[Mb-civic] Vote Recount to Settle Doubts?

[Michael Butler]

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  Vote Recount to Settle Doubts?
  By Kim Zetter
  Wired News

  Wednesday 17 November 2004

  A vote recount in New Hampshire on Thursday could shed light on anomalies
with election results in that state, voting activists say. And if the
recount finds problems with voting machines there, it could open the way for
recounts in other states, such as Florida.

   Presidential candidate Ralph Nader requested the recount, which will
include only a small percentage of voting districts in the state where
anomalies appeared in the election results. New Hampshire uses a combination
of traditional paper ballots and optical-scan machines -- where voters mark
a paper ballot with a pen before officials scan it through an electronic
infrared reader. The anomalies occurred mostly in districts that used
optical-scan machines.

   Nader spokesman Kevin Zeese said the campaign was closing up shop and
paying off its debts when it received several requests to look at data from
a number of New Hampshire voting districts. "There was enough to it that
made it worthwhile to at least check it out," he said.

   The data came from Ida Briggs, a Michigan voter with 20 years of
experience as a software programmer, including eight years as a statistical
analyst of databases for the telecommunications industry. Briggs compared
this year's New Hampshire votes with those cast in 2000.

   Most people would have expected John Kerry's performance at the polls
this year to be similar to Al Gore's in 2000. And in 229 out of 300 voting
districts, or wards as they're called in New Hampshire, that was the case.
Kerry either matched the percentage of votes that Gore received in 2000 in
those wards or did better than Gore. But in 71 wards, Briggs found, Bush did
better in 2004 than he did in 2000.

   When Briggs broke the 71 wards down by voting equipment -- separating
wards into those that used traditional paper ballots and those that used
optical-scan machines -- she discovered that 73 percent of the wards used
optical-scan equipment, while only 27 percent used traditional paper
ballots. Even more interesting was the breakdown per brand of voting
equipment. New Hampshire wards used optical-scan equipment made by Diebold
Election Systems and Election Systems & Software. About 62 percent of the
wards with anomalous results used Diebold machines.

   "Which is pretty high," Briggs said. "Especially in comparison to
hand-counted paper ballots, which accounted for only 27 percent of the
out-of-trend wards."

   In one ward in the city of Manchester, the change was remarkable. In
2000, Gore beat Bush 49 percent to 48 percent. But this year Bush carried
the ward with 53 percent of votes. In another Manchester ward where Gore won
52 percent to Bush's 44 percent in 2000, Bush won with 50 percent to Kerry's
49 percent this year.

   "The numbers could be real," Briggs said. "But to be this dramatically
outside of the trend raises some red flags."

   Some people have explained away the numbers as a result of affluent
Massachusetts voters moving to New Hampshire to take advantage of its tax
system. These transplants would be more likely to vote for Bush. But Briggs
thinks this is too anecdotal and shouldn't be used to dismiss the numbers.

   "It's also anecdotal that urban voters tend to vote more liberal than
rural voters, but in New Hampshire we see that trend reversed," she said.

   Briggs said the wards with surprising numbers account for about 235,000
votes, at least 200,000 of which are in wards that used Diebold machines.
This is significant because earlier this year, activists found security
flaws in the Diebold counting software that could allow someone with access
to the system to alter votes.

   But Briggs stressed that there was nothing to indicate fraud.

   "My take is this could simply be a glitch. And if someone made a mistake,
then it's an easy find," she said. "Thank God New Hampshire has a paper
trail so we can just sit down and count the paper ballots."

   Unlike states and counties using paperless touch-screen voting machines,
New Hampshire passed a law in 1994 requiring all voting machines to produce
a paper trail, so the paper can easily be used to verify the vote results.

   But this isn't why Briggs chose to examine New Hampshire's machines. She
chose the state because Kerry won there, with 50 percent of the votes to
Bush's 49 percent, and people would be less likely to view her examination
as a partisan tactic to overturn Bush's victory.

   The recount will consist only of 11 wards, taken from a list of wards
that Briggs supplied to the Nader campaign. Because state officials are
already busy conducting 15 recounts in close local races, they will only be
able to count five of the wards Thursday and will do the remaining six wards
at a date to be determined.

   Nader paid a $2,000 deposit to secure the recount and will have to pay an
additional amount once the state determines the full cost, though it isn't
expected to cost much more. If the 11 wards indicate problems with the
machines, Nader officials will likely ask to widen the recount to include 44
wards.

   Nader spokesman Zeese said New Hampshire officials have been very
cooperative. He said his group also evaluated information about anomalies in
Florida that were uncovered by a mathematician, but found no reason yet to
call for a recount there.

   "We're open-minded about looking at any evidence that raises suspicions
that has legitimacy," he said. "But we're not going to just jump in and do a
recount without reason." He said they looked at data showing that in Florida
counties using optical-scan machines numerous Democrats had voted for Bush.
But he concluded, as several academics did, that "it's not unusual," since
many Democrats in Florida had been voting Republican for years.

   But if the New Hampshire recount uncovers problems with the machines, the
Nader campaign will consider seeking a recount in Florida, since the state
uses many of the same Diebold and ES&S optical-scan machines as those in New
Hampshire. The process in Florida, however, would be more complicated and
expensive.

   "New Hampshire makes it very easy to ask for a recount. But Florida
requires you to file a lawsuit. You have to get a court order," Zeese said.
"And we need to have a compelling reason to request a recount."

   Briggs said that interesting data has also shown up in Ohio and New
Mexico, though she has not yet been able to examine all of the figures she
needs from those states. She said states vary in the level of data they make
public and that finding numbers for individual voting districts rather than
for whole counties has so far been difficult to do in Ohio and New Mexico.
But at least two candidates are already seeking a recount in Ohio.

   Anthony Stevens, New Hampshire's assistant secretary of state, said he
thinks the recount in his state is a good thing.

   "It will put people's minds at ease," Stevens said. "It will assure
(voters) that things are being done right. It also may discourage any future
tampering of the machines (if people see that the machines will be
examined). So it's a good check and balance of the process."

   Both Zeese and Briggs said whatever the recount results, the outcome
would be positive.

   "It will either show that there wasn't a problem with the machines or
we'll find a problem and raise issues that need to be raised," Zeese said.

   "Whenever there is even a perception that there is a problem, then there
is a problem," Briggs said. "If people are raising questions then by God you
sit down and you prove it so nobody has to take anyone's word for it. Why
have four years of bitterness and doubt?"

  

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