Blog For Arizona

Mule Train Mail: Mickey Duniho Writes an Open Letter to C. Huckelberry on Elections Security

Mr. Huckelberry:

I got wind of your latest memo on election security [pdf download] by reading about it in a Tucson Citizen article. Given that you mentioned my name in the memo, I would have expected to receive a courtesy copy of the memo. Maybe my copy went astray.

On page 14 of your memo you said that the Pima County Democratic Party Election Integrity Committee “has failed to provide a number of items that it agreed to provide in response to County requests”, including a copy of an election integrity manual that I drafted for the party. [Download ei_manualcomplete.doc ]

I don’t know about requests to the committee, but I provided a copy of the draft manual to the County as part of my deposition in November 2007. I think the manual was an exhibit at the trial in December 2007. John Moffatt was present at the November 2007 deposition, so I assumed that he got a copy of the manual at that time. To avoid having your copy of the manual get lost again in the County bureaucracy, I am sending it directly to you as an attachment to this email. I want to point out that this is a draft that has not yet been officially adopted by any part of the Arizona Democratic Party.

Your memo contains a number of good ideas for improving election integrity in Pima County, particularly your recommendations to improve procedures for chain-of-custody control of ballots, doubling the number of ballots to be hand counted, and adding the hand-count audit process to non-partisan elections. If you would also require sorting early ballots by precinct before hand counting them, it would greatly improve your recommended hand-count process.

Unfortunately, doubling the number of early ballots hand counted in the recent Presidential primary would not be an improvement. There were no Democratic ballots included in the hand count audit and a ridiculously minuscule number of Republican early ballots: 1 batch of the four percent of the ballots that had been set aside for hand counting. When I complained about this omission to Brad Nelson, he claimed he was following the Secretary of State’s manual. He did not read the manual correctly, and the writer of the manual did not read the statute (ARS 16.602.C.3) correctly. I hope that you will remedy this defect in future elections.

I am also attaching a file containing the 22 suggestions I offered to you in December 2007 in response to your call for public comment on election integrity. You recommended in your memo adopting two of these suggestions and part of a third. I have highlighted the adopted suggestions in green and key parts of the other suggestions in yellow. I hope you will reconsider your omission. All of these ideas are already operational procedures in Tucson City elections and would be excellent improvements to the County’s procedures.

Mule Train Mail: Mickey Duniho on the Hand County Audits in Pima County

by Mickey Duniho

When SB1557 was first passed in 2006, Pima County’s attorney told the Board of Supervisors that it would be illegal for them to do a hand-count of the September Primary Election because the new law had not been completely approved by the US Justice Department. Despite a last-minute plea the day before the primary election, the Board of Supervisors voted not to do a hand count audit of that election.

Two days after the primary, we discovered that Maricopa County was doing a hand count audit of their primary on an informal basis, in anticipation of the approval by the US Justice Department of the new law. As events developed, it became obvious that Pima County’s Elections Department was aware of the Maricopa hand count at the time that they told us they could not do it. We also learned that Pima County had been doing hand counts of a single precinct in every election for the past twelve years, with the full approval of the County Attorney’s office.

Under pressure from the people, the Pima County Board of Supervisors finally agreed to do an informal hand count. When they did the count, they delivered to the volunteer counters stacks of ballots that had been removed from their secured containers and neatly stacked up. This violated chain-of-custody rules for the hand count. They also interpreted the law to require the counting of only one race in each precinct, violating the clear wording in the law. Their lawyer backed them up on this erroneous interpretation.

During the period between the primary and the general elections, Bill Risner proposed asking a judge to clarify the meaning of the law. The County attorney immediately caved to our interpretation of the law: counting four races in each precinct as stated in the law.

In November 2006, the Pima Election Director and his lawyer tried to go back on their agreement and interpret the law to allow a single race per precinct hand count, but we then had a memo signed by Huckelberry saying that they would adopt the four races per precinct interpretation. When we showed them the memo, they again caved and agreed to count four races per precinct.

In the 2008 Presidential Preference Primary (PPE), Pima County first announced that they would delay scanning early ballots until Election Day so that they could sort the ballots before scanning them. Then they announced that they would start scanning ballots on Sunday before the election. Then they announced that they would start scanning early ballots on Election Day. We sent observers to the central count facility on Election Day morning, and nothing happened all day. When I asked Bryan Crane about this around 6 pm on Election Day, he said no one had told him to scan any ballots on Election Day.

