July 27, 2004
Election Integrity Organizations Ask Judge to Protect Ohio Elections

Lawsuit Remedy Should Permit Secure, Accessible Voting Systems

Akron, OH - Organizations focused on election integrity today asked a federal judge to choose secure electronic voting machines with voter-verified paper audit trails as the remedy for a lawsuit challenging the use of punch card and certain kinds of optical scan systems in Ohio.

In a friend-of-the-court brief, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections, the Verified Voting Foundation and VotersUnite wrote that they "urge that in considering the issues and potential remedies in this case, this court not suggest or require that any Ohio Counties adopt electronic voting machine technologies that do not contain a voter-verified paper ballot."

The brief also lists 18 incidents in which electronic voting machines caused problems in elections, including several where voters were disenfranchised and one in which an election had to be redone due to problems with the machines. It discusses a variety of available technologies that are accessible and secure, and presents evidence that e-voting machines may not be the panacea for disabled voters that they are advertised to be.

Voter-verified paper ballots permit voters to check a paper ballot to make sure that their votes are recorded as intended and allow election officials to perform recounts and audits.

Judge Dowd is hearing the case called Effie Stewart et al. v. J. Kenneth Blackwell et al. (Case No. 5:02CV-2028).

Donald McTigue of Columbus, OH serves as local counsel for the groups.

Stewart v. Blackwell case documents.

Contacts:

Cindy Cohn
Legal Director
Electronic Frontier Foundation
cindy@eff.org

Will Doherty
Executive Director
VerifiedVoting.org
press@verifiedvoting.org

About Verified Voting Foundation

The Verified Voting Foundation is a nonprofit organization championing reliable and publicly verifiable elections. Founded by Stanford University Computer Science Professor David Dill, the organization supports a requirement for voter-verified paper ballots on electronic voting machines allowing voters to inspect individual permanent records of their ballots and election officials to conduct meaningful recounts as needed.

About VotersUnite!

Voters Unite! is a nonpartisan national grassroots network for fair and accurate elections.

About CASE Ohio

CASE Ohio, Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections, is nonpartisan statewide grassroots association of volunteers that advocates for fair and accurate elections, and supports a voter-verified paper audit trial.