FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ATLANTA, GA
" October 14 - Citizen plaintiffs in a voting rights lawsuit denounced
today a recent Georgia Supreme Court decision allowing the state to
continue conducting elections that cannot be independently audited for
accuracy. The citizens contend that the decision offered little rationale,
was not based on merit, and conflicted with U.S. Supreme Court case
law. Their suit challenges a specific type of unverifiable electronic
voting machine used in Georgia, vulnerabilities identified in county
tabulation servers as well as state procedures that removed existing
audit controls and full recount capabilities when the equipment was
implemented in 2002 at a cost of $54 million.
Plaintiff Mark
Sawyer stated: "This decision authorizes the Secretary of State to
continue pretending to conduct elections. Not one of the 100+ million
actual votes that have been cast on Election Day since 2002 can be audited
for correctness of vote recording. No state election official can prove
that any election result ever produced by these machines is correct.
Sawyer continued: "Our constitution
requires that Georgia elections be by secret ballot. To meet this requirement,
the state must show not only that our ballots are secret, but also that
they have integrity. In fact, the court cited an Oklahoma court
ruling that makes this very point. Well, the problem is, as the state's
own experts admitted in deposition, Georgia's electronic system cannot
detect electronic fraud. Obviously, any voting system that cannot detect
fraud cannot protect the integrity of the ballot, in which case the
fiction can no longer be maintained that Georgia's elections are by
secret ballot. How the court did not see this is a mystery to many of
us.
Plaintiff Garland
Favorito explained other controversies in the ruling: "The court defied
all U.S. Supreme Court case law for ballot counting and refused to apply
strict scrutiny to our fundamental voting rights. It instead applied
a minimal standard of scrutiny and ruled that the former Secretary had
a rational basis for implementing the machines even though they did
not have an independent audit trail of each vote cast as required by
law. Her office was warned in advance of our needs by numerous governmental
and public sources before she purchased the machines that offer no way
of detecting electronic vote fraud on Election Day. The court denied
our normal right to a trial on all 13 counts although we disputed 41
assertions made to the court by the Attorney General's office and
cited 17 lower court conclusions that had no basis in fact.
Georgia is the only state planning to conduct 2010 elections
on unverifiable voting equipment used statewide.The
citizens believe that the Georgia justice system may be compromised
and their attorneys are considering an appeal of Constitutional issues
to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Interview Contact: Garland Favorito
Telephone: (404) 664-4044
Email: garlandf@msn.com
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