Summer Elections

Today's post is two fold:

1) I hope that you are following the ongoing battle for a locally elected Supervisor of Elections to have decision making authority. Ion Sancho, Leon County's Supervisor of Elections, and one of the best election experts in the country, continues to be targeted by the Republican lead leadership of Florida. The title bar links to a story in yesterday's paper regarding how Cobb, the Jeb Bush appointed Secretary of State, is trying to change state law to give the state the power to approve how Election Supervisor's test there machines. Why, after all these years, would the State need this power? Because Ion Sancho has found flaws, with the machines the state is requiring him to use, that allow the results of the elections to be tampered with and changed.

2) Don't forget that this Monday is an LCYD meeting, and that we will be holding officer elections for the next year this Monday. Rules and procedures have been sent out over our Yahoo Group (There is a link to join ---------->). I hope to see you there!

"Happy Sunshine Week - slam!"

The Florida Sec. of State Sue Cobb showed a lack of commitment to the spirit of "Sunshine Week,” a week for recognition of Florida's open-government law, before yesterday's meeting. This excerpt is taken from a Tallahassee Democrat Article available Online through the link in the title bar:

"Tallahassee Democrat Political Editor Bill Cotterell, Associated Press reporter Brent Kallestad and cameraman Dave Heller also were threatened with eviction from a hallway outside Cobb's closed conference room by Capitol Police for trying to attend the meeting with Cobb, Leon County Commission Chairman Bill Proctor, Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho"

Please click on the title to view the full article, where you may share your views on the article, and download video clips of Sec. Cobb, Com. Proctor and Sup. Sancho.

Light at the end of tunnel for Sancho

There's breaking news in the Leon County Voting Machines Issue. This excerpt is from a Tallahassee Democrat Online article (available through the link in the title bar):

"After a two-hour meeting with Leon County officials, Secretary of State Sue Cobb said today she is 'slightly more confident' that the county can work out problems with providing handicapped-accessible voting equipment.

Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho and County Commission Chairman Bill Proctor said they were pleased with the closed-door session."

Although this news is encouraging, this issue is not yet resolved. "Today's article about Sue Cobb's and Ion Sancho's meeting is encouraging, but in no way does it diminish the importance of attending tomorrow's events," said Rick Minor, Chair of the Leon County Democratic Executive Meeting. For details about tommorrow's activites visit the comments.

Light at the end of tunnel for Sancho

There's breaking news in the Leon County Voting Machines Issue. This excerpt is from a Tallahassee Democrat Online article (available through the link in the title bar):

"After a two-hour meeting with Leon County officials, Secretary of State Sue Cobb said today she is 'slightly more confident' that the county can work out problems with providing handicapped-accessible voting equipment.

Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho and County Commission Chairman Bill Proctor said they were pleased with the closed-door session."

Although this news is encouraging, this issue is not yet resolved. "Today's article about Sue Cobb's and Ion Sancho's meeting is encouraging, but in no way does it diminish the importance of attending tomorrow's events," said Rick Minor, Chair of the Leon County Democratic Executive Meeting. For details about tommorrow's activites visit the comments.

Leon County and Ion Sancho Make National News in the ongoing drama regarding diebold

Wed. December 14, 2005: Due to contractual non-performance and security design issues, Leon County (Florida) supervisor of elections Ion Sancho has announced that he will never again use Diebold in an election. He has requested funds to replace the Diebold system from the county. On Tuesday, the most serious “hack” demonstration to date took place in Leon County. The Diebold machines succumbed quickly to alteration of the votes. This comes on the heels of the resignation of Diebold CEO Wally O'Dell, and the announcement that a stockholder's class action suit has been filed against Diebold by Scott & Scott. Further “hack” testing on additional vulnerabilities is tentatively scheduled before Christmas in the state of California.

Finnish security expert Harri Hursti, together with Black Box Voting, demonstrated that Diebold made misrepresentations to Secretaries of State across the nation when Diebold claimed votes could not be changed on the “memory card” (the credit-card-sized ballot box used by computerized voting machines.

A test election was run in Leon County on Tuesday with a total of eight ballots. Six ballots voted "no" on a ballot question as to whether Diebold voting machines can be hacked or not. Two ballots, cast by Dr. Herbert Thompson and by Harri Hursti voted "yes" indicating a belief that the Diebold machines could be hacked.

