On Election Day in 2006, in Sarasota County’s 13th U.S. Congressional district race, some 18,000 votes cast on ES&S iVotronic touch-screen systems failed to register a vote for either candidate on the ballot. It was an extraordinarily high undervote rate, which has never been explained, in an election outcome determined by just 369 votes. (BRAD BLOG’s long series of reports on FL-13 here.)
Nonetheless, just last year, the county’s horrible, and still un-resigned, Supervisor of Elections, Kathy Dent (one of the country’s absolute worst), lied to a bunch of colleagues during a speaking engagement at the Pacific Northwest Election Conference.
“It was only after the results were in and the 18,000 undervotes were revealed that all of a sudden there were all of these folks that started saying well they couldn’t touch the machines … and their vote wasn’t registering,” she tells her colleagues, as seen in the video above right, as captured by Ginny Ross of the Oregon Voter Rights Coalition.
“But they were all after the fact,” Dent informs the crowd, “and there were no phone calls coming into my office. So it’s a little bit of an indication that there may have been some politics involved in this.”
Documentation from her own office, however (yes, a paper trail!), shows incontestably that the Election Director’s comments, as caught on tape, are a complete and utter and unrepentant fabrication…
As Kim Zetter at WIRED’s “Threat Level” blog revealed on Tuesday, public records requests for written complaint forms from the SoE’s office, clearly show otherwise. Dent had received tons of complaint calls from voters unable to register votes in the FL-13 race, both on Election Day, and even during the early voting period. Moreover, additional reporting from Zetter shows that Dent knew about those complaints both at the time, and certainly by the time she made the out-and-out false statements seen in the video.
In other words, the woman entrusted to administrate the Sarasota County, Florida, elections, Kathy Dent, is a bald-faced liar.
But that’s not all she lied about in the speech…
“Also contrary to what Dent says in the video,” writes Zetter, “it wasn’t only voters who supported the losing candidate who complained. Among those who expressed problems with a voting machine was the wife of the winning candidate, Vern Buchanan.”
That’s right, even the wife of the “winning candidate,” the candidate who told everyone in the media that the reason for the extraordinary undervote rate — which didn’t occur in the same race in any other county, or even in the same county on the paper absentee ballots, but only on the e-voting machines and only on the ones in Sarasota — was because thousands of voters chose not to vote in that race, for some unspecified reason.
Incidentally, that particular race was the most expensive one run during that 2006 election. Ironically, enough, it was also the contest to fill the Congressional seat being vacated by former FL Sec. of State Katherine Harris.
“So why would Dent tell her conference colleagues that voters never complained about machines until after the election was over, when records her office kept during the election clearly belied this?” asks Zetter.
Because she’s a liar, answers The BRAD BLOG, in lieu of WIRED saying it directly (as per the genial journalistic courtesy, which we do not follow at this point, when the evidence is clear, since such undeserved niceties now ill serve this nation, in our opinion.) Though this certainly isn’t the only such example of blatant dishonesty in Dent’s storied disgraceful career as Sarasota’s SoE. You can look back through our voluminous FL-13 archives to find many more examples.
And, as if all of that is not shameful enough, in a second video posted by Zetter (go on over and check it out), Dent goes on to “joke” about all of those complaints (which she lied about), and on which her own petard is once against hoisted.
“Sarasota county is going paperless,” she told her colleagues. “We don’t really put anything in writing anymore.”
WIRED notes the laughter from her colleagues following that remark, and Dent’s follow up to it: “You think I’m kidding.”
Thanks BRAD, for calling a LIAR a LIAR for once, instead of honking on mightily about DENT’s lack of malicious INTENT in the face of her never-ending SERIES of ELECTION LAW VIOLATIONS.
Every time the broad opens her mouth it’s a lie/ a distortion/ a re-direction/ a diversionary tactic/ a threat/ a freaky, belligerent exchange/ a LIE.
Here’s another good one we culled from the INCREDIBLE FOOTAGE FROM GINNY ROSS and that UBER CREEPY “NW PACIFIC CONFERENCE:
“THOSE PESKY ACTIVISTS…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83TGawMwJhQ
Here, Dent distinguishes between GOOD activists and BAD activists/ even mentions our FABULOUS BEV HARRIS and her CITIZEN TOOL KIT as the “cause of all her woes”…that, and apparently “the endless barrage of bad press she’s received from “the media” on YOUTUBE…which is just three of us with video cameras. Good to know she’s not only watching them, but PROMOTING them.
(Thanks, Kathy!)
