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The Tennessee Conservative [By David Seal] –
The Jefferson County Election Commission has taken action to comply with state law on voting machine security, a move that could be a model for other jurisdictions to follow.
Tennessee Code Annotated 2-6-104(2)(c) sets requirements for voting machine security.
That section states as follows.
“The county election commission shall secure each voting machine used in early voting to prohibit tampering and shall also provide maximum security that allows no other person, except for persons designated by the election commission or the administrator of elections, to have access to the room or facility in which the voting machines, ballots and other election supplies are stored.”
Following a records/information request from The Tennessee Conservative News, Jefferson County Administrator of Elections commented as follows for this news report concerning voting machine security and the applicable code section.
“The attached TN Code 2-6-104 directive states we must assure we have the only access to the room or facility in which the voting machines, ballots and other election supplies are stored. Because the Early Voting White Pine and New Market machines are stored overnight for the fourteen (14) days of Early Voting, our locations at White Pine and New Market do not meet the criteria. Rather than closing these satellite sites completely, the Election Commission has elected to have one Saturday Voting, with extended hours from 9:00am to 2:00pm, instead of closing at 12:00 noon. The Early Voting schedule has not changed for the main office other than the additional 2 hours added to each Saturday.” – said Nathan Bugg Ed.D, Jefferson County Administrator of Elections
During our phone interview, AOE Bugg stated that he attended training provided by State election officials in which voting machine security laws were emphasized and that he and the Jefferson County Election Commission Board changed their early voting schedule out of an abundance of caution to comply with state election law and to secure voting machines.
A detailed schedule of early voting locations and times will be available on the election commission website prior to the start of early voting. Bugg indicated that the website should be updated within a few days.
Election security activists prefer paper ballots and single day voting in order to provide secure elections. They also discourage “voting centers” which geographically favor certain candidates. Generally, early voting locations are viewed as a form of voting centers in which multiple precincts are represented on a single voting machine which complicates the voting audit process.
For background on the effort to provide election security in Tennessee, a link is provided here that details the efforts of Kathy Harms, Tennessee Fair Elections.
The Tennessee Conservative News will investigate how other jurisdictions address the recent state election training and report accordingly.
About the Author: David Seal is a retired Jefferson County educator, recognized artist, local businessman, 917 Society Volunteer, and past Chairman of the Jefferson County Republican Party. He has also served Jefferson County as a County Commissioner and is a citizen lobbyist for the people on issues such as eminent domain, property rights, education, and broadband accessibility on the state level. David is also a 2024 winner of The Tennessee Conservative Flame Award & has received an accolade from the Institute For Justice for successfully lobbing the TN legislature to protect property rights. David can be reached at david@tennesseeconservativenews.com.
2 Responses
A quaint start. But does the Jefferson County Election Commission not realize that no one is allowed to inspect the insides of these voting machines that we’re forced to use? Not when the Tennessee State Election Commission makes them available to counties… or when the machines enter the county after purchase or before, during or after an election? Internal inspection would void the machine vendor’s contract if county/state experts open them up. So, there is no account for ANY nefarious components that might be in the machine and disguised as an innocuous power coupler but actually be a wireless conductor.
All even more risky if your voting location has the internet piped into it, which vote centers do.
Maybe more importantly, does Jefferson County have 24/7 video surveillance of the room where the machines are stored when not in use? Williamson County doesn’t. That’s when the vendor may upgrade or service the machines. Could nefarious people somehow gain the door key or code and enter the storage room to make structural or performance changes to the machines undetected? Sure. And if computer or cyber experts can’t inspect the internal components (hardware) or software (the source code of these machines is proprietary and can’t be inspected) before, during or after an election, anything could happen via the machines.
The machine vendors literally have citizens over a barrel. Why don’t election commissions complain about this or better protect citizens and the voting process?
In a world where technology is increasingly being hacked (how many company notices have gone out to citizens informing them their personal information has been released in a machine hack?), why can’t we return to paper voter election registration (so no internet-driven epollbooks are needed), high-security hand-marked paper ballots (to remove the ballot marking devices), neighborhood precinct voting instead of vote centers, limited early voting instead of election season, and hand counting paper ballots (with no bar codes) to ensure the tabulators that many are forced to use are giving us the correct tally?
Citizens have got to wake up. Check out: http://www.TennesseeElectionIntegrity.com .
GOOD!!