In the evening of PPE Election Day, Bryan announced that they would select the batches for the early ballot hand count audit and scan them that evening and then count the rest of the early ballots starting the next day. We randomly selected batches of ballots to be scanned and hand counted in the amount of four percent of the expected number of early ballots. These were scanned and set aside. The next day, no early ballots were scanned. Only one of the eight batches selected was hand counted – with Brad Nelson claiming that that batch was far in excess of one percent of the early ballots scanned before the close of polls on Election Day. But the law says that one percent of the early ballots RECEIVED by the close of polls on Election Day will be hand counted.

When the hand count of ballots began, Brad Nelson announced that they would only count one of the two presidential races, in accordance with the new Secretary of State Procedures Manual. The law says all the presidential preference races are to be counted, not just one, and the new procedures manual is contrary to the law. The hand count of early ballots counted approximately one sixth of one percent of the early ballots received – one sixth of the number that should have been counted. Also, since the “randomly selected” ballots were removed from the boxes and counted separately from the rest of the early ballots, their selection was no longer random relative to the rest of the ballots.

It is apparent that Pima County’s Elections Director will continue to game the system whenever he has the chance, and will not follow the law unless forced by legal pressure. In every election since the hand count audit law was enacted, he has tried first one thing and then another to avoid following the clear language of the law.

Mule Train Mail: Dick Kaiser "Bushies Allowed to Kill Election Reform for Another Year"

by Dick Kaiser:

On April 15, as millions of Americans made a commitment to fulfill their obligation to fund the commonwealth and its imperialistic ways, the House of Representatives all but guaranteed that election integrity in November this year will be a crap-shoot at best.

 

The story begins full of good news...

 

At 4pm Empire time, the House voted on HR 5036, the Emergency Election Assistance for Secure Elections Act, providing for paper ballots throughout the country. Already, the bill had been voted unanimously out of the House Administration Committee, chaired by Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), for a full House vote.  With strong bi-partisan support, the Majority Leader Steny Hoyer put the measure on the "suspension" calendar which requires a 2/3's "aye" vote for passage.

So far so good, right?

But just prior to the vote, the White House signaled to Bush supporters in the House to vote “nay” on the bill, and to real democracy. Despite this maneuver, Hoyer, who is responsible for 1) how legislation is brought to the floor and 2) assessing vote strength for each bill headed for a vote, forged ahead on the fast, but risky, track, apparently oblivious to the control Bush still has among House Republicans.

Result?

The bill failed miserably to achieve the two-thirds threshold, 239-178, and the initiative to support paper ballots was stalled, possibly until the next Congress!

 

As expected, author of the bill Rush Holt (D-NJ) and co-author Robert Wexler (D-FL) blamed Bush and the Republicans who claimed the legislation would “cost too much."  But it is clear that activists need to be cognizant of the botched job of the leadership of the House Democrats.

Why on earth did Hoyer risk certain defeat and simply put the bill to a floor vote under regular business? Now that we know the sorry result, a slower, but surer approach would have probably saved the day.

 

Or was this defeat of the bill not bungling but duplicity at work to sabotage an imperfect, but helpful, bill? After all, the elections corporations were fighting this bill, big time. We may need to wait for some politician's memoirs to be written to know the answer to that one.

Who's fault this is, readers will need to decide. But the question remains, “Does Congress have the will to protect the People from the Perpetrators on Election Day?"

Mule Train Mail: Mickey Duniho on the Attorney General's Investigation of Election Integrity in Pima County

by Mickey Duniho:

Pima County voters deserve to see convincing evidence that the May 2006 Regional Transportation Authority (RTA) election was honest, not just a half-baked investigation that raises more questions than it answers.

The concern about possible wrongdoing arose from several anomalies: the RTA passed by a surprisingly wide margin; there are computer audit log entries indicating that after the first day of scanning early ballots, the election staff printed unauthorized vote total summary reports; and there are computer audit log entries indicating that on the second day of scanning the staff began the day by deliberately replacing the previous day’s backup of the election database with a new, unnecessary backup. This replacement could not have been an accident, as suggested by the county’s lawyers, because both GEMS and Windows require that the user confirm the overwriting of a file. Because the Diebold GEMS election database is known to be easily hacked and there were apparently no outside observers, these anomalies raise serious questions about the actions of the election staff.

When the AG investigator queried Michael Shamos, a nationally recognized voting systems expert at Carnegie Mellon University, Shamos responded in email, “My suggestion would be to retabulate from the original ballots. This should tell us very quickly whether the GEMS results were fudged.” The AG investigator replied, “If there is no evidence of any computer issues then the recount …will be unnecessary.” Shamos responded, “My suspicion is that no review by the elections division or the state purporting to claim that no manipulation occurred or was possible will be accepted by naysayers and will instead be viewed as a whitewash. Ultimately the proof of the pudding is in the ballots.” The AG investigator replied, “The most vocal local naysayers have bought into this process.” As one of the local naysayers, I can tell you that we had not bought into the process – we had simply been dismissed by the AG investigator.