Another video CHOCKED FULL OF DENT LIES can be found here:
“DENT DENIES TIES TO ES&S: REVISED WITH NEW LIES:”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFEgYIHsM8w
In this stunning example of chutzpah, Kathy Dent claims there is “no evidence” of her blatant, shameless ties to Election Systems and Software–the voting machine vendor that produced the now notorious whopping 18, 412 undervote in Sarasota County’s 2006 Congressional Election.
NO EVIDENCE?…Well, we have some.
Thanks again, Brad~! Keep up the heat! And of course, Ginny Ross, who managed to infiltrate that bizzaro-world den of thieves and partisan foot-soldiers to bring us this amazing, but alarming footage. GREAT to see it get some play.
(FYI: the REST of that conference is stunning. VERY CLEAR in all clips that these election officials have TREMENDOUS DISDAIN for the voters they represent. Disgusting…)
But is she a world class hacker for over two decades?
Wonder why noone besides Raw Story wants to do an expose of the world class hackers who have infiltrated the GOP?
One such hacker is a chair down in Brad’s area and is a California treasurer of the party (remember the Washington DC dude who stole them blind?).
She needs to be charged with malfeasance and misfeasance of office.
Someone with standing to sue needs to make the charge. There is clear and inconvertible evidence that she is guilty.
One must never be afraid to spread the truth and put it in a good light. One politician said this:
(HuffPo, emphasis added).
I posted an earth shaking development in electronic voting machine hacking news, larger by far than the Clint Curtis story, and it is not getting any brad blog official play.
Brad, are you moving the school?
YoungHarry (#3)
Amen! Problem is, there was a criminal complaing against DENT filed with the FDLE (Florida Department of Law Enforcement); we even GAVE them enough incriminating documents to choke a horse and then send that choked horse straight to jail. Then the FDLE report came out, and COMPLETELY overlooked the most incriminating evidence in the report; exonerated Dent because the investigator concluded DENT did not “intend” to break the law, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
So, NOW what? Best we can do is hope she is defeated for re-election in NOVEMBER…but she RUNS THE VERY ELECTION SYSTEM we will use for HER ELECTION. (A BRAND NEW, UNTRIED DIEBOLD OP SCAN MODEL.)
Oh, and FYI: In today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune re: a local election held yesterday, a voter reported DENT was handing out literature and pens FOR HER OWN CAMPAIGN inside the polling place.
Again.
I guess she hasn’t learned her lesson, because NO ONE HAS ENFORCED THIS LESSON; no accountability and a creepy elected official who HATES the voters is completely in charge.
Wait a minute, Liar. It was all Kate harris’ fault because the district belonged to her and there would not have even been a need for an election if that freak stayed to terrorize the people of Sarasota for another 2 years? Does that not freak anyone else out? Hey liar what makes you think there wouldn’t have been a malfunction of voting machines if Harris was in the race? Brad, I hope you don’t take Antonin Scalia’s advice and just get over this. Why arent’ there a thousand protesters a day at liar’s office calling for LIAR’s resignation. Signs that say LIAR LIAR and WE DEMAND PAPER TRAILS. If LIAR’S loony toons cell phone ringer that just happened to be left on and ringing during LIAR’S Liefest got LIAR to pee LIAR’S pants, think what the American people out for justice could do to LIAR.
There will never be paper trails as long as Congress can’t pull their balls out of their asses and fight for justice. They will let these liars and crooks run this country. It is up to us to make America fair and honest. People like LIAR don’t want elections. They want Bat shit crazy Kathy Harris to make their cushy jobs easy by staying in power. For now they will take the used car salesman, but another election is coming. The American people will be heard.
In the Defense of Kathy Dent this exceptional public official I offer the following”¦.
a. She was with a “power users” group from ES&S at the same convention so what else could she say”¦. It was a joint conference”¦.
b. She was so nervous she did not recall who paid for her way out there and what about social drinks and jet lag”¦
c. She told them there was an “SQL” worm in early voting but she had backup.. now that was exceptional planning”¦ but turns out she just was not clear on the State required election report where it was stated that it was just an “outage” with some libraries.. the County IT report stated that the “hacker captured” the system operator passwords,, ,not any kind of SQL worm know to man.. more like a Trojan horse”¦ in the form of an SQL worm”¦.. taking over passwords and closing off the system for two hours with voters data sent all over the internet world”¦..
