In what appears to be the only known case of the Democratic Party itself (to our brain-addled knowledge anyway, since we’ve been on the road for the last several days for last minute super-secret meetings that have left us exhausted for the moment), the Alaska Dems and the DNC Alaska Communications Director have announced a lawsuit is being filed to demand the state release election records from 2004.
Yes, they are still trying to figure out what happened in 2004. And in America 2006, apparently such info can only be obtained (perhaps) by going to court!
The complete press release issued today is posted in full below, but here’s a recap on this mind-numbing story up until now:
In December 2005, the Dems asked the state for the election data files from the ’04 election. They were told that they couldn’t have that information, because the state’s contract with Alaska made that information a “company secret” of Diebold’s!
After complaints to the state, and the state’s consultation with Diebold, the state agreed to release the information, but only after informing the Dems they’d have to cover the cost of (and this is a direct quote from their letter), “manipulating the data” before releasing it!
Finally, before the data could be released — “manipulated” or otherwise — the state’s top security official announced they would not release the information after all because it was a “security risk.”
Oh, how I wish I was making this shit up. But I’m not.
So, now the Dems up there are showing a rare bit of spine and going to court to get at that highly secret and super dangerous information otherwise known as “how American citizens voted in an election two years ago.”
Why are they so interested in this info in the first place? Here’s a graf or two from the release (which you should read in full below for full impact!):
In 20 of the 40 State House Districts, more ballots were cast than there are registered voters in the district, according to information on the state’s web site. In 16 election districts, the voter turnout percentage shown is over 200%.
“Alaskans must have an accurate accounting of the 2004 election results. “The accountability of our election system is at stake. Confidence in the integrity of our elections is fundamental to our democracy,” [Alaska Democratic Party Chair Jake] Metcalfe said.
UPDATE 4/19/06: The entire complaint, filed as #3AN-06-7035 CI, is now available here [PDF]. Coverage from today’s Alaska Daily News is here.
The entire press release from the Alaska Dems follows…
Anchorage – The Alaska Democratic Party filed suit in Superior Court today seeking to force the Division of Elections to release public records needed to verify the 2004 election results.
“We are asking the court to release these public records so that the people of Alaska can be assured that their votes were counted correctly,” said Alaska Democratic Party Chair Jake Metcalfe. “The Division of Elections’ numbers do not add up. The Division has refused to release the public records that would allow us to verify the results. All we ask is that the Lt. Governor and the Director of Elections follow the law and meet their obligation to Alaskans so every one knows why these numbers don’t add up.”
The Alaska Democratic Party has been trying since last year to get the public records of the election in order to find out why there are numerous errors and discrepancies in the state’s reported results of the 2004 general election. The Division of Elections’ latest excuse for refusing to release the election information is that it would create “security risks.”
“Nothing we have asked for compromises security,” Metcalfe said. “Why is the Division of Elections is so reluctant to provide these public records? What are they trying to hide?”
According to the Division of Elections’ vote reports that were produced by the state’s Diebold computer system and are posted on the Division’s official web site, a far larger number of votes were cast than the official totals reported in the statewide summary. In the case of President George Bush’s votes, the district-by-district totals add up to 292,267, but his official total was only 190,889, a difference of 101,378 votes. In the U.S. Senate race, Lisa Murkowski received 226,992 votes in the district-by-district totals, but her official total was only 149,446, a difference of 77,546 votes.
In 20 of the 40 State House Districts, more ballots were cast than there are registered voters in the district, according to information on the state’s web site. In 16 election districts, the voter turnout percentage shown is over 200%.
“Alaskans must have an accurate accounting of the 2004 election results. “The accountability of our election system is at stake. Confidence in the integrity of our elections is fundamental to our democracy,” Metcalfe said.
The ADP filed a formal public records request on Dec. 19, 2005, seeking the “central tabulator data file” taken from the Diebold-supplied computer used to run the “GEMS” (Global Election Management Software) application. This is the electronic file containing all final vote tallies for the 2004 General Election.
Under the public records regulations, the Division was supposed to release the data file on Jan. 4. On Jan. 4 the Division extended the deadline until Jan. 19.
In a Jan. 19 letter, the Division asserted that the file was proprietary information belonging to its contractor, Diebold Elections Systems.
In a Feb. 3 letter, the Division advised the Democrats that Diebold had agreed to waive its proprietary rights to the GEMS database files, and said that the records would be provided if it determined that the integrity of the election system could be protected. In the Feb. 3 letter the Division asked for an additional 10-day extension until Feb. 13, and the Democrats agreed. On Feb. 13, the Division again extended the deadline to Feb. 27. In a letter dated Feb. 22, the Division denied the Democrats’ public records request, citing “security risks.”
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UPDATE 7/24/06: After stalling and running out the legal clock for 7 months, Alaska now says they can’t release the data because it’s too close to a primary election. Details now here…
Brad your a busy man today! – I left a message for you here
Thanks for noticing, Bluebear 🙂
I responded to your message over there. Short version: It was a *last* minute appearance in Sacramento. I didn’t know I was gonna be there either 🙂
Wow that’s amazing news with the Dems in Alaska. Now if only Dean could get Ohio…. Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t Kerry supposed to have a court date for that in August? I read that at DU a couple of months ago and was wondering if it’s still happening.
Are the Dems finally growing some balls… better late than never, one supposes.
Are the Dems finally growing some balls… better late than never, one supposes.
Are the Dems finally growing some balls… better late than never, one supposes.
Write your local and national representatives that these are a start and may be the only way to keep vote acquisition, counting, and delivery honest, under constant public scrutiny, and accessible to the public. Some of this will seem repetitive, but it’s done to try to show the various different ways the voting process is jeopardized by current contract practices.