The AG investigator’s description of the project sent to Michael Shamos included tests for swapping the Yes and No vote codes in the database. The statement of work written by the investigative contractor contained no reference to such a test. During the investigation, the county’s IT director suggested to the investigative contractor that they look at the Preferences table in the database to see if the programming had changed, and they found no evidence of changes to the Preferences table. But the simplest manipulation of the election database, swapping the codes that identified the Yes and No votes, would have been done in the Candidate table, which they apparently did not examine.

This investigation looks very much like a whitewash. The AG investigator refused to take advice from a nationally renowned voting systems expert about looking at the ballots. We can only be confident that the election results were honest if the ballots confirm the machine total. Arizona’s Attorney General needs to assign an investigator who will publicly recount the RTA ballots.

Rating Service for Election Processes

Link: Rating Service for Election Processes.

This is one of the most sensible and useful—and ambitious—ideas I've seen come out of the Election Integrity community to date. John Denker is undoubtedly a goddamn genius. Read this, and then slap your forehead and yell, "Of course!"

This is not a little local idea, however. This is something that will require significant resources, but it is really absolutely an essential part of a true solution to the problems of Election Integrity in the United States. Kudos, John.

Pima County Becoming Mildly Deranged Over Election Integrity

The recent supplementary hearing on release of the GEMS election databases here in Pima County showed just how little substance there is to the County's objections to further public disclosure. They have been unable to substantiate their overheated claims that release of these public records would harm election security. They even admit that the Pima County political parties have been model citizens in handling the data responsibly. Yet, the county is even revisiting legal theories long disposed of in the trial, and trying to gain time by generating yet more ponderous 'fact-finding' by the County Administration.

Stripping away all the legal mumbo-jumbo, the County just looks foolish and is acting increasingly deranged over the whole affair.

If you don't want to watch the video you can read an excellent summary of supplementary hearing that will give you a good overview of the on-going issues—or lack thereof, actually.

If you have the stomach for it, the whole sorry hearing is online to eternally embarrass the County Attorneys involved, CHuckelberry who's pulling all the strings, and the Board of Supervisors who are ultimately responsible:

PART 1 (Judge Miller's comments, 6 min.):

PART 2 (Pima Dems' oral arguments, 29 min.):

PART 3 (Pima County's oral arguments, 49 min.):

PART 4 (Pima Dems' rebuttal, 21 min.):

NOTE: When I talk about "Pima County", I mean the majority of the Board of Supervisors, County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry, elections director Brad Nelson, and County Attorney Barbara LaWall and her civil deputies in charge of the case, especially Chris Straub.

Pima County has been getting increasingly deranged, dishonest, and down-right nasty over the election integrity issue. They seem to be painting themselves ever tighter into a corner, and getting angrier and angrier toward anyone who tries to point out that they are running out of room to maneuver.

If they are not hiding anything, they are certainly acting like they are, which only raises citizens' concerns even further. No knowledgeable observer can now believe that they are merely trying to vindicate a good-faith legal position. Their opposition to public oversight of our elections computers has veered into overt psycho-pathology.

Let me be more specific:

• Even though Judge Miller has clearly stated that the computer files the Democratic Party sought are public records (the ONLY issue is whether there are security concerns that would prevent or limit their release—and it's becoming increasingly obvious that there are NO actual security concerns attendant on the files' release) the County is seeking to deny the Democratic Party's attorney's fees on the grounds that they did not prevail. If you can't win the litigation, kill the lawyers...


• The County continues to maintain the fiction that releasing the GEMS databases constitutes a security threat to our elections despite their on-going inability to produce any expert testimony as to any security threat that does not boil down to 1) already existing threats that are not enhanced by release of the GEMS databases, 2) threats that are clearly and easily eliminated by due diligence by the County, and 3) threats of a very unspecific and speculative nature that amount basically to "chaos and discord." Pima County demonstrates they are lacking any sense of proportion by their refusal to recognize that GEMS is fundamentally flawed as to security and is wide open to insider manipulation of our elections. That condition represents a much greater threat to public confidence and the security of our elections than any of the imagined threats posed by release of the databases to all of the political parties soon after every election.


• Recent depositions make it clear that Pima County attorneys made arguments to the Court in the recent trial that they knew where simply absurd and did not reflect the good-faith legal position of relevant authorities. They alleged at trial that state law prevented the County from releasing the relevant data, despite being told by the Secretary of State's office that such an interpretation was contrary the SoS's own practice and the plain meaning of the relevant statute. The County Attorney's office demonstrated fundamental dishonesty toward the Court by even advancing such a defense. Their behavior might not rise to the level of an ethical breach, but it was a desperate and foolish attempt to advance a defense theory that had absolutely no support in the law. No public attorney whose duty is to seek justice, not just victory or delay at all costs, should have committed the State to such a dishonest and flimsy position. The stench of desperation hovers thick around this move, and I will elaborate more on this in a future post.