d. As President of the Florida Supervisors of Election’s she deserves more respect,,.. activists she said are good and bad just check with Kathy to get the list.. as an example in the recount in Nov 2006 the present Sec of State, ESS Executives, her lawyer a registered lobbyist, lawyers from the State division of elections, the chief of certification for the State of Florida, even the public relations outside consultants for ES&S all in one warehouse. So many turning out to support her that there was not room for public observers”¦ then one of the “bad” activists strikes! .. and reminds the horde of legal staff that they are not following the Florida Election Code”¦ and the bad activist is armed with a copy of the law the only one in the building”¦ they borrow it and a Judge finds that bad activist is the only one there who knows the law”¦. Poor Kathy, President of all the SOE’s in Florida had to say that it was an “archaic” law but just to go that extra mile they would then follow it”¦. so much on her mind”¦. Like ten machines with broken seals on them and the “archaic” law that required calling out the poll tapes”¦to the public.
e. She told the conference audience about all that security, first mission for her and her staff.. but the speakers time was short so she did not have time to tell the audience that she used 4 “election ID spare cards” that did not have logs and which could be given out to anyone and were.. in that secure warehouse”¦.and that she had to investigate herself when some of the bad activists discovered the widespread use of bogus ID cards on election night, during the recount, and prior to the election”¦”¦she did not have time to tell them that they feel now the warehouse with all the special voting equipment in it is now secure with all the changes she made after the election”¦. And then there was that VP of ES&S who had an active ID Card even after the election and a history of being in the industry with a voting machine company where the president was found to provide retirement benefits as extra compensation to public officials for purchase of his machines. How could anyone expect one person to clean up the whole industry and run elections at the same time and how could voters expect her to know that her warehouse was not secure when the State Audit said it was “¦.
f. Another problem with the time she was given to speak”¦. Again she was not able to tell the audience about that contract her husband drafted for her and sent to ES&S which the Canvass board later refused to sign even with her, ES&S and the head of Florida Certification pleading with them”¦she was only able to tell about how it protected the voters from any PUBLIC election data that ES&S might leak out”¦. There just was not time to tell the audience that article #20 appointed ES&S as a consultant in their own audit of the machines”¦.. and how she wanted to save the county money by having ES&S “contact” her husband for questions as he was not an overworked county employee, restricted from employment according to Florida Laws, thus he would have more time to “help out” given she had to deal with silly public document requests from the “bad” activists”¦and the mountain of legal suits.
g. She was so limited with speaker time that she could not tell the audience of the rich heritage Sarasota Florida has as the home of Kathryn Harris former Sec of State when one candidate lost the election for president and Florida helped him out”¦”¦they will even have a movie on her HBO May 25, called RECOUNT. I am sure Kathy Dent is deserving of her own movie”¦.
h. Supervisor Dent looks after voters in her county, she knows “the voters do not know how to vote” as she told them after the Nov 7th, 2006 election and wants to help them. She even went as far as ordering in “Hype over Hacking” Pro T-Screens reprints in an election that had an active ballot item to do away with the T-Screen voting in Sarasota after she had been “hacked” just days earlier. And again was exonerated in a police investigation for placing them inside the polling area, saying she did not have “intent” to influence voters a felony.. she did say in an interview that “obviously not too many were influenced” when asked by the press about it”¦. “tell the people it (the ballot item to get rid of T-Screen DRE voting machines) passed”!
i. Supervisor Dent has taken extraordinary steps to educate the voters and the county commission”¦. In 2004 appearing in front of them in an official hearing she stated three times “the machines do not have software” when discussing voter intent in T-Screen voting Vs. paper ballots and the iVotronic voting machines she purchased instead of scanners. This look into computer technology shared by Kathy Dent could set back the computing industry to its very roots, but Kathy had the courage to tell us what MIT and Cal Tec would not”¦.
j. Supervisor Dent time after time has told the voters how well the T-Screen machines worked and even went as far as keeping secret that all the T-Screen parts in Sarasota County had to be replaced”¦. Installing voter “confidence” at the price of loss of confidence in herself when the bad activists made it public”¦ now that is dedication.
k. Supervisor Dent has also stated that all this concern about her and the voting machines is just “sore losers” talk in elections,,,, and she is supported by her boss the Secretary of State. In a recent speech he stated that “sore losers” were responsible for all the legal suits, and he does know about that ,, he filed a suit with Supervisor Dent to repeal the vote in Sarasota County by a majority of its voters, (to only use scanners and get rid of the T-Screens as well provide a comprehensive audit for its elections.) Again dedication at any price to the tax payers”¦
We could go on and on with the dedication of this public official to keep voters confidence up at any taxpayer cost, but what difference does it make, the “voters do not know how to vote” anyway, as she told them.”¦..
WWWEeeeeeEEEEEEE! Jill! This is a FABU summation! Mind if I tattoo it on my forehead? THANKS SO MUCH for this!