Report: E-Voting problems might infest midterm elections
Equipment failures and legal battles over new voter identification rules likely to result in delays and confusion, watchdog group says.
A watchdog group is warning of possible chaos at the polls next month as states attempt their first full-scale test of electronic voting systems.
In a report released Tuesday, electionline.org said equipment failures and legal battles over new voter identification rules mandated by many states were likely to result in widespread delays and confusion at the nation's polling places.
"The Nov. 7 election promises to bring more of what voters have come to expect since the 2000 election -- a divided body politic, an election system in flux and the possibility, if not certainty, of problems at the polls nationwide," the report said.
The good news is that two other reforms mandated by the 2002 Help America Vote Act -- the installation of machines accessible to the disabled and the development of state-wide voter data bases -- have been widely implemented across the country, the report said.
As evidence of the potential for voting machine mayhem, the report cited Maryland's "disastrous September primary," in which Montgomery County was forced to postpone opening its polls due to a lack of computer activator cards, frozen screens and missing ballots.
Confidence in the system was further undermined a few days later when a Princeton computer science professor released a study showing how the Diebold TS machine -- the system used in Maryland and other states to replace lever-activated and punch-card machines -- could be easily manipulated with a program capable of spreading from terminal to terminal, the report noted.
An estimated 66 million voters are due to vote on touch-screen systems in next month's election. In a number of states, moreover, vendors have failed to deliver the new machines on time, the electionline.org report said.
New voter identification rules mandated in some states might be another source of voting turmoil, according to the report. It noted that the required use of government-issued photos has triggered unresolved lawsuits in several states, including Georgia, Indiana and Missouri.