August 15, 2007
WTP Takes Action Against Vote
Fraud
Diebold
Vote Machines Fail In Iowa
Last Thursday, two days before the August 11th presidential
Iowa Straw Poll, Bob Schulz and seven other Plaintiffs filed
suit in federal court in Des Moines, Iowa seeking to
permanently prohibit the state of Iowa from conducting any
Straw Poll, Caucus, Primary, Special or General Election
unless the voting and vote counting was open, verifiable,
machine-free, and computer-free.
Upon filing the suit, the Plaintiffs formally asked the Court
for emergency injunctive relief, i.e., to order state
election officials to modify the voting procedures for the
Iowa Straw Poll to insure the validity of the voting
process.
Specifically, the desired order sought to eliminate the use
of Diebold voting machines that had been officially
decertified by the state of California on August
3rd, to assure that the ballots were never out of public
view, to force state election officials to publicly
hand-count the ballots at each voting station and to
announce the results and to conduct the tabulation of the
vote station subtotals under full public observation.
Besides the Complaint and the motion for emergency
protection, a Declaration by James Condit, Jr. was also
filed. Condit, familiar to many advocates of constitutional
government, founded Citizens For A Fair Vote Count.
He resides in
Cincinnati,
Ohio.
Besides WTP's Schulz and Condit, the Plaintiffs include five
citizens of
Iowa (Jenneifer Maki, Pam Wagner, Troy Reha, Roger Leahy
and Ginger Corbett) and one from
Connecticut
(Walter Reddy).
Click here for a copy of the
Complaint and the
Motion to force a change in the voting
procedures.
At
8:00 am on Friday, the District Court telephoned the parties
to say Judge Gritzner had ordered a hearing at 1:30 pm that
day on Plaintiffs emergency request for a change in the
voting procedures.
Shortly after
10:00 am,
the Defendants filed a Motion to Dismiss the case.
On Friday afternoon
USDC Judge
Gritzner heard arguments for two hours on the motion to
change the voting procedures. He then issued his decision
denying the motion. He did not dismiss the case. The case
for a permanent injunction against elections in Iowa that
are not open, verifiable, machine-free and computer-free
will continue.
Click here for a copy of the
transcript of the hearing and for a copy of the
Judge’s decision.
Late Friday night, Schulz filed an emergency Appeal to the
Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in
St. Louis
to issue the injunctive order. On Saturday, the Appeals
court likewise denied the request.
The
Voting Machines Failed
As
Plaintiffs had predicted, there were indeed significant
problems counting the votes cast at Saturday's Iowa Straw
Poll.
After delaying the release of the voting results an hour and
a forty minutes beyond the planned 7 PM announcement time,
state election officials were forced to admit repeatedly to
the press that there were vote machine malfunctions and that
(at least) 10% of the ballots had to be counted by hand.
By using the flawed Diebold machines and by tabulating the
totals behind closed doors,
Iowa
election officials have caused significant confusion,
frustration and distrust of the results.
Unfortunately, because the Straw Poll has been well
established as an early and influential political event in
culling the field of presidential candidates, the inability
of Iowa election officials to secure a constitutionally
verifiable vote will leave an enduring legacy upon our
entire nation.
Here is
just a sampling of the news reports detailing the machine
failures and vote recounts:
Des Moines Register,
United Press International,
Chicago Tribune,
CNN
And for your further thought, consider this:
On
Friday,
April 13,
2007, Romney For President issued a press release announcing
its Story County (Iowa) “Leadership Team.” The
press release named Defendant Mary Moisman, the
Story County Auditor, as part of its Leadership Team.
Mary
Moisman and her staff were in charge of providing the
Diebold voting equipment, as well as managing and auditing
the operation and results of the Iowa Straw Poll, which was
purportedly won by candidate Mitt Romney.
WTP Files Motion To Preserve
The Record
To determine the truth about the Straw Poll's vote totals
and the truth about the security, accuracy and reliability
of computerized machine voting, and to address the
confusion, frustration and mistrust (and possible fraud)
directly linked to machine-based counting, it will be
necessary to hand count the ballots cast in the Straw Poll
and review the electronic files, documents and materials
related to the machine processes. Therefore, WTP has filed a
Motion to preserve those ballots, files and
materials for further examination.
Today, Bob Schulz filed a notice of motion for a temporarily
restraining order enjoining and prohibiting Defendants from
altering, destroying or otherwise disposing of any of the
ballots cast on August 11, 2007 in the Iowa Straw Poll or
any of the electronic files, documents and materials related
to voter checklists and voting machine inspections and
operations including but not limited to printouts of vote
totals.
In
addition, Schulz asked the Court for limited discovery that
is necessary to determine the truthfulness and accuracy of
the vote totals and machine printouts. Limited discovery is
necessary to obtain copies of all ballots and machine
printouts, and to determine with specificity what actually
took place during and after the voting period.
