(SC) State’s Touch-Screen Voting Machines Under Increased Scrutiny

State’s Touch-Screen Voting Machines Under Increased Scrutiny

BY COREY HUTCHINS

Issue #25.31 :: 07/31/2012 - 08/06/2012

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The iVotronic touch-screen machines used here are under review by the Legislative Audit Council at the behest of Republican Lt. Gov. Glenn McConnell, who asked for an investigation when he was the Senate’s president pro tem.

As the Legislature’s investigatory arm probes the machines, they’ve also come under fire from a national clean elections watchdog group.

In a recent report, the national office of Common Cause declared South Carolina one of the least prepared states in the lead-up to this fall’s presidential election. The reason? It’s one of only 16 states that still use paperless voting machines.

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The League of Women Voters of South Carolina has long taken the position that there should be a voter-verified paper trail for all votes. And for years the league and others have questioned whether the machines we use in South Carolina can ever produce a proper recount.

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A coalition of election watchdogs and computer scientists formed, and they began an independent review of the machines. Their inquiry uncovered that thousands of votes had gone missing in the Nov. 2, 2010, elections.

At one Bluff Road precinct, more than 1,000 votes went missing from the totals that were certified by the State Election Commission, according to University of South Carolina computer science professor Duncan Buell and Massachusetts programmer
Chip Moore, who conducted the audit.

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