• Chuck Huckelberry has personally stooped to lying to the press about the actions of the Chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party to cover for the incompetence of his appointee, Elections Director Brad Nelson, in the recent primary election. I will elaborate more on this in future posts.


• The Democratic majority on the Board of Supervisors has apparently been convinced by the County Administrator and the County Attorney's office that the Democratic Party is being used as a hapless cat's paw to create chaos and discord at the behest of Ray Carroll. As a result, they continue to vote to prolong the legal controversy instead of taking a leadership decision to allow the political parties to exercise proper oversight of elections by delivering up the GEMS databases, consistent with the Court's finding that these are public records. Because of their paranoia and the misinformation they are receiving from the Count Administration and Attorney, at least two of the Democrats will face primary challenges inspired in large part by their lack of leadership and lack of cooperation with their own party. They have cut themselves off politically at the behest of the administrative leadership. They have become merely dupes for the County Administration, rather than a political leadership representing the people of Pima County. Election integrity is one of the few areas where there exists a broad non-partisan consensus, and they have put themselves on the wrong side of the issue, severely damaging their political credibility.


• The County Attorney's office has attempted to take a second bite at the apple by getting the Secretary of State's office to change the legal definition of software in the elections manual following Court's findings in the recent litigation. The stunning arrogance of this move is a slap in the face of the judiciary, and deeply troubling demonstration of how far the County Attorney's office will go to achieve victory for its own sake. They are no longer seeking wise public policy regarding elections and seem unwilling to accept the guidance and authority of the courts to interpret the law. I will also examine this issue more closely in a future post.

When taken in sum, the County Administration and Board are making legal claims that cannot be sustained in good faith, going after the Democratic Party's financial ability to sustain the suit, attacking and lying about a Democratic official to the public, bending the law to suit their agenda of keeping the public's nose out of our own elections, and flat-out fear-mongering, foot-dragging, and throwing as much bullshit as they can to try to bury the issues, out-last activists, and confuse the public on the fundamental issue: nothing stands between elections officials and the ability to steal elections at will, and very likely undetected. And the way they are acting, they don't deserve that kind of trust.

KOLD 13 Does Election Integrity Right

KOLD 13's Bud Foster covered yesterday's hearing in the on-going election integrity legal battle between Pima County and the Pima County Democratic Party. He does an awesome job of setting the tone (code red!) and conveying the real import of the complex issues involved (there is no adult supervision of our elections!). I haven't seen more clear and compelling coverage before, which means just one thing: we're winning.

Sheila Tobias on Donna Branch-Gilby for Pima County Supervisor

Sheila Tobias, a well-known educator and activist here in southern Arizona recently has been circulating her endorsement of Donna Branch-Gilby over incumbent Sharon Bronson in the Democratic primary for District 3 Pima County Supervisor. I thought it really well done, and worth a read for anyone trying to understand why Donna is challenging an incumbent Democrat:

Dear Friends:

A Board of Supervisors election rarely generates the passion and excitement of a presidential primary; or a congressional race; or even the contest for Mayor and City Council.

But, once you think about the power exerted by the Pima County Board of Supervisors over everything that matters, from plugging potholes to budgeting and managing the libraries, from juvenile detention to solid waste land fills, from ensuring the integrity of elections to waste water treatment, county property assessments and taxing, and approving (or rejecting) rezoning requests for homes and business development, you will realize, as I have come to realize: that the upcoming election to the Board of Supervisors matters very much to all of us who live here in the County.

The five supervisors sometimes appear to be a permanent body. With two of the Supervisors in their (well-paid by the way) positions for 12 and 10 years, a third for 8 and a fourth ensconced for six, I am supporting a challenger, Donna Branch Gilby, former Pima County Chair of the Democratic Party, most recently Vice-Chair of the State Party, because Donna is committed to voter integrity (see below) and balanced growth. She’s already been endorsed by the Election Integrity Committee of the Pima County Democratic Party.

Donna has explained to me the arcane workings of the Board of Supervisors – which we voters cannot alter; all we can do is to change the “cast of characters.”

Donna is running against a Democrat in a district that includes north Tucson and extends from the West side of Tucson to the Yuma County line and south to the Mexico border and includes the Tohono O’odham Nation. If you’re wondering why a Democrat would oppose another Democrat (and two of the other Democratic Supervisors are likely to be challenged by members of their own party this year as well), the reason resides in yet another responsibility that the Supervisors have, namely, determining voting modalities, and certifying elections. 

