Votes Reportedly Flipping From Repub To Dem In TN!

Yesterday we reported the problems experienced at the Davidson County (Nashville), TN polls by Election Integrity filmmakers David and Patricia Earnhardt. Patricia, like so many others before, in so many elections past, saw her vote flip before her eyes on the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen system from her intended candidate, Barrack Obama, to the Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney.

Last week, we noted voter reports from two different WV counties, Putnam and Jackson, both counties where the same ES&S iVotronic touch-screen machines (which are notorious for flipping and losing thousands of votes and costing at least one Democratic U.S. House nominee her rightful seat) similarly flipped votes away from Democratic candidates.

Earlier today, John Gideon reported on ES&S iVotronics in SC which fail to include a number of races on the final review screen. In at least one county in that state, during the Republican Primary earlier this year, the machines had failed to even turn on at all, leading voters to scramble to find scraps of paper to vote on. ES&S is the nation's largest supplier of voting machines.

Now, finally --- and thankfully --- we have a report of voters experiencing votes flipping from the Republican candidate John McCain, to the Democratic candidate Barack Obama in a second TN county. Does this mean someone can actually take some action to get these machines the hell out of service now?!...

From Tennessee's Decatur County Chronicle today...

Several Decatur County voters are concerned about problems with the voting machines at the Election Commission Office. Voters claim they tried to vote for McCain for President but the machine checked Obama instead.

At least three voters encountered the problem when casting their early ballot on Saturday morning. Franklin Boroughs says he intended to vote for Republican but rather the computer had checked the Democratic candidate instead.

Like Davidson County, TN and Putnam and Jackson Counties, WV, Decatur uses the same ES&S iVotronic machines infamous for vote-flipping and failure.

The machines should never be used in any American election. But since the Democrats apparently won't call for these machines to be removed and impounded immediately, despite so many similar reports this year and in previous elections, perhaps the Republicans can now demand the machines be impounded and removed from service immediately, and each voter be given a paper ballot instead.

During the 2006 election, when report after report of vote-flipping touch-screens piled up in state after state, the only call for removal/impounding of the flipping machines came from then-Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) and the GOP after reports of votes-flipping away from the Republican. They wrote a letter on Election Day, as the reports were coming in, calling for the impounding of the touch-screen machines being used in 27 Pennsylvania counties.

From the GOP's November 7, 2006 request to the Secretary of the Commonwealth in PA:

We also ask that you issue instructions to every County to not recalibrate any Voting Machine that has been identified as being miscalibrated, but rather impound the Voting Machine. Additionally, we request that a sufficient number of emergency ballots be provided to these affected Counties so that no voter loses his/her right to vote.

The Republicans were exactly correct to make that request at the time, and both Dems and Repubs would be absolutely responsible in making the same demand now.

If the Democrats, who have the most to lose here, won't do the right thing, and get these machines the hell out of service --- immediately --- in every state where they are still used, then maybe the Republicans will step up and do so and demand that every voter be given the opportunity to vote on a verifiable paper ballot, instead of a wholly unverifiable, easily hacked, and notoriously faulty touch-screen voting machine.

Unlike the Democrats, for some reason, Republicans don't seem to be afraid of being called "sore losers" or "conspiracy theorists" (most likely because the Rightwing media are the ones who spout such nonsense, and there are few in the media willing to throw such absurd insults at Republicans if/when they actually do the right thing.)

We would gladly support the efforts of either party here who does the right thing for the voters and gets these machines the hell out of service. Now!

More Articles By Brad Friedman

© Scoop Media