For Immediate Release
“Off with Their Heads!” cried the Queen of Hearts
“How am I to get in?” asked Alice again, in a louder tone.
“Are you to get in at all?” said the Footman. “That's the first question, you know.”
It was a Queen of Hearts sort of a day in California on August 9, 2006. The Secretary of State’s advisory panel was hearing public comments regarding the pending certification of the Vote-PAD, a non-electronic assistive device designed to help voters with disabilities mark and verify a paper ballot
independently.
Voting integrity advocates held signs supporting the certification of Vote-PAD. They told of countless failures of
computerized voting systems. They spoke about recent discoveries of easily hackable “back doors” into the vote totals on
those systems, which have been certified. By contrast, “Vote-PAD is no more hackable than a #2 pencil,” said one.
Notwithstanding this and the letters praising the Vote-PAD from dozens of people with visual and motor disabilities, the
Secretary of State’s staff was recommending against certifying the Vote-PAD for use in California.
The Queen started by describing the testing process, “We asked them to vote independently on the Vote-PAD, and we told
them exactly what to do the entire time.”
“Excuse me,” said Alice, “but how is that independent?”
“That’s not the point,” said the Queen. “The point is that they weren’t able to vote independently.”
“But you didn’t let them,” objected Alice.
“Don’t be impertinent,” said the King.
“Yes!” murmured the jury.
“Let’s be clear on one thing,” spoke the Queen. “When disabled people tried to vote on the Vote-PAD, their error rate
was unacceptably high and they took an excessively long time.”
“Compared to what?” asked one of the jurors.
“Nothing,” said the Queen. “Nothing at all. We have no standards.”
“They've begun asking riddles,” thought Alice.
“--I believe I can guess that,” she added, aloud.
“What was the error rate on the voting systems you’ve approved, and how long did people take to vote on them?” asked
Alice.
“We haven't used people with disabilities to test the other systems,” said the Queen. “We know nothing about that.”
“Nothing whatever?” asked a voting integrity advocate.
“Nothing whatever,” said the Queen.
“That’s very important,” the King said, turning to the jury.
“So, how do you know they did worse with the Vote-PAD?”
“Because!” said the Queen.
“Of course!” said the jury. “That makes sense!”
“That's very curious,” Alice thought.
The Queen continued, “Everyone had to vote four write-in candidates. They made over half their mistakes on the write-in
votes.”
“Wait!” objected a juror, “Write-ins are a universal problem. They’re a problem on every voting system.”
A county registrar spoke up, “And why so MANY write-ins? That’s a very small part of a real election, and it was too big
a part of the testing.”
“Who ever saw one that size? Why it fills the whole window.”
“And voters wouldn’t hop-scotch around the ballot the way you told them to, said another registrar. “It’s unnatural, confusing.”
Alice was wondering if anything would ever happen in a natural way again.
“Hush, hush!” ordered the Queen. “We were stress testing the system.”
“But,” cried Alice, “That wasn’t stress testing the system. It was stress testing the people with disabilities!”
“Regardless,” the Queen dismissed her and went on, “Blind people can't verify write-in candidate names reliably on the
Vote-PAD.”
“They can't verify write-in names at all on the Hart InterCivic eSlate,” Alice objected, “and you certified the eSlate.”
“I don’t think they play at all fairly,” Alice began, ...
“Off with their heads!” cried the Queen.
After a lull, Alice pointed out, “Blind people can verify their ballots with Vote-PAD.”
“But they can't verify other people's ballots,” countered the Queen. “They have to be able to verify other people’s
ballots.”
“That's not a regular rule,” said Alice, “you invented it just now.”
In response to joint applications submitted by Vote-PAD, Inc. and California counties, Secretary of State Bruce
McPherson’s voting system assessment staff set up two days of certification testing of the Vote-PAD in July.
With no training or experience in usability testing, the Secretary’s staff and computer voting system consultants conducted usability testing on the Vote-PAD.
This event marks the first time the Secretary has ever used people with disabilities to test a voting device intended
for use by people with disabilities.
During the test, participants were not allowed to vote independently on the Vote-PAD. From this testing, the Secretary concluded that they would not be able to.
Two human factors experts submitted written testimony stating that the testing process violated basic principles of usability testing. They pointed out that any results
would be unreliable. The Secretary ignored the testimony of these experts and agreed with his non-expert staff’s
negative assessment of the results.
Friday, August 25, 2006, Secretary McPherson signed a letterdenying certification to Vote-PAD.
The Registrars in six California counties wanted to provide the Vote-PAD to assist their voters with disabilities.
Instead, they will be forced to provide computerized voting machines, which have never been tested for accessibility by
Secretary McPherson. Now, these registrars are at risk of being embroiled in the lawsuits recently filed in California
by disabilities organizations and voting integrity advocates opposing the use of the computerized voting machines.
“Off with their heads,” boomed the Queen.
“Off with their heads,” agreed the jury.
“Off with their heads,” echoed the Secretary of State.
Ellen Theisen, President of Vote-PAD, Inc. said, “Secretary McPherson simply rubberstamped the staff’s ill-conceived
testing process to the detriment of California voters.”
“Curiouser and curiouser!” cried Alice.
Contact: Ellen Theisen
President of Vote-PAD, Inc.
Ellen @ vote-pad.us
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