Congresswoman Corrine Brown in Favor of Governor Crist ’ s Proposal
3 The Christian Reader October 2008
Corrine Brown Governor Charlie Crist Jcksonville , Florida Christian Reader October 2008
Congresswoman Corrine Brown in Favor of Governor Crist ’ s Proposal
( Washington , DC ) With regard to Florida Governor Charlie Crist ’ s proposal to recommend $ 32 million to convert 15 Florida counties from electronic voting machines to optical scanners that produce paper trails , Congresswoman Corrine Brown made the following statement :
“ During the 2000 presidential elections , 27,000 votes were tossed out in Duval County Florida in precincts 7 , 8 , 9 , and
10 . These precincts are in African American neighborhoods , where 95 % of the residents vote Democrat . That same year , President Bush went on to ‘ win ’ the 2000 election by 527 votes . Clearly , there were many questions then , as there are today , about the election ’ s veracity , and of the possibility that there was outright manipulation of our voting system .
3 The Christian Reader October 2008
To make matters worse , here in Florida , presently we do not have any laws mandating a paper trail when our ballots are cast . Because of this , any slight computer glitch in the system could cause a vote to simply disappear .
Indeed , in the presidential elections of 2004 , as many as 50 million voters cast their ballots on electronic voting machines that lacked a voter-verified paper audit trail . To this day auditors have not been able to entirely resolve the questions about the election results since there are no hard copies of the ballots . What is truly needed is uniform implementation nationwide of an independent audit mechanism : a voter verified paper record for all voting systems .
Black Expo Jcksonville , Florida Christian Reader October 2008
The disagreement still playing out in district 13 over 18,000 under votes in the election between Christine Jennings and Vern Buchanan is just one more reminder of the importance of having a way to concretely verify results . This is not about which party wins elections , it goes beyond that : the underlying issue here is voter confidence in our election system . It is about the integrity and assurance that the person who receives the most votes wins , not a candidate who wins by default because of computer malfunctions without a way to concretely re-count or verify the ballots .
Something as important as one ’ s vote should be accountable , verifiable , and auditable . A fair election system , indisputably , represents the very essence of our democracy , and I strongly believe that the Governor ’ s plan is a positive first step towards restoring voter confidence here in Florida .”