State law charges political parties with performing oversight of the election process; this includes monitoring the vote counting process.  When Donna chaired the Pima County Democratic Party, she spoke numerous times on this before the Board of Supervisors.  Her opponent in this election was the leading obstructionist.  Even after a 3½ day trial in December 2007, when Judge Michael Miller ruled that political party officials could examine the databases of the 2006 elections, Supervisor Bronson was calling for an appeal of the judge’s ruling.

With friends like these (on voter integrity), you don’t need enemies.

About Donna:

• Donna is a 40-year resident of Tucson with a Master’s in Public Administration from the U of A.  She taught supervisory and management skills to Dept of Economic Security staff for 20 years.  Was a member of AFSCME.

• Served as Chair of the Pima County Democratic Party in 2006 and then as 1^st Vice Chair of the Arizona Democratic Party in 2007

• Founder of the Arizona Women’s Political Caucus; served as a Director on the Boards of Tucson Peace Center, Planned Parenthood, Open Inn and as a Commissioner on the Tucson Human Relations Commission for 8 years. 

• She lives with her husband Bob Gilby at Milagro Cohousing - a Community in Balance with Nature, which they co-founded in 2001. She is the mother of Michelle Williams, MD, Tucson, and Toby Branch, AIA, Denver.

Donna’s priorities – including voter integrity – are ours:

• Balanced growth – to ensure that the population of Pima County doesn’t exceed our water supplies – employing the Board’s power over

  •      zoning,

  •      building  codes,

  • impact fees,

  • determining where sewer lines will go

  
  Thus, the Board could communicate to developers that in-fill rather than sprawl is a Pima County priority; and make that ruling stick!

• Transportation –through the budgeting process,

• Election process – through funding and supervision over the County Elections Division

• Open Decisions – Openly Arrived At

• Taking more leadership so that the professional County Administrator (who has also been on the job a long time, directing policy from behind the scenes) implements Board policy rather than his own.

The Pima County Board of Supervisors is required by law to hold open “Study Sessions” at which upcoming decisions (not laws – they do not legislate) are supposed to be publicly aired. But  for the past several years, these “Study Sessions” have been routinely canceled. Donna wants to bring in the kind of experienced people who invite input, criticism, and other (better) ideas when appropriate to a discussion or a decision.

Donna is likely to be opposed in her bid to unseat Supervisor Bronson (in office since 1996) by the Arizona Home Builders, Realtors, and others who have come to benefit from her long incumbency.

Once you meet Donna Branch-Gilby, you will know that she would make the Board of Supervisors more responsive to the views and the needs of people like us.

What you can do?:

• Offer your support publicly, by adding your name to a list of supporters.

• Volunteer, especially to do research on the impact of the Board’s actions/inaction on the utility service delivery boundary.

• Make a financial contribution. County elections are not part of “Clean Elections,” so candidates must raise funds traditionally – by asking. The maximum allowed contribution is $390 per person each election cycle.  Checks to “Branch-Gilby 2008” may be sent to P.O. Box 85781, Tucson, AZ 85754 

• Join me at a Meet the Candidate party at the home of

Bob and Joan Kaye Cauthorn
Wednesday, April 2,  5:30 – 7:30 pm
30 N Camino Espanol
One block North and East of Broadway and Country Club.

Voter ID Laws: Voter Supression Under the Guise of Preventing Individual Voter Fraud

"The GOP has transformed the legal apparatus of the United States into an instrument of partisan force." - Scott Horton "Vote Machine: How Republicans hacked the Justice Department" (PDF)

The GOP has been engaging in a cynical and deliberate attempt to use the justice system to punish their political enemies, justify and legitimate their systematic voter suppression programs, and seek electoral advantage by undermining the neutrality and credibility of our criminal justice system. Any citizen of conscience, liberal and conservative alike, should condemn these practices before their entrenchment in our legal culture enables Democrats to abuse power in a similar fashion as they move into positions of power.

Once an instrument of power becomes legitimate through repeated use, it is naive in the extreme to expect those who seek power to lay such tools aside voluntarily. The GOP's misuse of our justice system in this fashion therefore threatens the freedom of every citizen and undermines the integrity of our democratic system of governance.

The GOP's campaign seeks to build a myth of individual voter fraud in which large numbers of ineligible persons (usually non-citizens) seek to subvert our elections by voting fraudulently or multiple times. Concern about such fraud is exploited to pass draconian voter ID laws, the purpose of which is to differentially reduce Democratic voter's effective participation (i.e. a voter's ballot actually counting) by 3-5%, thereby allowing victory for the GOP in more close contests.

