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Could voting meltdown repeat itself?
BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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Published: November 4, 2008
Associated Press
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In 2000, the presidential election was marred by hanging chads in Florida. Four years later, it was malfunctioning machines in Ohio. With record numbers of voters expected yet again, the fundamental question remains whether the country’s embattled election machinery will stand up to the pressure.
New York ballot machine.
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BACKGROUND
2000
Major voting problems disrupted the presidential election when poorly punched ballots, which resulted in hanging chads, and huge turnouts ignited a volatile, weekslong recount that ended with a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.
2004
Lines that stretched 14 hours long and malfunctioning electronic machines created havoc in Ohio, which eventually gave President Bush a second term by a margin of about 119,000 votes.
Since then
With federal money, local election officials nationwide have changed their systems — and changed them again when highly touted electronic voting machines were shown to be vulnerable to hacking and malfunctioning.
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This year’s unprecedented primary turnout has already exposed cracks in the infrastructure. In Texas, lines stretched for hours and ballots ran out. Voters in Virginia were told to submit slips of paper — which were later disqualified — when ballot deliveries didn’t arrive, and overwhelmed poll workers in Washington, D.C., hid electronic machines because they were afraid of the contraptions.
Though nearly all election officials have taken extra precautions for today — some have ordered a paper ballot for every registered voter as well as increasing the number of electronic machines — substantial fear remains that polling places won’t be able to stand up to millions of voters.
"The ultimate test of democracy is full voter participation,” said NAACP President Ben Jealous. "States are not completely grasping what they’re in for.”
Today, nearly half the country will be casting ballots on a new system, the majority of them using cards read by scanners. But it is not the machines that most worry voting advocates. It’s the number of people using them.
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