At the beginning of the test election the memory card programmed by Harri Hursti was inserted into an Optical Scan Diebold voting machine. A "zero report" was run indicating zero votes on the memory card. In fact, however, Hursti had pre-loaded the memory card with plus and minus votes.

The eight ballots were run through the optical scan machine. The standard Diebold-supplied "ender card" was run through as is normal procedure ending the election. A results tape was run from the voting machine.

Correct results should have been: Yes:2 ; No:6

However, just as Hursti had planned, the results tape read: Yes:7 ; No:1

The results were then uploaded from the optical scan voting machine into the GEMS central tabulator, a step cited by Diebold as a protection against memory card hacking. The central tabulator is the "mother ship" that pulls in all votes from voting machines. However, the GEMS central tabulator failed to notice that the voting machines had been hacked.

The results in the central tabulator read: Yes:7 ; No:1

This videotaped testing session was witnessed by Black Box Voting investigators Bev Harris and Kathleen Wynne, Florida Fair Elections Coalition Director Susan Pynchon, security expert Dr. Herbert Thompson, and Susan Bernecker, a former candidate for New Orleans city council who videotaped Sequoia-brand touch-screen voting machines in her district recording vote after vote for the wrong candidate.

The Hursti Hack requires a moderate level of inside access. It is, however, accomplished without being given any password and with the same level of access given thousands of poll workers across the USA. It is a particularly dangerous exploit, because it changes votes in a one-step process that will not be detected in any normal canvassing procedure, it requires only a single a credit-card sized memory card, any single individual with access to the memory cards can do it, and it requires only a small piece of equipment which can be purchased off the Internet for a few hundred dollars.

One thousand two hundred locations in the U.S. and Canada use Diebold voting machines. In each of these locations, typically three people have a high level of inside access. Temporary employees also often have brief access to loose memory cards as machines are being prepared for elections. Poll workers sometimes have a very high level of inside access. National elections utilize up to two million poll workers, with hundreds or thousands in a single jurisdiction.

Many locations in the U.S. ask poll workers to take voting machines home with them with the memory cards inside. San Diego County (Calif) sent 713 voting machines/memory cards home with poll workers for its July 26 election, and King County (Wash.) sent over 500 voting machines home with poll workers before its Nov. 8 election.

Memory cards are held in a compartment protected by a small plastic seal. However, these simple seals can be defeated, and Hursti has found evidence that the memory card can be reprogrammed without disturbing the seal by using a telephone modem port on the back of the machine.

The Hursti Hack, referred to as “the mother of all security holes” was first exposed in a formal report on July 4. (http://www.blackboxvoting.org/BBVreport.pdf).

Diebold has insisted to county and state election officials that despite Hursti’s demonstration, changing votes on its memory cards is impossible. (Public records from Diebold, including threat letter to Ion Sancho: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/2197/10535.html)

On Oct. 17, 2005 Diebold Elections Systems Research and Development chief Pat Green specifically told the Cuyahoga County (Ohio) board of elections during a $21 million purchasing session that votes cannot be changed using only a memory card. (Video of Pat Green: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/2197/14298.html)

Over the objections of Cuyahoga County citizens, and relying on the veracity of Diebold’s statements, the board has chosen to purchase the machines.

According to Public Records obtained by Black Box Voting, Diebold has promulgated misrepresentations about both the Hursti Hack and another kind of hack by Dr. Herbert Thompson to secretaries of state, and to as many as 800 state and local elections officials. Stockholder suit filed by the law offices of Scott and Scott: and http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002153.htm

Diebold CEO resigns: http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=175001748

Permission to reprint granted with link to http://blackboxvoting.org/

You Need To Know

Town Hall
"You Need To Know"
Your Rights, Your Liberties, Your Freedom: How the Supreme Court's 5-4 Decisions Affect You


Tuesday, September 13th
6:00 p.m.
Tallahassee City Hall Chambers
* Refreshments will be provided

Join State Representative Curtis Richardson,
Georgia Representative Alisha Thomas-Morgan,
Caroline Stuart of Planned Parenthood,
Virgil Miller, former FAMU SGA President,
Sharon Lettman, PFAW Director of National Programs and
Ion Sancho, Leon County Supervisor of Elections

Bringing together students and local residents of Tallahassee to discuss issues concerning their rights and liberties.
Issues include:
Civil Rights / Affirmative Action
Education
Women's Rights
Voting Rights
The Supreme Court


For more information, please contact Raquel Simon at 850-877-0307 or RSimon@pfaw.org

Sancho reaffirms that he wants paper trail when people vote!

