Florida: Voters approve Amendment 4 on restoring felons’ voting rights | Miami Herald

About 1.2 million convicted felons in Florida will automatically have their right to vote restored, thanks to a ballot measure that received about 65 percent of the vote Tuesday. At least 60 percent of voters had to approve it for Amendment 4 to become law. For the past seven years, felons have had to wait five years after completing their sentence to even apply to have their voting rights restored. The movement to reform the state’s notoriously strict restoration process was championed by the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, a bipartisan group led by convicted felons. The group collected more than 800,000 signatures to qualify Amendment 4 for the 2018 ballot.

Georgia: Voters Ask a Federal Judge to Bar Brian Kemp from Counting Ballots in Georgia | The New Yorker

Just after five o’clock on Tuesday afternoon, five Georgia voters, represented by the D.C.-based, nonprofit, nonpartisan group Protect Democracy, filed an injunction in a U.S. district court in Atlanta, attempting to prevent Republican gubernatorial candidate Brian Kemp “from exercising any further powers of the Secretary of State’s Office in presiding over the 2018 general election, in which he himself is a candidate.” So far, Kemp has resisted numerous calls for his resignation as secretary of state, including, predictably, from Stacey Abrams, his Democrat opponent, and also the former President and Georgia resident Jimmy Carter.

Idaho: Signs at polls warning college students about voting draw legal complaint | Magic Valley

Signs at the polls in Rexburg warning students in the college town, home of BYU-Idaho, against voting there “simply because you failed to register and vote at your true domicile” were taken down Tuesday afternoon, after the American Civil Liberties Union of Idaho charged that they violated the federal Voting Rights Act. Chief Deputy Idaho Secretary of State Tim Hurst said, “They never turned anybody away. I talked to the county clerk over there today.” Nevertheless, the signs, which were headed in big letters at the top, “STUDENTS,” were taken down mid-afternoon. Hurst said the signs originated with the Secretary of State’s office a decade or more ago, but he wasn’t aware of any other counties that were still posting them. “They were displayed just about everywhere a number of years ago,” he said. Hurst maintained the signs accurately reflect Idaho law about establishing residency. However, he said, “If you’ve been a resident for 30 days, you’re entitled to vote.”

Michigan: Problems at polls persist as voter turnout ramps up | Detroit Free Press

On a potentially record-setting Election Day in Michigan, problems at the polls in metro Detroit popped up sporadically, leaving some voters waiting in line for more than an hour while others left altogether. Several would-be voters in Redford Township did not stay Tuesday morning while the lone voting machine at Pierce Middle School was being fixed, voter Rex Nagy said. “It stinks, it really does. So many people were upset,” Nagy said. In Detroit, voting equipment was not ready when the polls opened at Martin Luther King Jr. High School because a custodian did not know where the equipment was located, city elections director Daniel Baxter confirmed in a text message.

South Carolina: Voting machine problems in Richland County precincts | The State

A calibration issue resulting from aging technology caused ‘mismarking’ of votes for some ballots in Richland County voting precincts Tuesday morning. By the time polls had closed on Election Day, Richland County officials said they were “happy with where we are.” Early in the day, Richland County Elections Director Rokey Suleman told The State some precincts had problems with machines “mismarking the vote” — or switching the selection to another name — because of calibration issues with the aging touch-screen machines. “If the calibration slips, you can touch it but the screen will select either above or below because of the calibration issue,” Suleman said. “The machines are just old, and we’re starting to see more and more issues with screen calibrations not being able to hold.”

Texas: Harris County keeps some voting locations open an extra hour | The Texas Tribune

A state district judge has ordered Harris County to extend voting hours at nine polling locations that failed to open on time this morning. The order to keep nine voting locations open an extra hour until 8 p.m. came soon after the Texas Civil Rights Project and the Texas Organizing Project sued the county over delays at those polling places. The groups alleged that the county was violating the Texas Election Code because polling locations that opened after 7 a.m. would not remain open to voters for 12 hours on Election Day as required by state law. In a lawsuit filed Tuesday afternoon, the two groups noted that the nine polling locations across the state’s biggest county “not only failed to open at 7 a.m., but remained closed until well after 7 a.m.,” the plaintiffs wrote. Voting was further delayed at some polling locations because of equipment issues, including sign-in and voting machines that weren’t working.

