Analysis: Voting Machines At Risk In 2022

This article by Turquoise Baker, Megan Maier, Lawrence Norden, and Warren Stewart is published by Verified Voting. Here is an excerpt:

Between 2014 and 2020, the Bren­nan Center released a series of analyses detail­ing the prob­lem of aging voting equip­ment in the United States. Those analyses relied signi­fic­antly on data provided by Veri­fied Voting. Today, our organ­iz­a­tions update those analyses with a look at the state of the nation’s voting systems ahead of the Novem­ber 2022 midterm elec­tions.

The Bren­nan Center’s first over­view of voting systems in the United States, published in 2014, found that 43 states relied on machines that were past or near the end of their expec­ted lifespans. Four­teen states used at least some machines that were no longer manu­fac­tured and diffi­cult to repair. Outdated machines suffer frequent break­downs and create long lines at polling places. They are also more suscept­ible to error and fraud, risk­ing public confid­ence in elec­tions.

Since that report, the nation has made signi­fic­ant progress toward repla­cing its most insec­ure systems. In 2012, for example, the major­ity of Elec­tion Day voters in some or all counties in 16 states voted on direct record­ing elec­tronic (DRE) voting machines that do not produce a voter-veri­fied paper audit trail (VVPAT). Secur­ity experts have long iden­ti­fied DREs as a unique secur­ity risk. By 2022, juris­dic­tions in only six states (Indi­ana, Louisi­ana, Missis­sippi, New Jersey, Tennessee, and Texas) relied on those machines as their prin­cipal voting equip­ment — that is, the tech­no­logy used by most voters on Elec­tion Day in an elec­tion juris­dic­tion.

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