YOUR VOTE IS UNDER ATTACK!

✅  Support hand-marked paper ballots for all voters able to mark by hand, and well-maintained ballot-marking devices (BMDs) for voters with disabilities. 

✅  Make sure that ballot-marking devices can print ballots - but don't count them (non-tabulating ballot marking devices.) Remember that if a voting machine can mark your ballot and count your ballot - it doesn't need you - it can vote on it's own!

✅  Voters with disabilities have a right to vote privately, independently and securely. There are ballot-marking devices that do that, like this one from Hart called the Verity Touch Writer. It has the ability to print a paper ballot for voters with disabilities that is identical to a hand-marked paper ballot, preserving the secrecy of the voter's choices.

✅  There are also systems to help voters with disabilities vote-by-mail, like this system from Five Cedars. There is no need for all voters to use ballot-marking devices to vote.

⛔ Reject risky “hybrid” all-in-one voting machines: 

ES&S ExpressVote XL

Dominion Image Cast Evolution (ICE) 

Express Vote Hybrid

• Security experts say these systems can be hacked to add fake votes to paper ballots.
• They sometimes score poorly with voters w/ disabilities.
• Some of these voting machines have an “Auto-Cast” option that security experts call “Permission to Cheat.”

⛔ Reject touch screen voting machines:

ES&S Express Vote 

• Touch screen systems have many security risks, and if not calibrated correctly can pick a different candidate than the one that was selected by the voter. They can also be programmed to do this with malware (through hacking.)

⛔ Reject counting votes with barcodes: 

• The ES&S ExpressVote & The Express Vote XL count votes with a barcode. 
• Barcodes add new vectors for hacking elections and are not transparent.
• The barcode-based setup “makes a mockery of the notion that the ballot is ‘voter-verifiable,’” said Duncan Buell, a computer science professor at the University of South Carolina, because “what the voter verifies is not what is tallied.” - Politico Magazine
• Colorado, a leader in election security, prohibits barcodes for counting votes

Multiple studies have shown that hand-marked paper ballot systems are two to three times less expensive for jurisdictions than ballot-marking devices. In this actual bid from a vendor, a hand-marked paper ballot system for the state of Georgia is estimated to cost approximately 25 million, but ballot-marking devices for use by most voters is estimated at over 100 million with maintenance costs. (bid courtesy of VoterGA.)

Security experts recommend hand-marked paper ballots for most voters, and non-tabulating ballot-marking devices (BMD’s) for voters with disabilities. Hand-marked paper ballot systems are more secure, less expensive and faster for voters to use. 

Some “hybrid” voting machines merge a scanner and a BMD printer into the same path. Security experts say these hybrids can be hacked to add fake votes to paper ballots, and they do not recommend them.