Bowen lists her top ten rights that every American voter has been mandated by our Constitution:
1. The Right To Register To Vote. Every Californian who is eligible to vote has a legal right to register to vote without being forced to navigate through unnecessary bureaucratic obstacles.
2. The Right To Vote. Every registered voter has a right to cast a ballot. This means that Voters shouldn't show up at a polling place, only to find it closed for hours or be forced to stand in lines because the voting equipment doesn't work. In addition, essential information about voting should be readily available to all voters.
3. The Right to Vote In A Tamper-Proof Election. Every voter has the right for his or her vote to count equally -- which means no one should be required to vote using machines that have been proven time and time again to lack the security necessary to ensure that people's votes are counted accurately. If a piece of voting equipment isn't secure, accurate, and auditable, it should not be used in California's electoral process.
4. The Right To Vote On Paper. More and more counties are installing electronic voting equipment and doing away with the paper ballots that voters are used to just as voter confidence in electronic machines is plummeting. Voters should have a right to cast a paper ballot, and it should be made clear to voters that they have this choice.
5. The Right To Have Each Vote Counted Accurately. A vote is meaningless unless it is counted as the voter intended it. In recent years, every election has brought instances of votes being inaccurately tabulated and voter confidence in the election results is at an all-time low. It's time to change that.
6. The Right To Have Election Results Properly Audited. Audits are the only way to ensure the accuracy of the vote. Next year, when SB 1235 (Bowen) takes effect, the current law requiring that 1% of precincts be audited will be expanded to include votes cast by absentee ballot and early voting centers, and will require full transparency of the auditing process. Audits should be statistically valid, and when there are irregularities the audit should be expanded or a full recount should be conducted.
7. The Right To An Open, Transparent, Public Process. While every voter's ballot is and must be private, that's the only thing in the electoral process that should stay a secret. We should have full transparency in elections procedures, all phases of the conduct of the election, the process used for testing, reviewing and buying voting systems, and all reports of errors and anomalies should be made public. Finally, voters should be entitled to watch the vote-counting process and the 1% manual audit process.
8. The Right To Elections Officials Who Operate Free of Partisan Influence. Anyone who is in charge of tallying the votes and certifying the results of an election, including the Secretary of State and local registrars of voters, should not endorse candidates for office in that election.
9. The Right To Know that Elected Officials Are Free From the Influence of Campaign Contributions From Voting Machine Vendors. The people responsible for setting the standards for voting equipment, for testing a voting system, or for deciding which system to buy should not be taking campaign contributions or gifts from voting equipment manufacturers who have a financial interest in the decisions that are made.
10. The Right To Find Out How Money Is Being Raised And Spent In The Political Process. Voters should be able to easily find out the true identity of any person or any entity that is contributing to campaigns, as well as how candidates and campaigns are spending their money.
While many of these rights sound simple, Bowen says, "in light of the voting problems we've seen in California and across the country, we can't take a single one for granted."
And she is right. This country is under attack by those who use under the table deals to a monopoly of companies who refuse to disclose information about the calculation of the votes. But the fraud doesn't stop in smoke filled rooms among powerful bureaucrats- it continues all the way down to county levels of government where machines are tampered with and hacked leaving the average voter fearful of whether our vote was counted as it was cast.
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