Here is an article from the Tallahassee Democrat discussing the fact that the Secretary of State's office is encouraging local (Leon County) Supervisor of Elections offices to start using the Diebold systems for touch screen voting system. Fortunately, our elected officials know better, and our Supervisor of Elections, Ion Sancho, works hard to legitimately count every vote.

Voting machine advice irks county
Tallahassee Democrat, 3/30/2005

Secretary of State Glenda Hood's elections office has advised Leon County to provide handicapped voters a touch-screen-voting system made by a company whose president caused a stir in last year's campaign by promising to help deliver Ohio to President Bush.

Leon County Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho objected Tuesday to a brief letter sent to county officers by Paul Craft, head of voting-systems certification for the Division of Elections in Hood's department, touting a Diebold system. State law requires counties to have handicapped-accessible equipment in every voting precinct by July 1. 'Your immediate, and probably most cost-effective, option is to upgrade your voting system to the Diebold Election Systems Inc.... System as certified Oct. 14, 2004,' Craft wrote to Sancho. He sent copies to County Commission Chairman Cliff Thaell and Herb Thiele, the county attorney.

Craft wrote that in regional conference calls last week, several counties asked for advice on meeting the accessibility deadline. 'My personal view is that it's a bunch of hooey,' Thaell said. 'It's inappropriate for the state to be so heavy-handed with an elected constitutional officer such as the supervisor of elections.' Jenny Nash, a spokeswoman for Hood, said there are three touch-screen systems certified for 'audio-ballot' voting by the handicapped. She said they are made by Diebold Election System of McKinney, Texas, Sequoia Voting Systems of Oakland, Calif., and Election Systems & Software Inc. Of Omaha, Neb.. 'I think we recommended Diebold because he already has Diebold equipment and it would be compatible,' Nash said. She said the department recommended other brands for other counties. 'Since Florida began using these voting systems in 2002 the disabled community, for the first time ever, was able to cast an independent ballot,' she said of the touch screens.

But Sancho said Diebold optical scanners are not compatible with Diebold touch-screen systems unless a third piece of equipment is bought. He said the ES&S 'AutoMark' system - not a touch screen - is probably what he will recommend to Thaell for handicapped voting. 'The problem is that election regulation in this state is administered by people who have never run an election,' said Sancho, who has been elections supervisor since 1988.

The use of touch-screen-voting machines, and their lack of paper records, was a source of lawsuits and political posturing in last year's Florida campaign. Hood defended their accuracy while Democrats argued that without paper ballots no recounts would be possible.

Leon County uses Diebold optical-scanning voting machines, on which voters mark an oval next to candidates' names and computers count their ballots. Touch-screen systems, similar to those in some supermarkets and banks, are used in 15 Florida counties with more than half of the statewide vote - allowing voters to touch a spot next to candidates or ballot issues. 'People in Leon County would rather vote on paper than on vapor,' Sancho said. Diebold's chief executive, Walden O'Dell, was harshly attacked by Democrats and other Bush critics last year because of a 2003 fund-raising letter he sent for a Bush-Cheney '04 event. O'Dell wrote that he was 'committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes for the president next year.' Ohio turned out to be the tipping point on Nov. 2. O'Dell explained during the campaign that he only meant that he would support Bush personally - adding that Diebold's election-systems division is located in Texas and is run by a Democrat.

Although the federal Help America Vote Act gives states until Jan. 1 to have accessible voting equipment at every precinct, Sancho said, Florida requires counties to get them by July 1.

Sancho said Craft told him the AutoMark optical-scanning system should be certified by September for handicapped voters. Since there are no statewide elections until September 2006, Sancho said, counties should be allowed to wait until other handicapped-accessible scanners are approved. 'If you buy the AutoMark system you don't have to buy a third piece of equipment,' said Sancho. Previously, Sancho said he has had two poll workers - a Democrat and a Republican - go with handicapped voters into a private area to fill in the ovals on a scanned ballot. One poll worker verifies that the other has accurately marked the ballots, he said.