I find it hard to consider that the election went smoothly here in Texas for the Republicans. Just because there was a good political outcome outside of Texas doesn’t mean they didn’t continue to slime their way to “victory” through fraud in several states that are considered Red.
The problem here in Texas and else where, Democrats and the media continue to claim that the election went “better than expected” and it went “relatively smoothly.” But in areas where there were problems it is being reported as “isolated problems;” and my favorite there were “just a few glitches,” “minor issues,” and “no major problems.” Now that the Democrats control both the House and the Senate, will the Democrats continue to champion election reform considering new voting machines failed from coast to coast.
Here is a list of problems in 20 Texas counties that have already been reported in the media of the problems that occurred during the elections.
| Date | Problem Type | County | Description | |
| 11/9/06 | Machine malfunction |
Falls, Hill, Bosque |
Falls, Hill and Bosque counties reported glitches either with counting votes or long waits for residents wishing to cast ballots. Falls County ran out of ballot paper. Bosque County early votes apparently were counted twice in all races. About 1,300 duplicate votes being recorded in numbers that were sent to the Texas Secretary of State’s Office. Hill County had problems with the vote-counting machine, the operator could not get votes from paper ballots to combine with votes submitted electronically. Story | |
| 11/9/06 | Machine malfunction |
Tarrant | Votes were not properly recorded on an electronic machine. Others were not even aware they could have voted on an electronic voting machine. Story | |
| 11/9/06 | Machine malfunction |
Tom Green |
San Angelo – People had to wait nearly 11 hours for final election results. Story | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Hidalgo | Top election official discovered the mistake when early voting results giving long-shot Constitution Party candidate an extra 2,000 over the Democratic incumbent. The problem was the software that compiles the totals. Story Story2 | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Bexar | San Antonio – Some ES&S iVotronic machines failed to work, and paper ballots weren’t available. Voters across the country complained of flaws with electronic voting systems. Bexar County’s elections administrator, Jacque Callanen, said that overall, the election locally went smoothly. Wrong candidates appeared on some people’s ballots. Story | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Medina | 420 people lost the opportunity to vote in the US Senate race, which was “inadvertently omitted” from some ballots Story | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Comal | Undefined problems occurred combining totals from ES&S Optech 3P Eagle scanner with the new iVotronic touch screens. Story | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
San Patricio |
Officials were still dealing with computer glitches and had to hand count the vote which delayed the results for the State Representative District 32 race. In Callanen, some machines had failed to activate Tuesday morning. Story Story2 | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Webb | Officials were still dealing with computer glitches and had to hand count the vote which delayed the results. Story | |
| 11/8/06 | Machine malfunction |
Grayson | The new electronic voting system had trouble processing votes. Story | |
| 11/8/06 | (Other) | Fort Bend | Machines were delivered to the wrong precincts, delaying voters and casting some uncertainty on ballots already cast. Story | |
| 11/7/06 | Machine malfunction |
Harris | Houston Three of the seven E-Slate voting machines at Lockhart Elementary school weren’t working properly since the polls opened at 7 a.m. Two were inactive, one was “misnumbering itself.” Technicians arrived 2-1/2 hours later. Story | |
| 11/4/06 | Machine malfunction |
Williamson | ES&S iVotronic failed pre-election testing when straight party selections did not record a vote for Precinct 3 Commissioner. The same problem occurred at the beginning of early voting, but it was corrected and no votes were affected, Stacy said. Story | |
| 11/3/06 | Machine malfunction |
El Paso | Vote-switching by Diebold touch screens. Review screens show the wrong choices – switching Democratic vote to Republican in at least one case. County attorney is investigating. Some voters had to correct the review screen three times, before it registered correctly. Story Story2 | |
| 11/2/06 | Machine malfunction |
Collin | Near Dallas. Vote-switching to Republicans. Diebold touch screens switch votes from Libertarian to Republican, and from Democrat to Republican. Story | |
| 11/1/06 | E-Poll malfunction |
Denton | A county server that identifies and qualifies voters malfunctioned. A lack of paper ballot backups prevented at least one woman from voting. Story | |
| 10/28/06 | Machine malfunction |
Jefferson | Vote-switching from Democrat to Republican on the ES&S iVotronic screen. “Friday night, KFDM reported about people who had cast straight Democratic ticket ballots, but the touch-screen machines indicated they had voted a straight Republican ticket. Story | |
| 10/26/06 | Machine malfunction |
Travis | Austin – Hart InterCivic eSlate chops off the last part of candidate names on the review screen. This is the same problem that occurred on the machines in Virginia. Officials have complained to the manufacturer for two years, yet they insist the votes are counted correctly. Story | |
| 10/24/06 | (Other) | Hidalgo | Peñitas and Palmview – Two Hidalgo County cities that waited until Friday to request special machines for disabled voters are now forced to conduct early voting without the state-mandated consoles. A thief stole a voting machine outfitted for disabled voters out of a city grant-writing consultant’s garage. Story |
The flaws of each voting system used through out Texas and the country have exposed repeatedly by folks like Mark Crispin Miller, Bev Harris, Brad Friedman, Clint Curtis, Lynn Landes, Earl Katz and Bruce O’Dell. If that is not good enough, they also have been exposed through many academic studies like, NYU’s Brennan Center for Justice, Princeton’s Center for IT Policy, and a group of computer scientists at Johns Hopkins, Rice and Stanford universities. Even the US Government Accountability Office has put their two cents in. What more will it take to have people look into this matter? Are you waiting for it to be broadcast on your local news, you can forget it. Research conducted by the Media and Democracy Coalition (MDC) in twelve states – California, Texas, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Florida, Ohio, Washington, Oregon, Arkansas, Virginia, Montana, and Maine – found that in “every one of those states, most citizens already live in highly concentrated media markets with few choices for news and views.”
More media mergers in these highly concentrated markets will reduce already insufficient local news coverage and eliminate diverse voices and viewpoints and, in every case, exceed US Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission Merger Guidelines. Yet these mergers would be approved by the FCC under its proposed new rules with “no questions asked.”
If polling places all across the largest state in the nation ran out of paper ballots and the voting machines didn’t work, are these really considered “isolated problems”?
If voting machines of every brand switched people’s votes or lost their votes in several counties, can we really say there were “no major problems?”
What if Texas was really a Blue state, how would we ever know if nobody ever looks into it.
Election integrity issues can no longer be considered as conspiracy theory or a thing of the past. The refusal to talk about election fraud by top Democrats in and out of Texas can only be explained that they cannot, will not, wrap their minds around the implications of what is happening now, and what will keep on happening until we are willing to face the issue. By refusing to speak about the growing danger of such fraud, it makes it hard for people to conceive that fraud can ever occur. It is up to us, not as party members, or as liberals, moderates and conservatives, but as Americans to do that vital work by spreading the word what is happening. Isn’t our democracy still worth fighting for?