Australia: Government rules out dual election option, says poll will be ‘next year’ | Sydney Morning Herald

The Morrison government has ruled out a “dual election” scenario where Australian voters would go to two federal elections next year, after talks about the option emerged in the media. Special Minister of State Alex Hawke dismissed the idea and insisted on the standard timetable for an election next year. “The government has no plans for a dual election. The election is due next year, as required,” Mr Hawke tweeted. Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s office also rejected the option, saying “the government has no plans for a dual election” and also stipulating the election would be next year, as Mr Morrison continues a bus tour in regional Queensland to listen to voters.

Canada: Bill won’t stop hackers from sowing election confusion: watchdogs | iPolitics

Canada’s top two elections officials say a bill to modernize election laws will make it difficult to stop computer hackers from sowing chaos that confuses voters, deterring them from casting ballots and undermining confidence in the electoral system. Bill C-76, omnibus legislation to reform election laws, creates a new offence of computer interference in response to attempts by hackers in other countries to undermine the electoral process. While he supports the additional offence, chief electoral officer Stéphane Perrault says the bill requires proof that the offender intended to affect the result of the election. He says that qualifier will “greatly restrict the application of the new offence,” letting off the hook hackers who simply sow confusion.

The Gambia: Diaspora Gambians should have voting rights | The Point

A native of Kunting village in Central River Region’s Sami district has said that Gambians in the Diaspora are equal citizens of the country and they should be given the right to vote in the country’s elections particularly in presidential elections. Kalifa Sillah said Diasporans are one of those who regularly contribute to Gambia’s remittance through foreign currency exchange and contributing to national development. During the first phase meeting of a two-week civic education public sensitization campaign by National Council for Civic Education (NCCE) and the Constitutional Review Commission (CRC) in his community, Mr. Sillah said Gambia should now be advancing to provide voting right opportunity to Gambians abroad. The NCCE and CRC civic education public sensitization campaign is meant to prepare and set the ground for the public consultations across the country. 

Madagascar: Three presidents, three crises | AFP

Madagascar’s past three presidents, all in the running against 33 other candidates in Wednesday’s presidential vote, each had their terms tarnished by political crises. Here is a look back at the turbulent recent history of the Indian Ocean island: Marc Ravalomanana, a former milkman turned millionaire milk mogul is declared winner of the presidential election in 2002 after a crisis lasting nearly seven months against outgoing leader Didier Ratsiraka, who disputed the results. Ravalomanana is re-elected in 2006.

Thailand: IT representative eyed for fraud after copying code | Bangkok Post

A Democrat Party committee supervising the election of a new party leader will look into a complaint that an information technology team of former Democrat MP Warong Dechgitvigrom, one of three contenders for the party leadership, had copied a source code from an electronic voting system — an act which could lead to possible fraud. Jermmas Juenglertsiri, secretary-general of the committee, said the panel will investigate the matter. She said copying a source code from the system is a breach of an agreement reached between the IT representatives of the three contenders for the party leadership. Apart from Mr Warong, the other two contenders are incumbent party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva, and former party deputy leader Alongkorn Ponlaboot.

Media Release: Verified Voting Outlines Steps Voters Can Take to Report Problems on Election Day

Recent reports of possible threats to voting systems and registration databases are alarming, but voters should not be deterred from voting this Election Day. Election officials at the state-level are more prepared for cybersecurity threats or problems with computers than they were two years ago.

“The only way to ensure your vote doesn’t count is if you don’t vote,” said Marian K. Schneider, president of Verified Voting.

Verified Voting urges voters who notice anything wrong with their voter registration or at their polling place to call the Election Protection Hotline: 866-OUR VOTE / 1-888-Ve-y-vota or check out 866OURVOTE.org. Voters should also report any problems to their local county board of elections or to the Secretary of State’s office or both. Doing so will allow officials to understand how widespread the issue is and assist in efforts to pinpoint the cause.

For statewide information about polling place equipment, please visit the Verifier.