For
instance, information needed includes but is not necessarily
limited to: how many machines were used during the day; was
each machine inspected before the voting period began and,
if so, by whom; was any machine(s) tasked to print vote
totals before the machines were moved from the voting
stations; who moved the machines to the central room and
how; when and where were the machines asked to print out
their totals; which machines were opened for ballot removal
at a voting station or in the central tabulation room and
why; how many ballots were hand counted and why; who was in
the centralized tabulation room from 6 pm to 8:30 pm;
specifically, how did the County and State Auditors
participate in the voting process.
Click here
for a copy of the
Memo of Law supporting preservation of the
documents and ballots.
Educating
Others About
Vote Fraud Is Insufficient
For twenty years or more, people have been publishing
articles about the dangers of computer and machine voting.
Notably, comprehensive studies by Cal Tech, MIT,
Princeton
and most recently the UC have all concluded that the
computerized machines on the market should not be used
to count votes in elections.
Click here to access some of the reports used by the state
of California in decertifying the Diebold machines.
Not withstanding these comprehensive expert studies demonizing the machines,
machine and computerized voting is widespread and becoming
further entrenched as the machine manufacturers respond to
each study by announcing upgrades, changes or fixes to the
machines which they say has improved security, accuracy,
reliability and accessibility.
Despite the repeated efforts of the machine manufacturers
and election officials to address the well documented
security, accuracy and reliability problems inherent with
machine-based voting, one fact stands bare, and until now,
unaddressed by a court of Law: The voting procedures and
machines currently used by virtually every state and local
government in America fail constitutional muster.
They fail
to secure for the Citizens of this nation the Fundamental,
constitutionally protected, Right to Vote and Right to have
your vote counted legally and properly.
Make no
mistake, our election officials have effectively delegated
the Right to an accurate count of the Votes to a small
number of private corporations, about who little is publicly
known.
In short,
the possibility of confusion, deceit, frustration and fraud
will always be greater if votes are counted by a
computerized machine rather than by hand in full view of the
public. Only by hand-counting ballots in full public view at
each voting station and wherever vote subtotals are further
aggregated can election officials minimize the possibility
of error and prevent fraud.
Talking about the problem is not enough.
Citizen vigilance and Civic action is absolutely necessary
if we are to preserve the integrity of the vote. This
Right is the cornerstone of our democratic, constitutional
Republic.
WTP finds no upside to computerized machine voting,
absolutely none. Proponents of computerized voting say the
votes can be counted faster.
However examined or weighed, the potential gains in vote
counting "efficiency" cannot be used to justify placing our
fundamental Right to Vote at known risk by the
use of provably defective and un-secure voting machines and
by tolerating election procedures, such as non-public
"back-room" vote totaling, that are so obviously
constitutionally deficient that their use is unconscionable
as part of a "free" nation.
Lawsuits in
every State, and if necessary, civil disobedience must be
the order of the day, beginning now.
Without our action, our choices in the upcoming caucuses,
primaries and general election may well be adversely
affected by machine error and human fraud.
Indeed, if one ponders the problem and engineering issues
deeply enough, one cannot avoid a reasonable, natural and
very disturbing conclusion: The implementation of
computerized-based voting is designed to
facilitate systemic, automated vote fraud.
Let the lawsuit by the "Iowa Eight" be the signal that an
aggressive, nation-wide campaign by the American People to
halt machine-counting of votes has commenced.
It's time for our servant governments to hand-count and total
our votes in public.
Its' time to start asking WHY so many appear to oppose
something so simple, so secure and so fair.
And it's time We the People take whatever actions are
necessary to secure our Right to Vote.
Please consider committing your financial resources to this
fight. Our organization cannot accomplish objectives
such as the vote fraud project without the support of many
people to help cover the costs involved in continuing the
litigation our Foundation is now engaged in, as well as the
significant and regular costs we incur daily to run our
office, secure the technology support we need and keep the
organization moving forward. PLEASE consider a
recurring donation, no matter how small, so that those of us
on the front lines of the battle can continue to organize
and fight and the tyrants that seek to deprive us of our
Liberty.
To make a tax-deductible donation to the WTP
Foundation, please click here:
Donation. You can make a
one-time or recurring donation and can also establish the
dates the secure transactions are run each month.
Update
Related Links
Read the
research reports critical of the Diebold machines and
official
decertification by the state of California.
Visit the Citizens For A Fair Vote Count
website
Read the main voting machine
Complaint and the
Motion to force a change in the voting
procedures.
Please consider a
Donation.
Please remember:
The Landmark Right-To-Petition
Lawsuit
and
Operations of
the WTP Foundation
are Funded
Solely By Your
Generous Support.
|
