Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Nevada County (California) Registrar of Voters/County Clerk-Recorder Kathleen Smith recommended against contracting with ES&S for AutoMark deployment for the June 6, 2006, election, at the Board of Supervisors meeting yesterday. Mr. Tom O'Brien of ES&S said ES&S would not agree to the County's request for contract terms regarding shared cost of upgrades or specific trade-in terms on future improved equipment. Now, 41 days before California's Primary Election, Lou Dedier of ES&S refuses to provide services to Nevada County (software coding for optical scan ballot tabulation equipment) for the June 6 election without a service agreement. A typically arrogant act by a company that does not care if they lose business because they have much more than they can possibly handle....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

"Over a very short period of time, we and West Virginia counties are working to literally revolutionize the way elections are run in the state," according to ES&S spokesperson Jill Friedman Wilson in an email to the Associated Press. Revolutionize as in don't meet contracted dates? Disabilities accessible voting machines are not programmed going into the second week of early voting. Also Pulaski County, Arkansas joins the ES&S hit-parade today as they announce that there is no software for their DREs. The last round of testing of the Summit County memory cards found 17 more failures. And how does ES&S plan on covering an problems in the county? They are hiring 19 University students, giving them a days training and sending them out to represent the company....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

California counties are switching back to paper based systems. Alameda is the latest to announce that they will be using optical-scan and paper ballots for the primary and probably in the future. In what is an extremely quick response MicroVote got their uncertified software ITA tested in just six days (less than four working days). Indiana now needs to certify it for use by the counties....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

An editorial today applauds the Allen County Indiana decision to violate state law and use uncertified voting machines. The editorial may be correct and Allen County may be in a position where they are faced with being illegal no matter which way they decided and they took the path with less consequences. VoteTrustUSA has put the complete testimony from the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law as presented to a state senate committee and regarding the California voter registration database....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Allan County Indiana's elections director is blaming the state for the fact she has been knowingly using uncertified software on her MicroVote machines and MicroVote did not submit it for federal certification until just last Tuesday. In New Jersey a judge found that Sequoia would probably not be able to install a printer on their Advantage machines by 2008 and the printer would cost far more than represented by Sequoia. And in Ohio the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals has found that punch-card voting discriminates against minority voters....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Yesterday it was revealed in Indiana that MicroVote has installed uncertified software on voting machines in 47 counties. Just two days ago MicroVote sent that software for federal inspection and certification. They hope to have that complete by an ITA by Friday or next Monday. Some counties admit they knew the software was uncertified but they trusted MicroVote when they were told it was in the process. Allan County has announced that they will ignore the uncertified software and take a chance on lawsuits. In Oregon the SoS has announced he is suing ES&S for breach of contract. And Bucks County Pennsylvania has announced they will use their lever machines in the state primary....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

ED NOTE: This "Daily Voting News" was posted yesterday, but due to a software "glitch", it was somehow overwritten by another post. We're reposting it here. Good thing we had a paper trail backup!

The Allegheny County Pennsylvania suit brought by voters and PFAW against the county, state and federal government will be heard beginning next Tuesday in Pittsburgh. Summit County, Ohio's election director has predicted failure of the voting machines in their primary on May 2. A recount of ballots in Kane and DuPage County Illinois has been asked for partially because some voting machines were shut-down early due to the polls running out of paper for the DRE vvpat printers. Sequoia is over two months behind in delivering Advantage machines to New Jersey counties. In Indiana, MicroVote has been given until May 2 to make their uncertified equipment meet all state requirements or counties will not be able to use it in the primary...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The folks in Marion County Indiana announced today that they had completed testing their iVotronic machines. They claim the machines are all ready to go. I think that is probably a bit of soothing for the voters. In fact, none of their iVotronics can be used for accessibility in the primary so they are announcing that disabled voters will be able to have someone assist them in the voting process. Also some ballots cannot be read by the op-scan machines and will have to be counted by hand. Kanawha County West Virginia is also having problems getting software for their AutoMarks so there will be no accessible voting in that county. Voters with disabilities are being told to bring a friend or ask for help. And, the Democrats in Alaska have gone to court, finally, in an attempt to get the records of the 2004 election from the state....

My article yesterday "The Approaching 2006 E-Voting 'Train Wreck' Continues On Course" seems to have hit a nerve in the Allegheny County Executive's Office. Apparently the County Executive's Spokesman, Kevin Evanto, does not like his remarks, as printed in The Daily News characterized as being "silly".

Evanto told The Daily News:

Yesteday afternoon Evanto sent me an email in which he defends his statement; well a part of it:

To which I responded:

Nice try, Kevin. I guess we will leave it to the readers to decide about "sweeping, incorrect statements".

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The most ridiculous quote for the day: "The ES&S iVotronic machines are fully HAVA compliant. They have been certified by both the U.S. government and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The optical scan machine does not have a voter-verifiable paper trail." Kevin Evanto, spokesman for Allegheny County Pennsylvania Chief Executive Al Onorato. Some North Carolina counties are now experiencing a problem that a lot of us told them would come up; that is storage space. They now have voting machines in every nook and cranny and they have to find climate control storage for them. ...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Most people agree that elections are successful when the losing candidates can be certain that they lost the election. Losing candidates and the Republican party in Cook County, Illinois have joined together in a request for re-vote or re-counts of all races due to the poor performance of the voting system and elections officials in last month's primary. ES&S continues to get a lot of deserved heat in Indiana where they seem to have failed to uphold contractual agreements. And the county council in Allegheny County Pennsylvania has have issued a resolution to stop the use of new voting machines in this years primary. They are asking for a moratorium on any changes until November. ...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

One Cook County Illinois candidate is threatening to file a federal lawsuit for both Democrat and Republican candidates and against the county for voting counting problems. ES&Ss inability to deliver paper ballots on time is now being blamed on consolidation that the company did last year when they closed a Chicago office and moved their functions in with the Omaha office. Meanwhile Indiana SoS Rokita has decided that it is time to hold hearings into the failure of ES&S to provide contractual services and to learn more about reports that MicroVote has provided uncertified software to some customers in the state. The fines to ES&S could be as much as $300,000 per incident....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

ES&S seems to be failing everywhere. Indiana officials are very concerned; a Pennsylvania county still has no machines; and West Virginia counties have no software so they can prepare for their primary. On top of that Allegheny County Pennsylvania is being sued for selecting ES&S due, in part, to the lack of accessibility of their DREs. The DoJ is sharing part of that lawsuit for threatening the county and forcing them to make a decision before they were ready....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

I will be on the Mike Webb radio program this evening at 9:15PM Pac to discuss "The Train Wreck". You can listen from. I will also be on the Jay Marvin show tomorrow morning at 7:05AM Pac. You can listen at. Today I am beginning a new feature for 'Daily Voting News'. The beginning of the list of articles will now begin with those articles that represent the "Train Wreck" as I described it in my article of a couple days ago. So, for instance, the newly printed and received ballots in Marion County, Indiana have a sequencing error that makes them unreadable by the optical-scan machines; and that dear readers is part of the "Train Wreck"....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Today we got the surprise news that EAC Commissioner Ray Martinez has resigned his position. This just two days following his appearance, in Washington DC, at a conference of voting activists from around the country. Also, another county (Wood Co., WV) joins the growing list of ES&S customers who have received less than adequate service....