Editorials: Voting Machines: What Could Possibly Go Wrong? | Jennifer Cohn/NYR Daily | The New York Review of Books

Since the 2016 election, there has been a good deal of commentary and reporting about the threats to American democracy from, on the one hand, Russian interference by Facebook and Twitterbot-distributed propaganda, and on the other, voter ID laws and other partisan voter suppression measures such as electoral roll purges. Both of these concerns are real and urgent, but there is a third, yet more sinister threat to the integrity of the November 6 elections: the vulnerability of the voting machines themselves. This potential weakness is critical because the entire system of our democracy depends on public trust—the belief that, however divided the country is and fiercely contested elections are, the result has integrity. Nothing is more insidious and corrosive than the idea that the tally of votes itself could be unreliable and exposed to fraud. 

National: How the Election Assistance Commission Came Not to Care So Much About Election Security | ProPublica

In a rush of preparation for this year’s midterm elections, scores of state and local governments have been working to safeguard their election systems from being hacked or otherwise compromised. At the same time, according to interviews with more than a dozen national, state and local election officials, the federal commission responsible for providing assistance to them has either been missing in action or working to thwart their efforts. The Election Assistance Commission has ceded its leadership role in providing security training, state and local officials say, forcing them to rely on the help of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which lacks the same level of experience in the issues confronting the country’s voting systems. One of the EAC’s commissioners has dismissed the threat of foreign governments undermining American elections in private meetings with state election officials, and often personally appealed to individual officials not to waste their time on the idea that election systems might be vulnerable to outside meddling.

National: New technologies could actually eliminate common voting controversies in the U.S. | Salon

As voting in 2018’s midterms ends on Tuesday, November 6, there will be contests with surprising results, races separated by the slimmest of margins, or even ties. How will voters know what to believe without falling prey to partisan angst and conspiracies? What if, as Dean Logan, Los Angeles County’s voting chief, retweeted this week, “the weakest link in election security is confidence”in the reported results? The factual answers lie in the voting system technology used and the transparency — or its lack — in the vote counting, count auditing and recount process. These steps all fall before outcomes are certified and the election is legally over. … In the past decade, two differing approaches to answering that question have emerged and evolved. The first to surface is what’s called a risk-limiting audit (RLA). Jerome Lovato, now an election technology specialist with the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, was present at the start of developing and implementing RLAs a decade ago when Colorado hired him to improve their audit process. Colorado had been sued for a lack of transparency surrounding its testing and certification after buying new machines in 2006. Back then, Colorado — like many states today — grabbed and examined hundreds of ballots after every election to see if they matched the announced winners.

National: Dozens of states tighten election security — by going back to paper | UPI

As key midterm elections approach, U.S. authorities are taking measures to make sure the balloting is secure and free of foreign influence. For years, a number of polling places have gone more high-tech with electronic voting machines. Fears about vulnerabilities in the systems, however, are turning eyes to a strikingly low-tech option — paper ballots. The United States largely moved away from paper ballots after the 2004 Help America Vote Act replaced lever and punch-card voting machines with Direct Recording Electronic, or DRE, systems. The reform was a direct result of the notoriously contested 2000 presidential election, which triggered weeks of recounts and multiple complaints about paper ballots in Florida. … The committee said many of the electronic voting systems are now outdated, and recommended all states go back to paper ballots — or, at least mandate that electronic machines produce a paper hard copy that can be audited.

National: Hackers are using malware to find vulnerabilities in U.S. swing states. Expect cyberattacks. | The Washington Post

The Pentagon has launched a preemptive strike against the Russian hackers who may have attacked the 2016 presidential election with social media influence campaigns. Numerous initiatives, including Harvard University’s Defending Digital Democracy Project, have educated officials on how to fortify elections against cyberattacks and encouraged social media companies to take down fake accounts. Despite these efforts, 67 percent of Americans consider that a foreign influence campaign, either by Russia or other governments, during the midterm elections is “very or somewhat” plausible. Their worry might have some basis. There’s another threat that few have worked to defend against: malware, or malicious software, designed to steal, deny or alter information. And our research strongly suggests that these attacks are underway in U.S. swing states, as we explain below.

