Posted by Robert Blackmon 45pc on January 10, 2019
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE THURSDAY, JANUARY 10, 2019
Stein Recount 2016
Contact: Dave Schwab, schwab@jill2016.com 518-610-2708
Today, former Green Party Presidential nominee Jill Stein announced another win in her push for election integrity in the 2016 recount follow up. She hailed a Wisconsin court ruling that denied a request by voting equipment corporations that would have barred any public disclosure of the findings of a groundbreaking examination of voting machine software that the Stein campaign will conduct. The voting machine corporations sought the gag rule in the wake of a Wisconsin Elections Commission decision allowing the Stein campaign to inspect this software and review its accuracy and reliability.
“This decision is a huge win for voters everywhere, and for the common-sense principle that the accuracy and reliability of our voting system is more important than shielding corporations from scrutiny,” said Dr. Stein. “As the Wisconsin Elections Commission ruled and the court affirmed, the law is unambiguously on our side. If the voting machine corporations had their way, we’d be prohibited from disclosing our findings under penalty of law, even if we discovered evidence of problems that could have changed the outcome of the election.”
“The only reason for voting machine corporations to push for a gag rule was to prevent us from revealing any problems with their machines, which would threaten their ability to keep profiting off our elections. It’s outrageous that we’ve had to go to court to argue that the integrity of our elections is more important than protecting corporations.”
“When we launched the 2016 recount with the support of over 161,000 people, we knew it wasn’t just a single election people were worried about, but the whole system. Over and over, we heard the concern that the computers and technology that were supposed to make our elections modern and reliable had instead made them more vulnerable. So when the recount in Wisconsin made it possible to examine voting machine software, we jumped at the rare opportunity to look inside the voting machines to see if they deserve the immense trust we’re told to put in them.”
“Wisconsin law allows us to conduct a groundbreaking state-wide examination of the voting machine “source code” – a crucial piece of voting machine software that controls the actual counting and tallying of the votes. This decision allows us to start preparing for the first-ever independent post-election examination of voting machine source code.”
The Wisconsin decision is the latest in a series of victories for election integrity resulting from the 2016 recount effort, including a recent settlement with the state of Pennsylvania to replace easily-hacked paperless voting machines with paper ballots and institute automatic vote audits. This precedent raises the bar for election integrity across the country. It adds to previous victories in Michigan and Wisconsin after the recount identified voting machine failures, leading to the replacement of faulty machines.
The Wisconsin court decision can be seen here.