Voting Machine Mess-up Du Jour (Displayed 11/01/04)


Snohomish County, Washington. September, 2004. Sequoia.
Circuit boards cause 20 paperless machines to malfunction.

County Auditor Bob Terwilliger believes they have corrected the problems that caused 65 of the 860 paperless voting machines to be removed from service during the September primary. Some were “operational errors.” Twenty were machine malfunctions.*

Sequoia's Charles said the equipment-failure rate of around 2.5 percent is unusually high for an election. Moreover, Sequoia does not know why that many machines would fail for random and apparently unrelated reasons. The machines underwent rigorous testing and trials.

But Terwilliger said the 20 breakdowns all involved circuit boards manufactured by a third-party vendor. Terwilliger also said Sequoia has not supplied a full machine-by-machine accounting of the breakdowns.

... If a similar number of machines fail tomorrow, it would suggest Sequoia "has some real problems on its hands," he said.

Rare among election officials, Terwilliger has demanded an investigation into the cause, has released the results of the investigation, and is holding the manufacturer accountable.

* Questions remain about touchscreen voting machines. Seattle Times. November 1, 2004. By Paul Andrews.

See: Sequoia in the News


News stories make it rapidly apparent that
electronic voting is not reliable, accurate, or secure.
Any one who claims otherwise is either ignorant or deceptive.
~ Joseph Holder