National: Complaints Allege Cruz, Kemp Benefitting from Faulty Voting Machines That Change Dem Ballots to GOP | Law & Crime

Early voters submitting ballots for hotly contested races in Texas and Georgia claim that their states’ paperless voting machines are changing their votes for Democratic candidates to Republican, or deleting them altogether. According to Politico, individuals, as well as civil rights groups, have filed complaints alleging that glitches are resulting in votes for Republican Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) instead of his Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke. There have also been complaints that votes have gone to Georgia’s Republican candidate for governor, Brian Kemp, instead of his Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams. Voting technology experts have said that this is not the result of foul play, but outdated, faulty systems that don’t even leave a paper trail of what happened. Kemp, who is currently the Georgia Secretary of State, has resisted past calls for the state to change voting systems. His state has used the same system since 2002. Texas only uses electronic machines in some counties, but there have been reports of ballots that were intended to be “straight ticket” votes for one party were changed to the other party.

National: Voting Machine Manual Instructed Election Officials to Use Weak Passwords | Motherboard

States and counties have had two years since the 2016 presidential election to educate themselves about security best practices and to fix security vulnerabilities in their election systems and processes. But despite widespread concerns about election interference from state-sponsored hackers in Russia and elsewhere, apparently not everyone received the memo about security, or read it. An election security expert who has done risk-assessments in several states since 2016 recently found a reference manual that appears to have been created by one voting machine vendor for county election officials and that lists critical usernames and passwords for the vendor’s tabulation system. The passwords, including a system administrator and root password, are trivial and easy to crack, including one composed from the vendor’s name. And although the document indicates that customers will be prompted periodically by the system to change the passwords, the document instructs customers to re-use passwords in some cases—alternating between two of them—and in other cases to simply change a number appended to the end of some passwords to change them. Harri Hursti, founder of Nordic Innovation Labs and a longtime election security expert, told me he and his colleagues were conducting a risk-assessment in a county when they found the binder containing loose-leaf pages in an election office. The vendor, California-based Unisyn Voting Solutions, makes an optical-scan system called OpenElect Voting System for use in both precincts and central election offices.

National: How to Hack an Election | GQ

There is a voting machine in J. Alex Halderman’s office, not a particularly large one, just an oversize computer tablet set into a plastic frame balanced on tubular legs. But Halderman’s office isn’t especially large, either, so the machine takes up an inordinate, almost clumsy, amount of space. The machine is a Diebold AccuVote-TSX. In the jargon of election machinery, it is a DRE, which is short for direct recording electronic: Voters touch the screen to make their choices, which are then logged in the AccuVote’s memory. This is not exotic technology. DREs have been used in American elections for three decades, and the AccuVote and similar machines are being used in some 30 states this fall, when voters are determining, among other things, which party will control one or both houses of the United States Congress and whether there will be any reasonable checks on the current administration. Halderman got his AccuVote-TSX on eBay. It cost him $94.90 from a seller in North Canton, Ohio, who by last spring had sold at least 40 other used AccuVote-TSXs and had at least 10 more for sale (by the last week of October, he either had sold out or gone out of business, as his listing was gone). Because Halderman is a computer scientist at the University of Michigan, he programmed his AccuVote to tally a two-candidate election for “greatest university” between Michigan and, of course, Ohio State.

National: What to Do When Voting Machines Fail | Electronic Frontier Foundation

With Election Day just hours away, we are seeing reports across the country that electronic voting machines are already inaccurately recording votes and questions are being raised about potential foreign interference after 2016. While the responsibility to deal with these issues falls to state election officials, here is a quick guide for how to respond to some issues on Election Day, along with a handy resource from our friends at Verified Voting indicating what equipment is used in each polling place across the nation. 866-OUR-VOTE: If you experience voter machine glitches, see voters being turned away from the poll, or run into other issues, report them to the nonpartisan Election Protection network. This is the only way that we can spot patterns, put pressure on election officials to respond and, in the long run, make the case for paper ballots and risk limiting audits. Since the first electronic voting machines were introduced, security experts have warned that they pose a risk of interference or simple malfunction that cannot be easily detected or corrected. If someone hacks the machines, they hack the vote. If the machines fail, the vote is wrong. The fix is clear: all elections must include paper backups and a settled-on process for real risk limiting audits. If voting machines are down, you should ask for an emergency paper ballot. Do not simply accept that you cannot vote—broken machines should not result in disenfranchisement.