1) Insist on "Open Source" programming of all computers associated with ALL election processes. There are quite a few reasons to do this.
A company newly awarded a voting related contract should not have to re-invent the wheel, create new company-unique tests, and add even more costs to the election process. Every time this is done, when the new vendor cannot build on the technology used in prior elections, the integrity of the election process is put at needless risk, election schedules are needlessly jeopardized, and needless extra costs are charged to the public.
Each successive election should be able to build on the technology and knowledge that preceeded it. This is a matter of contracting the WORK…and not giving away the intellectual property. It shouldn’t matter which COMPANY does the work, only that the work is done to specification.
Companies are smart enough to write their work contracts this way, why isn’t our government?
In addition, software and hardware systems that are found to work in one state, may be replicated and effectively used in other states and the nation. Diagnostics, training, manufacturing, and more will be greatly simplified and more effective, and when problems develop, systems and software will be fixed faster, cheaper, and more reliably.
One example: If I hire someone to write a computer program for me, I make sure the contract stipulates that all Intellectual Property rights are either assigned to me, or they are assigned as Open Source software. That is to ensure that the person I hired can’t come back later and require me to pay additional licenses to use the program I already paid for, or worse, have a court tell me I can’t use the program anymore.
Another example: As a programmer employed by a company like IBM, when I write a computer program (IP) for IBM, it is IBM that owns the IP…NOT me. That’s in my employment contract. I may have written the program, but IBM owns it. In the same way, Diebold may have written some programs for the State, but in the case of voting related materials, the public at large should own them.
Companies do this all the time with temporary contract workers and government bodies can and should do the same…the workers do NOT own the Intellectual Property (IP), the programs…the entity that hired them does. In the case of publicly funded programming, Open Source programming and licensing assures that the public will have unfettered access to all the software.
2) Prohibit by law, any election contracts that involve "proprietary" processes, programs, programming, hardware, etc. Anything that allows a company to hide the raw data, hide the results, or hide how the results were derived from the raw data, or adds more costs to post-election analyses should be illegal. Such proprietary mechanisms render the entire voting results suspect. They also effectively establish monopolies, as the established company has an automatic and incredibly enormous time and economic advantage when it comes to bidding for the contract.
Contracts should specify, contain, and manage any potential costs up-front. This will help avoid claims by a company for added "processing" fees to deliver vote data as is being done in Alaska. Such follow-up work should be contained within the original contract, and bids should take that into account.
The public should own the programs. All programs should be "Open Source".
The public should own any and all data.
The public should own all the data storage devices, including hard disks, memory cards, memory cartridges, memory modules, etc. Otherwise, the companies can, and will claim ownership and either mishandle the data, and/or charge added "processing" fees to handle or transfer the data to media owned by the public.
Any hadware and software patents, copyrights, or other IP produced as a result of this publicly contracted voting related work should be assigned to the public at large. No individual, company, or government entity should need to license or pay royalties to use or develop parts of or the entirety of programs and sub-routines used to acquire, store, process, and deliver voting activity. Open Source licensing helps ensure this will happen.
Otherwise, one possible future consequence in the future, is that a company like Diebold could sue the State or a competing company, for using "unlicensed" yet common and obvious routines necessary to process voting activity.
In other words, a company could stop the democratic process by filing a patent infringement lawsuit. The company could theoretically prevent a possible competitor from writing or using even the most basic software to provide voting support. That’s the screwy way that US Intellectual Property laws work.
If the programing is not "Open Source", and costs aren’t properly contained up-front, then the electronic election process will remain at risk.
The Alaskan frontier is stll full of many independent thinkers, and we are fighting mad with the GOP up here, they have a strangle hold on our great state. We will fight to get a clean voters count.
Good job Alaska. The crooks are afraid that if the truth comes out (regardless of how late), even their supporters will have to admit our elections (2000, 2004) were frauds. Pop goes the illusion..
I have to disagree with Jack, who is obviously still entranced by technology. It can’t be made secure, he’s chasing his tail. There is no good reason everything in life has to be computerized. Our democracy is too important to trust to the ever increasing complexity of technology, and ever deceitful claims of the charlatans that sell silicon snake oil. I’m not proud of it but should admit I have worked as a software developer and have a graduate degree in CS… but I’ve turned my life around and am back to designing bridges, a productive useful persuit ruled by the inarguable laws of physics.
Response to:
Another Paper Ballot Man—
You’re right. Nothing can be made 100% secure, not even paper ballots.
People can be bought…before, during, and after a vote, as past elections have proven time and again.
The thing is, technology isn’t going to go away, nor will the insatiable need of the government to use it.
A primary defense is to ensure things are as open and transparent as possible, so that instances of tampering can be detected. Heightened transparency and greater PUBLIC oversight can reduce the degree of fraud.
Open Source programming means that everyone, even the person on the street, has access to the software code. It can be reviewed for errors and inconsistencies by thousands of different people. Any changes are public.
It can also help keep some of the more shady types from managing and subverting the voting process, because proprietary, secret, and protected processes are the ways they hide their participation and methods of disenfranchising voters.
Whether the technology is electronic 1’s and 0’s, or pencil and paper.
The only secret that should be in the voting process is which individual voted for which candidate. Any other secret or information restriction inevitably leads to manipulation and abuse.
RAL #4,#5,#6
The republican dictatorship has balls but no brains.
And they stutter a lot.
Gosh RAL, you are a republican and proud of the dictatorship, and have three balls?
Whoopie do.