| Date |
Problem Type |
State
|
Vendor
|
Description
|
| 11/13/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Diebold |
Lancaster County. Multiple AccuVote ballot scanners malfunctioned. They didn't process the votes, nor would they print poll tapes.
Story
Archive |
| 11/3/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Sequoia |
Essex, Somerset and Gloucester counties. A "handfull" of Sequoia AVC Advantage e-voting machines malfunctioned at start up in all three counties.
Story
Archive |
| 11/3/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
|
A voter reports that the touch screen machine flipped votes for Lt Gov and Attorney General from Democratic to Republican. The summary screen was wrong and the only choice the voter saw was the Next button. The voter received assistance from the poll worker. |
| 11/3/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Unilect |
Augusta County. After just 5 votes a Unilect Patriot voting machine had to be shut down because of a malfunction. Two machines were left to carry the load.
Story
Archive |
| 6/10/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
Fairfax County. John McCann, 54, an attorney who is blind, said the audio technology malfunctioned on the machine he was using. Fairfax County uses the AVS WinVote paperless electronic voting machine, purported to be accessible.
Story
Archive |
| 3/11/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
Fairfax County. One of two WINvote paperless electronic voting machines broke down in one polling place while officials were tallying the votes. The malfunction left the outcome of the hotly contested race too close to call. Elections officials halted their efforts, sealed the malfunctioning machine and said they would resume their efforts to count the remaining ballots today.
Story
Archive
Update: 3/18/09. At the Fairfax County canvass, observers learned that among other problems, when the polls opened, the voting machine showed that there were no votes recorded -- which was as it should be. However, of those "zero" votes, three were for Republican John Cook, two for Democratic Ilryong Moon, one for independent Carey C. Campbell and one for a write-in candidate. Despite the obvious problem that there were seven unexplained votes at the beginning of the day and a mismatch of hundreds of votes at the end of the day, the county Board of Elections certified the results.
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2 |
| 11/12/2008 |
Ballot display |
VA |
Unilect |
Pittsylvania County. County election officials said some voters - no one seems to know how many - may have left polling places last Tuesday morning without voting for treasurer because the candidates were not on electronic ballots.
Story
Archive
[Pittsylvania County uses Unilect Patriot paperless voting machines -- the same machines that lost over 4,500 votes in Carteret County, NC in the 2004 General Election. Archive]
Update 11/26/08. The 'info pak' inserted into voting machines and containing the ballot had ballots in the wrong order for voters in all but the Central Absentee Precinct (CAP). Therefore, many who wanted a full ballot saw only a federal ballot, which did not contain the local treasurer's race.
Story
Archive
|
| 11/6/2008 |
E-pollbook |
VA |
Diebold |
Chesapeake. Electronic poll books manufactured by Diebold/Premier helped cause lines as long as 1,000 people on Election Day. Some machines would turn on and then just turn off. Poll workers also had problems hooking them up. Some people waited up to seven hours to vote.
Story
Archive |
| 11/4/2008 |
Deceptive practices |
VA |
|
Reported to 1-866-OURVOTE: - flyers and calls giving voters serious misinformation, like instructing people to vote on Wednesday.
Story
|
| 11/4/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
Fairfax County. "A handful" of memory cards didn't work when the WinVote machines were opened. Paper ballots will be used until the problem is corrected.
Story
Archive |
| 11/4/2008 |
Provisional ballots |
VA |
|
Thousands of voters in Virginia found themselves stuck in long lines today because of broken machines and inadequate polling site resources. To help move things along, some of them were reportedly given provisional ballots -- but voting by provisional ballot significantly lowers the chance their vote will be counted.
Story
Archive |
| 11/4/2008 |
Too few machines |
VA |
AVS |
Reported to 1-866-OURVOTE: Blacksburg in Montgomery County. Voters are calling to say there are too few machines to handle the large crowds.
Story
|
| 11/2/2008 |
Registration errors |
VA |
|
Reported to VotersUnite: I looked up my registration on line and found I wasn't there. I called my local registrar's office and we figured out that they had the last 4 digits of my social security number wrong, but that I was indeed registered and would have had no trouble at the voting booth even if they hadn't corrected the problem. When my partner looked up his registration online, it was the same story. He called the registrar, and they had transposed 2 numbers in the last 4 of his social also. |
| 3/12/2008 |
Accessibility |
VA |
AVS |
Richmond. Blind voters say the WinVote audio mangled the name "Barack Obama", pronouncing it so badly they weren't sure whether they were voting for the candidate or not.
Story
Archive |
| 2/27/2008 |
Vote suppression |
VA |
|
Chesterfield County. Nine precincts ran out of paper ballots and allowed voters to cast handwritten ballots. The Board of Elections refused to count the 299 Democratic ballots, saying it would violate state law.
