Image Credit: Jernej Furman / CC
Submitted by Frank Limpus [Tennessee Voters for Election Integrity] –
The ramifications of the 2020 and 2022 national elections have left an indelible mark on American consumer confidence in elections. Problems such as machine vulnerabilities, the misconduct of vote center workers, ballot drop boxes and ballot harvesting, as well as illegal voting law revisions, all caused a deep fissure in citizen trust in how elections are run.
Here in Franklin, where seven of nineteen Dominion tabulators glitched and miscounted votes on the tabulator tapes in the October 2021 municipal election, consumer concern heightened. The Dominion voting machines were jettisoned and the problem was named: The “Tennessee Error,” anointed by cybersecurity and IT experts who documented the problem. ES&S machines, which are just as precarious, replaced Dominion.
An April 2023 Rasmussen poll reported that nationwide, 60% of likely U.S. voters think it probable that cheating affected the outcomes of some races in 2022’s midterm elections. A similar percentage believes the same thing happened in the 2020 election. Both affirm the huge loss of confidence in our nation’s – and county’s – voting process.
Invariably, one of the top election integrity concerns cited today in numerous sources (here, here, here and here, for instance) has been the use of voting machines in our elections.
That has motivated citizens to request hand-marked paper ballots (HMPBs) be added into our election process.
The reason? The ballot marking devices (BMDs) on which voters are forced to mark their ballots have been proven to be highly vulnerable and hide voter intent in an un-human-readable barcode or QR code. Paper ballots can counter the effect BMDs have on our elections.
Plus, voter intent is crystal clear on hand-marked paper ballots because voter selections are actually marked by a voter, not a machine.
And because the election day tabulator, which counts our votes and is mandated by Tennessee law to do so, has the ability to spit mis-marked ballots back out for the voter to correct, hand-marked paper ballots are even more popular throughout the county. More than 68% of US voters vote on hand-marked paper ballots (with a BMD available for ADA purposes).
But here’s the rub.
Williamson County and a number of other Tennessee counties vote in vote centers and vote centers will almost certainly keep HMPBs out of our voting process.
In essence, vote centers are a voting experiment in these counties where registered voters can vote on election day in any of a number of locations spread out across the county. Vote centers are convenient because of the increased options of places to vote, but they are far less secure.
And many voters don’t seem to realize that.
If we can’t be moved back into precinct voting, which most Tennessee counties still do, it will be almost impossible to bring hand-marked paper ballots back in to address machine concerns. Because bringing HMPBs into a vote center environment means that a paper ballot for every one of possibly 100-150 races in an election from throughout the county has to be available for every voter in every vote center. In precincts, there should probably be only one ballot needed, not hundreds.
Think of those unused ballots sitting in a corner of a vote center. A chain of custody, security and cost nightmare. And the election commission’s answer? Keep vote centers and bring an entirely new machine system called ballot-on-demand to our voting process instead of just moving us back to precincts. In Williamson County that move will cost taxpayers at least a half million dollars, if not more.
Even worse, vote centers require an internet connection, resulting in additional security concerns.
Also, voters in vote centers are forced to mark their ballots on ballot marking device (BMDs) machines. There are a host of studies proving the untrustworthiness of BMDs.
Recently, the GOP’s Republican National Committee (RNC) stepped into the election integrity fray, issuing an importantresolution they titled “Return to Excellence in American Voting.” It documented eleven problems they and American consumers have tracked from these elections and an equal number of solutions. Removing vulnerable machines from our voting process, bringing hand-marked paper ballots into voting precincts and returning us to precinct voting vs. vote center voting are just a few.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll be focusing on these issues, especially the threats to your vote because of vote centers that you probably didn’t know about. All in the hope that these issues that endanger the votes of Democrats, Republicans and Independents alike can be addressed and that loss of confidence in our country’s and county’s elections can be remedied.
8 Responses
This is an excellent and timely editorial. Voting irregularities continue to be a major concern in elections and need to be resolved so that people can have confidence each vote counts and goes to the intended candidates. Hand-marked paper ballots are easy to use, convenient and safe. There is no good reason not to use them.
I had the option of a paper ballot in the last Shelby County election. I was very very pleased to have this option. The machines are rife with ways to steal the votes.
Ballot harvesting and weeks long early voting need to be eliminated. Election day needs to be a national holiday and the only day you can vote! Open the polls at midnight and close at midnight. If you can’t get to the polls and are not infirmed in any way, you can’t vote. Military and physically unable people should be the only mail in ballots allowed and those should be required to arrive one week before election day.
100% Agree
Excellent points that should be implemented before the next election!
Voting with paper ballots was the way it was done in the not-to-distant past. Why is this suddenly a nightmare? We’d get it all done in one day. It didn’t take days or weeks. If Florida can do it, why can’t Tennessee? Paper ballots – hand counted. No machines!
Frank Limpus is one of the handful of PREMIER resources we have in TN on election integrity. I have watched over the years as he relentlessly keeps keeping on to wake TN up! We think we are safe in a “Red” state…Not so! It is becoming far more ‘purple’ than most realize. If we don’t solve this election integrity problem we are sunk! Just ask California. Voting is so compromised in CA it seems impossible that any change in direction or any correction will ever be able to occur. Speak to your state legislators…demand legislation that will promote hand marked paper ballots in all counties. If they do not listen to their constituents do as Kurt Riley says, “Change the butts in the seats”. We must locate good Constitutional Republican candidates who will retain their moral compass amidst all enticement and get this legislation done! Now or never…we are getting close to losing our state AND our country!
Williamson county “elections” are 100% fake due to treasonous satan worshipping pedophiles John Duda and the 16 verminous oxygen thieves on the Williamson county board.