National: The cyber-hardened voting booth | The Fifth Domian

Protecting our elections from cyber meddling is a long-term effort; there is no silver-bullet answer. Yet the security of the 2018 midterm elections has practically made more headlines than the candidates have. A report from the the Center for Strategic and International Studies, in partnership with Raytheon, found that since the 2016 elections, 40 states have invested more than $75 million to improve election security. The center compiled the report from multiple sources and a survey it conducted with its network of cybersecurity experts. Robert “Bob” Kolasky, National Risk Management Center director at the Department of Homeland Security, expressed his confidence in the security of our election systems at an event ahead of the midterms elections. The event was hosted by CSIS on Oct. 30, in Washington, D.C.

National: U.S. Girds for Possible Russian Meddling on Election Day | Wall Street Journal

Two years ago, Rob Silvers arrived at a nondescript federal building in the Virginia suburbs of Washington on election day, afraid America was about to be hit by a catastrophic cyberattack. An alleged Russian operation to hack Democratic emails and peddle divisive disinformation was months in the making; election systems across the country had been probed by suspected Russian hackers; and one state—Illinois—had seen its voter registration database breached. “There was no playbook,” said Mr. Silvers, then a senior official at the Department of Homeland Security, now a partner at the law firm Paul Hastings. “We were writing the playbook as we were executing it.“ His worst fears never materialized, but Russia’s alleged actions convinced officials that cybersecurity would be a critical aspect of any future election. This year, voters will be casting ballots in what experts say will be the most secure U.S. election since the birth of the internet, thanks to steps taken since 2016. “States all across the country are more prepared,” said Wayne Williams, the Republican secretary of state of Colorado, who has been among the most active in adopting electoral cybersecurity measures.

National: Legal fights over voting rights tighten already-close races | The Hill

Legal battles over voting laws are poised to play a decisive role Tuesday in some states with tight races. Controversial statutes in Arizona and North Dakota have been challenged in federal court in recent months, with judges handing down rulings that are expected to keep thousands of voters from casting a ballot on Election Day. And while voting rights groups were able to get relief for Georgia voters in high-profile disputes over the state’s “exact match” registration verification process, the courtroom drama has catapulted a hotly contested gubernatorial race into the national spotlight. If elected, Stacey Abrams (D) would become the first black female governor in U.S. history. Edward Foley, director of the Election Law program at Ohio State University’s Moritz College of Law, said voting procedures perceived to be hostile to minority voters have backfired in the past. “It can actually increase turnout among groups that are purportedly targeted,” he said.

Arizona: Why new technology at polling sites could be a blessing or a curse this Election Day | Arizona Republic

Experts warn new technology intended to make voting on Election Day faster and easier also comes with new risks that could contribute to the problems it was intended to solve. And some of those experts say the Maricopa County Recorder’s Office hasn’t demonstrated it’s prepared for the myriad things that can go wrong. “Every other jurisdiction that I know of, except for Maricopa it sounds like, has a backup plan … to make sure you’re not just turning voters away or making them stand in line until you figure out what the technical problem is,” said Joe Hall, chief technologist at the Center for Democracy and Technology. “It sounds like (the recorder’s office) isn’t doing the right kind of contingency planning.” The recorder’s office has come under scrutiny since August’s primary election when 62 voting centers failed to open on time because the machines used to check in voters at the polling sites, known as electronic “SiteBooks,” hadn’t been set up.

District of Columbia: DC files suit to get votes in Congress | WTOP

A lawsuit was filed Monday on behalf of D.C. residents in a new bid to put legal pressure on Congress to give the District of Columbia full voting rights and representation on Capitol Hill. As millions of Americans head to the polls on Tuesday, advocates pointed out that District residents are still not able to cast votes for both a Senator and member of the House of Representatives. “This lawsuit says that it’s not just unfair and un-American, but it’s unconstitutional that people who live in the District of Columbia do not have the vote,” said Walter Smith, executive director of the DC Appleseed Center for Law & Justice. “It’s time to fix that.”

