Ray Boyd Offers $100,000 to Prove E-Voting is Verifiable
(APN) ELLIJAY — At a press conference on May 10, 2014 in Ellijay, Georgia, independent activist Ray Boyd offered 100,000 dollars to anyone who can prove that Georgia’s electronic voting equipment can be independently audited, recounted, or verified after the election.
Photograph courtesy of Nydia Tisdale.
APN has posted a video of the press conference, courtesy of blogger and open government activist Nydia Tisdale, on our Video Section:
As previously reported by Atlanta Progressive News, in 2002, the State of Georgia switched over to Diebold’s Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting equipment without voter verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) printers.
DRE’s can be equipped with VVPAT printers, but are not in Georgia.
Incidentally, starting with the 2002 election, Georgia switched from being a Blue State to a Red State.
“The problem is those machines do not have a method to verify that the vote you cast gets counted for the person you cast it for… There is no way to audit your vote… Because when that computer spits out the result for a recount, it’s going to spit out the same result it did before… Since 2002, we have not had a verifiable way to audit our votes,” Boyd said.
Some of Georgia’s more infamous nationally-reported problems in 2002 including the “Rob Georgia Patch,” and the Cleland/Chambliss race.
According to numerous reports, an unauthorized patch was installed on machines prior to the 2002 election and the name of the file was the Rob Georgia Patch.
APN reported on the incident in 2008:
Red flags again went up when Bob Urosevich, Diebold CEO, personally flew a patch to Georgia to be installed in DeKalb and Fulton counties, allegedly to fix a problem with the computer clock.
Stephen Spoonamore, CEO of Cybrinth, a cyber security company, reviewed the patch and concluded that it’s not a clock function. He said, “If I had to guess what that code is… it’s a vote flipping code.”
There have also been many eyewitness reports of vote-flipping, where a vote is cast for one candidate and it is recorded for another candidate. APN reported on these types of issues in the 2006 election:
Unanswered questions still linger as to how then-Republican challenger Saxby Chambliss won in 2002, when Democratic Senator Max Cleland was polling six points ahead a few days before the election and exit polls had Cleland winning.
The Velvet Revolution has released a YouTube video about the Chambliss election fraud at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_gBfUo9dPs
“We want a paper marked ballot that you can run through a scanner. Then you can audit or recount the vote and know that the vote we cast went to the person we cast it for,” Boyd said.
To learn more about different types of voting machines, and how Georgia compares to other states to assure voters of the integrity of the voting process, visit verifiedvoting.org
This is a non-partisan issue, as there are Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Greens, Constitution Party members, and Libertarians who have been asking for a verifiable paper audit trail in Georgia, since 2002.
Georgia has a “faith based” system of verifying votes while the vast majority of other states have independent ways to verify and audit citizens votes.
The Full Text of Boyd’s challenge is below. Anyone who can disprove any of the facts below should contact Mr. Boyd to claim the 100,000 dollar prize, according to Boyd:
####
VOTING IN GEORGIA
Georgia uses voting equipment which cannot be independently audited, recounted nor verified after the election. Georgia must replace this 12 year old outdated system. Georgia needs to implement a voter-marked ballot that can be independently audited and recounted to ensure election results that accurately reflect the voters’ intent.
1. VOTING – The ultimate goal of voting is to accurately reflect the will of the voters as shown on the collective totals of all ballots cast in a specific election. The accuracy of the process must be the top priority of every precinct in Georgia.
2. UNIFORM VOTING STATEWIDE -The election held on November 5, 2002, was the first election in the long history of Georgia voting where 2,926 precincts in 159 counties in the state used the exact same equipment platform to conduct the voting process.
3. DIRECT RECORDING ELECTRONIC (DRE) – Diebold Election Services, Inc. was awarded a contract on May 3, 2002, and the November 5, 2002, (186 days later) the General Election was conducted using the DRE machines (commonly referred to as “Touch Screen”) provided by Diebold.
4. TWELVE YEARS OLD – The same DRE voting platforms installed almost 12 years ago will be used to conduct the May 20, 2014, Primary Election.
5. FACTS RELATED TO DRE VOTING MACHINES:
* Using DRE machine technology, there are no voter-marked paper ballots or voter-verified paper records of the vote.
* DRE technology is “software dependent.” Software dependency can lead to undetected machine malfunctions, malicious code, or software manipulation.
* DRE voting machines are designed to record what is called an electronic “image”. But when the voter reviews their choices on the voting screen and touches the “cast-ballot” icon, they have not been able to check any non-electronic, independent documentation of their selections.
* Without an independent physical record of voter intent, like a voter-marked paper ballot
verified by the voter, the results cannot be independently audited nor verified after the election.
6. RECOGNITION OF THE PROBLEM – As a part of my crusade to Save Georgia, I want to expose the faulty voting system, Diebold’s DRE, specifically mandated for use by Georgia law on every voter in Georgia. One must recognize a problem exist before it can be corrected. That is my mission – recognition followed by immediate correction. The magnitude of this problem is mind boggling considering the potential distortion it may have caused in every election in this state since November 5, 2002.
7. VALIDATION OF THE PROBLEM – Verified Voting (verifiedvoting.org) is a 10 year old organization that is a tremendous resource for anyone desiring to understand how states compare to other states in meeting their obligation to assure voters of the integrity of the voting process. Their description of themselves: “Verified Voting a non-partisan non-profit organization that advocates for legislation and regulation that promotes accuracy, transparency and verifiability of elections. We believe the integrity and strength of our democracy relies on citizen’s trust that each vote be counted as cast. Our primary concern lies in ensuring that the means for verifying election outcomes is in place and used for that purpose.” Georgia is one of only four states that still use these type machines.
8. MAGNITUDE OF THE PROBLEM – For Georgians, the reality is jaw-dropping. DRE generated voting results since November 2, 2002, which were validated by the Secretary of State, could not then, nor can they now, be independently verified for accuracy. The DRE system results electronically counted will exactly match a printed version produced by the same DRE system. A candidate who lost a close election can ask for a recount, but the recounted paper printouts will generate the exact same loss.
9. SOLUTION – The citizens of Georgia must demand the immediate replacement of the 12 year old DRE machines. There should be no higher priority in this state than assuring the integrity of our voting process. THE BIG UNANSWERED QUESTION IS: WHY ARE DREs STILL BEING USED IN GEORGIA?
(END/2014)