Stein scheduled to appear LIVE on tonight's 'BradCast'...
By Brad Friedman on 11/23/2016, 12:26pm PT  

The Green Party's 2016 Presidential candidate Jill Stein is announcing her intention to seek a "recount of votes in the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania." The campaign's press release, posted in full below, cites "a multi-partisan effort to check the accuracy of the machine-counted vote tallies in these states in order to ensure the integrity of our elections."

The announcement follows on word that leaked out yesterday at New York magazine that top electronic voting experts and election integrity advocates have been encouraging the Hillary Clinton campaign to file for similar hand-counts and forensic analyses of electronic voting and tabulation systems in the same states. The BRAD BLOG has independently confirmed that those efforts have been under way and are still being considered at the top level of the Clinton campaign.

We discussed just some of those efforts, and a number of reasons for them, on yesterday's BradCast program. University of Michigan computer science professor Alex Halderman, who has cracked many electronic voting systems in recent years, offers additional reasons to check the results and the systems in WI, MI and PA now right here.

As millions of dollars must be raised in a very short time to pay filing fees and attorneys fees for the effort --- filing fees in WI alone, are $1 million, due this Friday --- the Stein campaign has set up a fund raising page for the effort right here.

Stein will be my guest on today's BradCast, nationally syndicated via the Pacifica Radio Network and others, at 6p ET (3p PT). You may listen live to the show at that time right here. [UPDATE: My exclusive interview with Stein is now posted here.]

The Green Party/Stein campaign press release follows in full below...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - November 22, 2016

Stein/Baraka Campaign Launches Recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania to Restore Confidence in our Voting System

Today, the Stein/Baraka campaign announced their intent to file for a recount of votes in the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, leading a multi-partisan effort to check the accuracy of the machine-counted vote tallies in these states in order to ensure the integrity of our elections.

Jill Stein observed, "After a divisive and painful presidential race, reported hacks into voter and party databases and individual email accounts are causing many American to wonder if our election results are reliable. These concerns need to be investigated before the 2016 presidential election is certified. We deserve elections we can trust."

In an election surrounded by hacks, the use of systems that have been demonstrated to be easily hacked should concern every American. Some of the machines used in Wisconsin, have been banned in California after they were shown to be highly vulnerable to hacking and malicious reprogramming, due to the lack of security features. Leading election security experts have been calling for exactly this sort of recount as a critical safeguard against cyberattacks.

The deadline for filing for a recount in Wisconsin is this Friday, November 25th, at a cost of $1.1 million. The Stein/Baraka campaign, along with election integrity advocates, are beginning in a massive [crowd source] fundraising effort to obtain the needed funds before Friday afternoon.

The Stein/Baraka campaign is well positioned to lead the effort as election integrity advocates, without a personal conflict of interest in the outcome.

"Greens have long been at the forefront of campaigns for election integrity," noted David Cobb, Stein/Baraka campaign manager. As the Green Party presidential candidate in 2004, Cobb led the charge for a recount in the state of Ohio for that election year. "This effort is about holding the institutions of democracy accountable by ensuring all votes that are cast are counted," said Cobb.

Stein noted, "Assuring the validity of our vote is a critical first step towards democratizing our elections. Other essential steps include ending discriminatory voter ID laws and voter purges (like "Interstate Crosscheck"); opening the debates to all candidates on the ballot in enough states to win the election; establishing Ranked Choice Voting, a system that enables voters to rank their choices, knowing that if their first choice loses, their vote is automatically reassigned to their second choice; and getting big money out of politics - and letting the people back in.

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