Take Action

4. Tell Others

Please copy and paste the following text into an email message and send it to friends, family, colleagues, organizations and email lists!

ON ELECTION DAY, HOW WILL YOU KNOW IF YOUR VOTE IS PROPERLY COUNTED?

ANSWER: YOU WON’T

The bedrock of our democracy is the right to vote. Maryland is quickly moving to put in place electronic voting machines that make it impossible to safeguard the integrity of your vote – threatening the very foundation of our democracy.

Across the nation, voters are raising questions about the security of these machines being rapidly marketed and installed in many states. The Diebold system that Maryland has purchased is particularly alarming – it lacks basic functional capacity for recounts or voter verified audits! Imagine that after the 2000 fiasco in Florida. Investing public funds in these machines is risking electoral chaos in Maryland.

We have all used computers and we all know computers can make mistakes – whether it is a virus, malfunction, human error or electrical failure. With electronic voting there have been over a hundred reports of errors – significant errors. Here are a few examples:

• In Fairfax County, VA Republicans filed suit in November 2003 when ten voting machines from nine precincts broke down on election day and when machines in three precincts showed an X next to a candidates name who was selected by a voter but than the X disappeared. Democrats joined the Republicans in expressing concern about the “electronic Florida.”
• In August 2002 in Clay County, Kansas machines reported Jerry Mayo lost in a squeaker with 48%; a hand recount determined he won by a landslide.
• In November 2002 in Scurry County, Texas machines showed a landslide victory for two Republicans; the hand recount and a recount with a new computer chip found the Democrats won by a landslide.
• In Lake County, Illinois in 2003 – no votes were recorded in a precinct where the Democratic candidate knew he had voted for himself!

This issue is moving quickly. Just last month, a report by Science Applications International Corporation commissioned by Gov. Ehrlich found "328 security weaknesses, 26 of them critical." The review concluded that even if the recommended technical fixes are implemented, SAIC cannot guarantee that votes are safe from significant “risks, vulnerabilities and threats.” These findings are consistent with the much-publicized research by Johns Hopkins and Rice University researchers this July who found the machines are unnervingly vulnerable to computer malfunction and hacking.

Experts agree there is a simple solution to the flawed Diebold machines – allow voters to review a permanent paper record of their vote before it is cast electronically and secure this paper record for audits and in case of a recount.

PLEASE TAKE JUST A MINUTE to write to the House Ways & Means Committee and the Senate Education, Health & Environmental Affairs Committee. Take Action to protect your vote!

Act NOW so your True Vote is counted in the next election.

ALSO – please send this alert to family, friends, colleagues, organizations and email lists.

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