Howard Dean, Democrats sound off on e-voting security

They want a paper trail for votes cast using e-voting machines

Paul Roberts - JULY 29, 2004 (IDG NEWS SERVICE)

Former Vermont governor and Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean joined prominent Democrats yesterday to call attention to the need for election machines that are accurate and secure and can be audited.

Dean joined Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.) at a news conference with the Campaign for America's Future and Rock the Vote to call attention to a plank in the Democratic Party's 2004 platform that calls for voting systems to be "accessible, independently auditable, accurate and secure," and to excoriate Republicans in Congress and state governments who have blocked legislation mandating a paper trail for votes cast using electronic voting machines.

"We can spend millions on security; surely we can do just as much to safeguard the central piece of representative government -- the voting process," Holt said. He spoke in a hotel in Cambridge, Mass., across the Charles River from Boston, where Democratic Party delegates and luminaries from across the country are meeting in the FleetCenter to nominate presidential and vice presidential candidates.

Holt was joined briefly by Dean, who said that he initially heard of the now-notorious security problems of e-voting machines while running for the Democratic nomination and dismissed the complaints as coming from "conspiracy whackos." A closer look convinced Dean of the seriousness of the issues, which he said threatened to undermine democracy in the U.S. if left unaddressed.

Read More >>

Special Coverage page on e-voting >>