Georgia: Brian Kemp under scrutiny after announcing probe of Democrats | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Secretary of State Brian Kemp has had two roles this year: Running Georgia’s elections and running for governor of the state. Democrats, including former President Jimmy Carter, have called on him to step aside, warning repeatedly of potential conflicts of interest. Kemp is now facing renewed scrutiny after his office announced Sunday — without providing evidence and doing so just hours before Election Day — that it is investigating the Georgia Democratic Party for an alleged hack of the state’s voter registration system. The move to publicly disclose the probe appeared to break with tradition in the office, which oversees voting integrity, as it differed from how Kemp’s team handled an earlier cyber breach at Kennesaw State University. Edgardo Cortés, Virginia’s former elections commissioner, called Sunday’s announcement “bizarre” and said the timing of it is “problematic,” adding he wouldn’t have done it had he been in Kemp’s shoes. Such public statements, Cortés said, could depress voter turnout by making people question the reliability of the election system.

Georgia: Brian Kemp Was Warned of a Cyber Vulnerability. He Weaponized It—Again | Route Fifty

Georgia Secretary of State and Republican gubernatorial nominee Brian Kemp’s office seems to have a cybersecurity problem. With less than 48 hours before voters go to the polls in Georgia, Kemp announced his office was investigating the Georgia Democratic Party for an alleged failed hack of the secretary of state’s voting website. The leader of an organization that claims to have disclosed these cyber vulnerabilities to his office says the blaming of his political opponents is both “fabricated and preposterous.” It is part of a pattern of Kemp not securing voting systems, then politicizing and weaponizing his cybersecurity vulnerabilities against those who report them. … The organizations that received the information about the alleged problems are among those suing the secretary of state for the high rate of rejections of absentee mail ballots in Georgia, as well as the Democratic Party. Marks told Route Fifty the organizations had six cybersecurity experts of “national preeminence” in the computer science world review the data. All of them came to the same conclusion that the vulnerability was real and significant. “The experts who did look at it immediately recognized the problem with a quick look and realized delving in further could be problematic from a legal standpoint,” Marks said. “And these aren’t people that come at this from a political standpoint, they’re scientists.”

Georgia: Election observers looking out for problems in Georgia | Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Georgia’s high-profile election on Tuesday will be closely watched — not just to see who wins, but to ensure that voters’ rights are protected and their ballots are counted. Election observers from several nonprofits are fanning out across the state to assist voters and report problems with long lines, voter registration and the state’s 16-year-old electronic voting machines. Well over 1 million voters are expected to cast ballots at their local precincts on Election Day, building on the 2.1 million voters who already participated in early voting over the past three weeks — a record number for a midterm election year. Voters are motivated to decide the race at the top of the ballot for governor between Democrat Stacey Abrams and Republican Brian Kemp. Voters should be prepared by checking their registration information online at www.mvp.sos.ga.gov, verifying their precinct locations and bringing photo ID to the polls, according to organizations promoting voting rights.

Editorials: Brian Kemp, if you’re running in an election, you shouldn’t be running the election | Joshua Douglas/CNN

American democracy is exceptional for many reasons. One of the most concerning but least understood is that partisan, elected officials run our elections. Instead of having nonpartisan, professional election administrators — the norm in most other democracies — self-interested politicians dictate the rules of the game. Elections should be won on ideas, not election rules. Having election officials dictate the rules for the very elections where they are on the ballot is like allowing an umpire in a baseball game to hit cleanup for his or her preferred team while also calling balls and strikes. Three secretaries of state are running for higher office this year while still administering the elections where they appear on the ballot. Republican Brian Kemp of Georgia and Republican Kris Kobach of Kansas are both running for governor in their respective states while also serving as secretary of state. Ohio Secretary of State Republican Jon Husted of Ohio is running for lieutenant governor. These officials have used their offices to promulgate rules that could affect their elections.