Guest Blogged by John Gideon
In a just released press release the Constitutional Litigation Clinic at Rutgers School of Law in Newark, NJ has announced that all electronic voting machines used in New Jersey may violate New Jersey’s Constitution and election laws.
The press release goes on to say:
The lawsuit is the first in the nation to successfully challenge electronic voting machines. Professor Penny Venetis, associate director of the clinic and lead counsel on the case, commented, “This shows that our courts take very seriously their role in protecting our most fundamental of all rights – the right to vote. Despite clear evidence that New Jersey’s voting machines are insecure, the other branches of government failed to take appropriate action. That is why the Court stepped in,” Venetis added.
The same voting machines used by almost all of New Jersey’s five million registered voters have been found too insecure to use and have been de-commissioned by California, Ohio, Nevada, and New York City. New Jersey does not check the software of electronic voting machines to determine whether they have been tampered with or whether they are faulty.
The Rutgers clinic filed the suit on behalf of the Coalition for Peace Action, a citizens group based in Princeton that has been in the forefront of advocating for safe, transparent and auditable elections, as well as voter Stephanie Harris, a farmer whose vote was lost by a malfunctioning Mercer County electronic voting machine. Other plaintiffs in the lawsuit include State Assemblyman Reed Gusciora, an early proponent of the voter verified paper ballot.
This lawsuit could have an impact on lawsuits in other states. Paul Lehto, who is a complainant in a suit against Sequoia in Washington state because using secret software to count votes secretly is contrary to the Washington state Constitution, is very interested in the opinion in this case.
We will keep an eye on this and report back when more is known.
Absolutely wonderful news. Bless their pea-picking hearts. Together with Diebold’s downfall, it really means we’ve turned the corner in ridding mankind of these furshlugginer machines..
Take another bow, Brad. And all the rest of you out there (too numerous to mention) who have gotten us to this point.
Good news!!
Now got to spread the word, must do this for utah. Looking at statutes concerning diebold…the governor shouldn’t have put these things in and now they are going bottom up!
Doug
Great find, John!
I’m going to see what we can do in FL,too,with Jeb here,it’s probably an impossible dream,but who knows?
I live in the state of NJ and this is the first I’m hearing of this! I hate this state, but after this decision, I will not leave until other states do the same thing. I have never been so proud to live here!
I’ll be able to sleep 1/50th easier tonight…
Everybody keep up the war on the frontlines here, I think its just about time for a Paul lehto to step into the court!
Lynn Landes has a huge case going to the court, huge cases require talented attornies….
Doug E.
Holy coolness! 🙂
Jeannie #4
Yes, if only the Ohio and Florida courts would do the same thing.
Well, for that matter all the states should have no trouble whatsoever of seeing this as obvious.
State election officials have been oblivious to it rather than seeing it as obviously the correct direction.
*bfg*
This is good news. It’ll be a slower transition moving away from Diebold than it was installing the machines because a lot of politicians and election officials will have to admit that they were hornswaggled, and pride is a hard pill to swallow.
It’ll probably be long court battles in a lot of states . . . and I say it’s worth the fight.
The machine in question here is Sequoia Advantage.
What is particularly significant about the NJ case is not just that Sequoia Advantage is one of the most problematic on its face technologically speaking, but that as of Jan. 1, 2006, it fell out of compliance with HAVA mandatory requirements, which disqualifies it from the use in federal elections.
For more information about the lawsuit, see http://www.eff.org/Activism/E-v...late_brief.pdf
Gusciora vs McGreevey/Codey & Harvey.
You know what this means?
It means we’ll finally pin some of these guys down in discovery. That alone is a major potential breakthrough if they can push the discovery through to the end.
Depositions oughta be a hoot and a half.
Hell yeah, this means another one is going to discovery process right now in New Mexico!
And hopefully that means the discovery process in Ohio won’t be cut off….that Blackwell won’t obstruct, Diebold will have to show up for trial and their memory cards will be handed over. At last.
Doug