coming up pell-mell, and we don't want to leave anyone out. }(
Yes, I know, VerifiedVoting.org has a list -- we've had an equivalent one for awhile, but both ours and verifiedvoting.org's are missing certain types of information for sporadic counties -- and, taken nationwide, the gaps are significant.
Help us out if you can. The entire volunteer project can be done by e-mail, internet, and quick phone calls.
Bev Harris
Executive Director
Black Box Voting - a nonpartisan, nonprofit, publicly funded consumer protection group for elections.