Florida elections officials have finished the machine testing phase of an "audit" of the voting machines in Sarasota County, where some 18,000 votes in a tight congressional race somehow disappeared or were never recorded. Their initial conclusions are laughable – and predictable.
The so-called audit is being conducted by people who have a vested interest in the outcome. Among those on the audit committee are an official who approved the machines in the first place, and a voting machine advocate who wore a "Bush Won" button throughout the entire 2000 recount of the presidential race in Florida. Further, the audit committee tested just five machines out of the 1,500 used on Election Day, as well as five more machines of the same type that were not used—an absurdly small sample.
What rubbish.
What rubbish.
If the auditors had actually listened to the voters, they would have heard the same testimony we heard at a hearing People For the American Way Foundation sponsored after the election. Dozens of voters said that the machines either would not record their vote in the congressional race, or that their vote had disappeared when the summary screen appeared. Experts on voting machines feel the massive undervote was caused by a combination of poor design, machine error, and the unwillingness of the elections officials to take action once the problem was discovered.
This is not the kind of democracy that Florida voters deserve. It’s not the kind of democracy that any American deserves.
When voters go to the polls on Election Day, they deserve to know that the winner of the election will be the candidate who got the most votes. In Florida’s 13th district, that may not be the case. It turns out that the results of this election have more to do with the decisions of elections officials than with the actual wishes of the voters themselves. That’s not right.
In the short term, the only fair option is to have a revote in this race. If Christie Jennings wins, she deserves to hold the seat in Congress. If Vern Buchanan wins, he deserves to go to Washington without a cloud of suspicion over his head. Only a revote will show us beyond any doubt which candidate ought to win the race.
Just as important is a long-term remedy for the next Presidential election, only two years away. If this audit shows us anything, it’s that Florida is on the path to another disastrous election and voters can’t have faith in the results.
Florida and the rest of the nation must undertake real election reform in time for the 2008 elections. This state can’t afford, once again, to have an election system that no one trusts. No election result should ever again be called "close enough." Every ballot cast must be countable, verifiable, and auditable. Only then will voters truly be able to know that every single vote counts.
Sarasota County voters deserve an election they can trust in 2006. And in 2008, every American voter deserves the same.
To learn more about People For the American Way Foundation’s ongoing fight for voters in Sarasota County, click here.