Washblog

First, VoteHere appears to have a very cozy (too cozy) relationship with the WA Office of Secretary of State (OSOS) where there is a "revolving door" of employees moving back and forth between VoteHere and the OSOS. First, former Republican Secretary of State Ralph Munro is the Chairman of VoteHere (2) The current Republican Secretary of State, Sam Reed, was Munro's protégé' at the OSOS.  Pam Floyd, the OSOS's current Assistant Director of Elections worked for the OSOS prior to taking a job with VoteHere.  Then she left VoteHere and returned to the OSOS.  There is at least one other employee who left the OSOS and is now doing contract work for VoteHere.

Sam Reed entered into a statewide agreement with his former mentor's company to provide ballot tracking software. The VoteHere press release states that, "[a]fter a successful 2005 pilot program in over 20 elections, the State of Washington purchased Mail-in Ballot Tracker from VoteHere for all 39 counties (3).

Successful?  I have to wonder after learning about San Juan County's experience with VoteHere.  Which leads me to the second reason why I find doing business with VoteHere disturbing.  As described below, the VoteHere ballot tracking fiasco in San Juan County was anything but successful.  

As some of you know, two citizens in San Juan County filed a lawsuit, White & Rosato v San Juan County, against SJC claiming that the barcodes used on ballots in SJC violated WA State's Constitution (Article VI, Sect. 6) and RCW 29A.36.111, both of which protect the secret ballot.  

Here is SJC's experience with VoteHere as told to me by the two plaintiffs. Note, however, that KCE supposedly will not be tracking our ballot but will be tracking the ballot envelope, which is different from the software used in SJC. However what is relevant in this story is the performance of the tracking system.

According to the plaintiffs, the SJC auditor entered into an alleged secret agreement with VoteHere.  Residents were not informed that their ballots would have barcodes linked to their Voter ID. The plaintiffs stumbled upon this when, after certification of the election (SJC's first all vote by mail election; curiously voter turnout decreased rather than increased), they looked at the auditor's website and discovered that their ballots had not been counted. When the plaintiffs discovered that their ballots had not been counted, they began looking up their neighbors' records whereby they found that many other ballots had not been counted as well as various other anomalies.

The website and tracking software allegedly allows voters to "verify" the date when their ballot is sent out, the date returned, the date received by the elections office, and the date when the ballot was counted. However, many of the dates did not make sense. For instance, in some cases it showed the ballot was "counted" but on a date prior to the date the ballot was allegedly received by the auditor, or a ballot was "mailed" after the date it had been counted, etc.  

At this point the plaintiffs began asking questions and doing public records requests.  A couple of weeks after they began asking questions, they looked up their names again. Low and behold, now it showed that their ballot had been counted, just 3 minutes prior to certification of the election results.   Then, a couple of weeks later, they looked again.  This time the website indicated their ballot had not been counted.

Ignoring these numerous anomalies, the SJC auditor touted the ballot tracking system as an "unqualified success."

"Unqualified success?" This comment reminds me of Mr. Bush's December 2004 declaration that the Iraq invasion and occupation was a "catastrophic success", which leads me to my third reason for concern over doing business with VoteHere which is VoteHere's ties to Bush/Cheney and their cronies.

Besides being linked to Ralph Munro, who has ties to the GOP at its highest levels (Munro was a GOP political appointee on the Carter/Baker Elections commission, which by the way,  received testimony from "nonpartisan" groups alleging "massive voter fraud"), two of VoteHere's former board members have long standing ties to the Bush/Cheney clan. One is Robert Gates, the current U.S. Secretary of Defense, with links to the Iran/Contra scandal, and is a former head of the CIA. The second is  Admiral Bill Owens, who was senior military assistant to Secretaries of Defense Frank Carlucci and Dick Cheney, and is a former CEO and Vice Chair of private military contractor SAIC.   These are definitely not the kind of people I want involved in elections in my county, state or country. Do you!?

Furthermore, VoteHere spent more lobbying dollars in support of the democracy destroying Help America Vote Act than any other lobbying organization. (4, 5, 6)

So, if you don't want VoteHere messing with KC elections, I urge you to contact the KC Council and Ron Sims. They have the power to say "no" to doing business with this very questionable company.

1. Ballot tracking and accountability recommendations sent to Council: Voters to be able to follow ballot online
   News Release, Ron Sims, May 17, 2007.
2. Vote Here Makes Key Management Decisions
   VoteHere's website, accessed on 5/20/07
3. New Voting Technology in use Today Helps Washington Election Officials Streamline Ballot Accounting
   VoteHere website, accessed 5/20/07.
4. New Def. Sec. Gates Was Director Of Voting Company
   Bev Harris, 11/9/06. Scoop Independent News.
5. 11/8/06 post on Blackboxvoting.org by Bev Harris on VoteHere's lobbying expenditures for HAVA.
6. 11/12/06 post on Blackboxvoting.org by Bev Harris on VoteHere's board of directors