The second, even more pernicious aspect of their campaign is to subvert the Justice Department (and even some local prosecutorial authorities, such as The Maricopa County Attorney's office) to bolster the claims of individual voter fraud by issuing voter fraud cases on flimsy and deficient evidence. This has happened repeatedly and is behind at least some of the U.S. Attorney firings that drew a great deal of attention last year.

In addition, the Justice Department has been used, as have the investigative resources of the FBI, to bring prosecutions for public corruption against political enemies and rivals of the GOP. From 2001 to 2006, the Justice Department had initiated 375 investigations of public officials: 298 of those investigations targeted Democrats, only 67 of them targeted Republicans.

The odds of such an imbalance being the result of random chance is 1 in 10,000. Based on the great number of public corruption scandals that have engulfed the GOP and dragged its reputation into the gutter with voters, neither is it based on the underlying proclivities of Democratic officials (who, being in the minority for those years, had much less opportunity to misuse their offices, in any case).

Recent Senate hearings have shown there is no evidence to support GOP concerns about individual voter fraud, which is the only kind of election fraud that could be addressed by voter ID laws. Watch the hearing (RealMedia).

Arizona's voter ID law, requiring proof of citizenship to register and to vote at the polls, is back in effect for the 2008 races. The effect of this law will not be to stop voter fraud, but to stop a class of people, including the poor and minorities, from effectively exercising their franchise, giving a preferential advantage to Republican candidates.

An Indiana voter ID law is now before the Supreme Court, and in the oral arguments the Justices admitted frustration that they haven't been provided any reliable data on which to judge the seriousness of the 'problem' of individual voter fraud. Download Oral Argument Transcript (PDF)

A State must have a compelling interest in preventing such fraud in order to burden a fundamental constitutional right such as voting. As the method of remedying the problem imposes a known cost of effectively disenfranchising a statistically measurable number of the most vulnerable Americans, there must really be a significant problem and the court must examine the State's method of addressing that problem to ensure that it is narrowly tailored to avoid burdening that right to the extent possible.

The Court has no such record establishing there is a serious problem with individual voter fraud, therefore the State's response cannot possibly be narrowly tailored to impose the least possible burden on the fundamental right to vote. If the Court upholds the Indiana law, the ruling will be utterly illegitimate and primarily based on the partisan bias of the Court.

Voter ID is merely a legal means of harassing certain classes of voters. Voter turn-out is not the issue, as turn-out is apparently not much affected by voter ID laws. Rather, it is the effective exercise of the voter's franchise that is the issue. A person without adequate ID may go to poll, and even cast a provisional ballot, but the likelihood of his vote actually being counted becomes much, much less.

Preventing people from coming to the polls and voting is much harder than simply creating a legal basis on which to ignore their votes. Provisional voting provides just such a legal mechanism that targets undesirable voters (i.e. preponderantly Democratic ones) by means of the ID requirement.

Many Republicans express derision for the idea that significant numbers of citizens lack a government issued ID acceptable under voter ID laws: an estimated 11% of the population (21 million Americans) lack such ID. Many of those citizens lack the resources (time, money, transportation, documentation) to obtain such ID in order to make their franchise effective. In the absence of any evidence that individual voter fraud is a significant problem, the burdens placed on these citizens to make their franchise effective is intolerable.

Every American should be outraged when any political party resorts to legalistic methods of voter suppression in order to win more elections. There is a clear echo of the legal methods of effectively destroying the franchise of black Americans for over a century in these laws, prompting many to call the new laws "José Crow."

Just as "Jim Crow" will forever stain the honor of my own Democratic Party, "José Crow" will become a source of eternal dishonor for the GOP. The temporary gains made as a result of such a shameful policy cannot even begin to compensate for the permanent reputational harm it imposes.

Election Integrity Issues Spark a Republican Civil War in Pima County

For someone who claims "I don't speak for the Republican Party" Benny White sure has a lot to say about election integrity. Benny is the political wife of Republican Party chairwoman Judy White (herself given to unilateral pronouncements as to what is legitimate or illegitimate subjects for political discourse). Benny was appointed to the Pima County Logic and Accuracy Committee, which oversees the pre-election testing of voting equipment, and he has an opinion as to how elections should be administered in Pima County, and how they should not be.

There have been some recent murmurings about the Board of Supervisors yanking the Elections Division away from direct supervision by County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry and placing it under the direct supervision of the Board of Supervisors, or even giving it to the Recorder's office. After the raft of embarrassing and troubling revelations about the Elections Divisions' operation in the recent trial and on-going legal tussle, I can certainly understand if some Supervisors have lost confidence in CHuckelberry's supervision of the division.

