Points to “Chronic, Systemic Problems with the System”
For Immediate Release: March 10, 2006
Annapolis, MD: Today, US Senate candidate Kevin B. Zeese urged Maryland to dump the Diebold voting system. He pointed out the machines had “chronic and systemic performance problems” and “serious security holes.”
“Maryland has invested $100 million in voting machines incapable of independent recounts – that was a mistake in itself. But, now we learn – from SBE – documents that the machines have had chronic and systemic problems since they were first used in 2002. In addition, there have been consistent reports of security problems. There is no way to know whether Maryland election results are reflecting the will of the voters,” said Zeese.
Zeese oversaw a recent review of State Board of Elections documents that show systemic problems with the Diebold machines in the 2004 election. Indeed there have been problems since the machines were first used in 2002. See: http://truevotemd.org/content/view/430/61/ to see all of the documents. These documented problems show:
machines not starting
machines crashing and freezing in mid-vote
defective motherboards on the computers
candidates and whole races not appearing on the ballots in multiple precincts
blank memory cards that record the votes
corrupted audit files that are back-up records of the votes
a five month lock down after November 2004 to try and figure out what went wrong
new security problems that make the vote count very vulnerable
These conclusions are based on documents produced primarily by the Maryland State Board of Elections and Diebold along with reports by election administrators in other states.
"Before Maryland considers buying a prototype Diebold machine, Diebold and the SBE should explain the chronic performance and security problems of their current equipment. The evidence right now supports dumping Diebold and finding a voting system voters can trust," said Zeese.
Zeese is a co-founder of TrueVoteMD.org, VoteTrustUSA.org and Candidates Alliance for Recountable Elections.
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