Why Audit Wisconsin's Election Results?

In January 2006, Wisconsin Act 92 was signed into law.  It requires a paper audit trail of ballots.  This passed overwhelmingly with bipartisan support and is a good indicator that across Wisconsin there is considerable concern over the reliability of the computerized voting machines.  Now let’s take advantage of this paper audit trail and actually do the audits.

• Important features of American life are subject to audits, such as financial audits of all public companies and banks, and independent inspection of accredited hospitals.  Vote counts determine who controls budgets and issues worth millions, billions and even trillions of dollars.

• Wisconsin has Diebold equipment in 21 counties.

• The U.S. Election Assistance Commission publishes a “Best Practices Toolkit” that states on page 32 “Consider conducting a manual recount of one percent of the ballots cast or of a randomly selected precinct.”  It uses New Mexico’s three-stage audit as an example.
• In Medford, Wisconsin, in November 2004, 27% of the votes were not counted by the tabulating machine.  Shockingly, this was not discovered by the municipal clerk, county clerk, or State Elections Board.  Months later, it was brought to light by a private company.
• In September, the non-partisan US Government Accountability Office issued a lengthy report #GAO-05-956 that summarized the flaws in the computerized voting machines that are now being sold. These machines have made some big errors. The GAO report discusses the security flaws that have been exposed. This equipment in general is susceptible to malicious people who would disrupt our elections. The conclusion of the GAO is that “key activities need to be completed” before we have secure and reliable electronic voting systems.
• Wisconsin Statute 7.08 (6) (created by 2003 Wisconsin Act 265)goes into effect this year, but the State Elections Board has not determined how to implement it.  “Following each general election, audit the performance of each voting system used in this state to determine the error rate of the system in counting ballots that are validly cast by electors.”
• What are other states doing?  Ten other states mandate audits, including Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Washington, and West Virginia.  See http://www.verifiedvoting.org/downloads/Manual_Audit_Provisions.html
• The U.S. Election Assistance Commission has commissioned a report on best practice for vote counts and recounts, due in September 2006.

Web page by Paul Malischke       malischke@yahoo.com        Last updated February 03, 2008