In response to some of those murmurings, Benny felt the need to speak his mind via email to all and sundry on the subject, and to critique any such plan as potentially making the situation far worse by making elections a direct report to a partisan body (especially one not controlled by his own party, presumably...).

I think Benny's got some excellent points. Maybe, as he suggests, the County Registrar is the natural home of the Election Division, since their functions are so closely coordinated, and that is the way Maricopa County has structured their elections system bureaucracy (though, of course, the argument "that's what Maricopa does" carries much less weight with me than it apparently does with Benny).

Unfortunately, Benny stomped on one particular toe by making a disparaging allegation as to one of our County Supervisor's responsiveness to him on this issue.

Benny opined:

"I was opposed to the release of the database and requested that the Board of Supervisors appeal the legally flawed order from Judge Miller. The Board of Supervisors chose to ignore me. As a matter of fact, Ray Carroll would not even return phone calls to discuss the issue. Well, I am still waiting for the benefits the Democrats promised Judge Miller they would provide." [emphasis added]

Well, that didn't sit too well with Sugar Ray, as it simply wasn't true, according to him. He also didn't much appreciate Benny, who is not a licensed attorney in Arizona, let alone an expert on Arizona elections law (other than perhaps in his own mind), criticizing a well-respected judge like Michael Miller, even if Benny claims he doesn't speak for the Republican Party.

Ray invited Benny to keep the Carroll name out of his damn mouth, thank you very much. He made it very clear that he didn't appreciate being talked about in such a manner, nor that Benny should presume to have any authority to speak for the Republican Party on this matter, despite his rather disingenuous disclaimer to the contrary.

I don't know if the source of Ray's annoyance is just Benny's casual smear on Ray's reputation, or if Ray also doesn't appreciate any challenge for leadership on election integrity within the Pima Republican Party that some might imagine Chairperson White's wife speaking up on the issue implies. In either case, Ray made it very clear that he's more than willing to take the case to the grassroots and let the PCs decide who should be leading the Pima County party, if the Whites don't step off.

Them's fightin' words, as they say. Ray is clearly sending a shot across Benny's, and by extension his husband Judy's bow. If Judy and Benny don't trim their sails, Ray seems quite ready to un-mast them, or put one below the waterline.

Asked if he had anything nice to say about the Whites, Ray deadpanned, "They're not the Clintons."

Election Integrity Film

by David Safier

I saw the film "Uncounted" at the Loft last night, about problems with the computerizing of our election system. It was followed by a panel discussion featuring the filmmaker, David Earnhard, as well as Brad Friedman, the founder of The Brad Blog, the nation's premier election integrity website, and our own Bill Risner, the lawyer who is pressing the Pima Democratic Party suit for access to Pima County election databases.

I'm not going to try and convince anyone of how much trouble our election system is in and how easily the results can be manipulated by anyone who has access to the machines and the software. Let me just say, everything I have seen, heard and read tells me this is a very real problem, and the concerns are vital to the maintenance of free elections. If we have computerized elections, we must have paper ballots that are counted to assure us that the computers have tallied the election results accurately.

Don't simply accept or discard what I say. Look into this yourself. The topic deserves your thoughtful consideration.

Yuppie Riot in Pima County Supervisor's Chambers

Ray Carroll referred to a 'yuppie riot' in chambers on January 8th in his recent interview with The Buckmaster. Here's some footage on that of which he speaks:

Diebold Reveals Winner of 2008 Presidential Campaign by Accident

Hilariously spot on:

Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early

Sugar Ray Speaks to the Buckmaster on Election Integrity

Pima County Supervisor Ray Carroll explains his position on the Democratic Party's lawsuit to gain access to public election computer records:

Election Integrity Hearing, 2/25/08

by David Safier

At the Monday afternoon hearing in Judge Miller’s courtroom, words were spoken in heat, and nothing was decided except for a date for a two hour hearing in April.

Here is a summary that I hope is accurate. Remember, I’m not a lawyer, and I don’t pretend to play one on this blog. (The Tucson Citizen published a good summary/analysis of the hearing.)

The first issue, whether Pima County Attorney Bill Risner should be paid for his time working on the trial by the County, was tabled until Risner breaks down his hours to distinguish between those relating to the trial and those related to another motion.

Risner wants the Judge Miller to order the release of all the election databases since the County began using the computerized system – about 1998. He gave Miller an update on the release of more databases by the County than the judge ordered (all the databases from the RTA election and the 2006 primary and general elections). Miller claimed selective ignorance about what happened since the trial – “I think I read something about it …,” and stated he can’t take what happened outside the evidence presented in the courtroom into consideration. But he was very interested in hearing the different interpretations of the events at the Board of Supervisors Meeting by Risner and County Attorney Christopher Straub.