Story
Archive |
| 2/12/2008 |
Check-in problems |
VA |
|
Elections board spokeswoman Susan Pollard said there are reports of long lines and shortages of poll workers at some polling places, but she said they weren't concentrated in any particular area of the state. Jonathan Adkins, for example, encountered a two-hour wait when he tried to vote at 10 a.m. He said the line moved slowly because there was only one table of poll workers checking voters in. In past elections, he said, there had been several tables. He left without voting.
Story
Archive |
| 11/8/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Sequoia |
Scott County. More than 30 of the county's 45 electronic voting machines displayed errors instead of working properly when they first started up in the morning. The machines had been "upgraded" with new firmware that displays larger fonts, but the technician from Atlantic Election Services who installed the new firmware missed a step and the installation went awry.
AES managed to get one or two machines per precinct working. "Each machine required software changes, as well as a diagnostic check that took about 12 minutes." Software changes in the middle of an election!
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2 |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
Fairfax County. Vote-switching on the WINVote e-voting machines. Voters report that when they touch the screen for one U.S. Senate candidate, the other would be selected.
Archive |
| 11/6/2006 |
Deceptive practices |
VA |
|
Threats of Incarceration, Changed Polling Locations, and Fliers to “Skip the Election.” Over the past several days, voters throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia have filed complaints of incidents aimed at suppressing voter turn out in heavily Democratic and African American neighborhoods. Today, the Secretary of the Virginia State Board of Elections Jean Jensen concluded that the incidents appear widespread and deliberate.
Story
Archive
|
| 10/24/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Hart InterCivic |
Alexandria, Falls Church, and Charlottesville. The review page on the Hart InterCivic eSlate (electronic voting machine) cuts off the last part of the candidates' names, as well as their party affiliation. For example, James H. "Jim" Webb appears as James H. "Jim", while James T. "Jim" Hurysz appears as James T."Jim". Officials attribute this to a larger font size. These jurisdictions have had this problem since purchasing the machines in 2002.
Editor's note: The eSlate does not allow voters to adjust the font size on the screen (as required by 2002 federal standards), so they are unable to read the last names of many candidates on the review screen where they confirm the accuracy of their votes.
Story
Archive
Falls Church officials say they complained about the problem a year ago and Hart InterCivic did nothing to fix it.
Story
Archive |
| 11/8/2005 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
Roanoke County. Voters in 4 precincts report that their votes on the AVS Winvote touch screen machine were registered for the Republican instead of the Democratic candidate for Governor. They say they attempted repeatedly to vote for Kaine, but the screen continued to show Kilgore.
Story |
| 11/8/2005 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
ESS |
Elizabeth City. ES&S iVotronic touch screen machines switched votes on the screen. In early voting, 42 blank ballots were recorded in this one-contest election. On election day 18 blank ballots were recorded. The margin of victory was 14 votes, 17 after provisional were counted. No meaningful recount is possible on the paperless machines.
Story1
Story2
Archive2 |
| 11/8/2005 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
|
Spotsylvania. The ballot counting machines wasn't working properly, and some ballots had to be counted by hand. "A faulty memory pack on the system at Wilderness was rejecting ballots with even the slightest fray or fold in the paper, said Shirley Boggs, Spotsylvania's registrar."
Story
Archive |
| 11/11/2004 |
Poor design |
VA |
AVS |
Roanoke. Some ballots were voided because voters left WinVote machines before pushing a flashing red button to record their votes.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
|
Richmond. One of the machines included the wrong candidates for Congress. The ballot was supposed to include 3rd District Congressman Bobby
Scott and challenger Winsome Sears. Instead it listed the 7th district candidates. Some voters were asked to use paper ballots but they said the
ballots ran out. It was unclear how many people might have voted for the wrong candidates.
Story1
Archive
Story2 (edited since first published) |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
|
Roanoke's city registrar's office fielded several calls about problems with several electronic machines, which included screen glitches and power source difficulties.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Unilect |
Two Unilect voting machines went down at Cardova precinct for about 30 minutes, creating long lines. Those waiting were told that people were voting too fast and machines didn't have time to reset. In Westmoreland, all four machines at the 2nd District precinct at Hague were down for an hour while Unilect manager Wout J. Kymmell worked on the problem.
Story
Archive
|
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
AVS |
At the Crestwood Elementary School in Fairfax County, for example, two of the four (WINVote) touch-screen voting machines malfunctioned and some voters had to wait in line for an hour and a half before the problems were resolved.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
|
In Hanover County, just north of Richmond, all three machines in a polling place were out of service for an hour.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Poor design |
VA |
|
Several voters left their respective polling places without completing their electronic vote, and those votes had to be canceled.
Story
Archive |
