Local election administrators across the country face new problems and threats. But their budgets for new voting equipment remain inadequate.
by Kate Rabinowitz
When poll workers arrived at 6 a.m. to open the voting location in
Allentown, New Jersey, for last November’s gubernatorial election, they
found that none of the borough’s four voting machines were working.
Their replacements, which were delivered about four hours later, also
failed. Voters had to cast their ballots on paper, which then were
counted by hand.
Machine malfunctions are a regular feature of American elections.
Even as worries over cybersecurity and election interference loom, many
local jurisdictions depend on aging voting equipment based on frequently
obsolete and sometimes insecure technology. And the counties and states
that fund elections have dragged their heels on providing the money to
buy new equipment.
A ProPublica analysis of voting machines found that over two-thirds
of counties in America used machines for the 2016 election that are over
a decade old. In most jurisdictions, the same equipment will be used in
the 2018 election. In a recent nationwide survey
by the Brennan Center for Justice, election officials in 33 states
reported needing to replace their voting equipment by 2020. Officials
complain the machines are difficult to maintain and susceptible to
crashes and failure, problems that lead to long lines and other
impediments in voting and, they fear, a sense among voters that the
system itself is untrustworthy.
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Source: ProPublica
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