Miller asked Risner what his basis was for requesting still more election databases. Risner became heated and said Judge Miller had made a “grievous error” (I think those are his exact words) in his earlier, restrictive ruling. The County, Risner argued, carried the burden of proof that releasing the databases would cause harm, and all they did was create imaginary scenarios with no basis in fact (Releasing the databases would create Chaos and Mayhem, the Democrats might falsify the databases they received to accuse the County of rigging the elections). Since testimony in the trial demonstrated that no harm would result from releasing the databases, Risner concluded, Miller should expand his ruling to include the others as well.

County Attorney Christopher Straub was even more heated in his reply. Nearly shouting, he said the Dems showed they wanted to create distrust in the conduct of the elections by saying repeatedly to the newspapers and on radio that the RTA election was suspect, even going so far as dragging Bryan Crane’s good name through the mud by claiming that a simple computer error was an indication that Crane was trying to cover up illegal election manipulation. That shows, Straub maintained, that the Dems are determined to discredit the Elections Division and sow mistrust among voters. (I believe he even expressed concern that by raising questions about the RTA elections, the Dems were putting the bonds for the RTA in jeopardy.) He also stated that it is even more worrisome that others outside of the political parties will be able to pore over the records once they make their way into the public domain.

Nothing was resolved in the hour long hearing. Judge Miller scheduled a two hour hearing on the release of more databases for April 21. Miller, to his credit, wanted to schedule the hearing earlier so his decision could be acted on before the upcoming primaries, but the lawyers had scheduling conflicts that pushed the date into April.

Tucson Weekly's White House Stunt Slows Hand Count Audit of Primary in Pima County

Jimmy Nintzel must have thought it would be a cute PR stunt for his paper that would widen voter participation and engagement with the primary election, but the Weekly's Project Whitehouse turned out to be a big waste of time for the volunteers who performed the hand count audits of the election returns. It may have been cute, irreverent, obnoxious, silly, creative and iconoclastic (all adjectives I strongly support), but it had real world consequences that need to be acknowledged.

Almost 50 vanity candidates, publicity hounds, and outright wackadoodles were placed on the primary ballots of both parties with the help and encouragement of Nintzel and and Weekly - far more of that ilk than normally populates presidential primary tickets.

The result was an appreciable amount of volunteer time burned needlessly by the counting and recounting of ballots because of these dead-weight candidates.

Secretary of State Jan Brewer, who seems to be hostile to any citizen involvement in or oversight of our elections, issued ridiculously obtuse guidelines this year for the hand count audit procedures that seemed designed to annoy, harass  and waste the time of anyone involved in the process; even the County Attorneys involved with the count took a "don't shoot the messenger" attitude toward the SoS's procedure. The result was that the sampled precincts' ballots had to be counted and re-counted multiple extra times because of all the minor candidates added to the ballot by The Weekly's stunt.

Next time, Weekly, consider the poor poll workers, elections employees, and audit volunteers whose time and resources are wasted by stupid and extravagant PR stunts with our elections that don't produce any public good whatsoever.

Well, maybe not quite no public good at all; the Project did demonstrate how ridiculously lax ballot access rules in the Presidential primary actually are. We should probably ensure that Nintzel and his band of merry pranksters can't do this again in 2012.

PSA: Report Presidential Primary Election Irregularities and Problems

Your Democratic Election Integrity Committee is collecting Presidential Primary incident reports.

Members of our committee will work through these identifying patterns to prepare for future elections. If you saw something happen be very specific in your report – who/what/when/where/how – please. 

Avoid hearsay, which would cause us to waste time as we attempted to trace down sources (“they said” and “I heard”). If possible, include names and phone numbers of persons we might contact to verify and/or fine tune the information. The better reporter you are, the more effective we can be. 

You may also send clippings of newspaper stories, letters to the editor and the like. Don’t assume we saw the coverage, send it in.

Title each email: PPP Incident Report : your county name.

Remember, the advantage of the AZ Dem EIC is that, by comparing counties and incidents, we can detect and develop strategies for mitigating recurring patterns. 

Protection of our elections begins with you.

Please send reports to your County Chair for collection.

Thank you,

Ted Downing
Election Integrity Committee Chair

Pima County Election Integrity Battle Update

The battle against bureaucratic inertia and political flaccidity by those who wish to vindicate the right of the parties and the people to oversee our elections continues here in Pima County. Though a major victory was won with the favorable court decision, and the Pima County Board of Supervisor's vote not to appeal that ruling and to release all tabulation databases for the 2006 elections, significant issues still await resolution, and the Board continues to struggle against accepting a full partnership with the political parties in oversight of our elections.

Here's the major developments:

- Though the Board released all 2006 election records, they voted 3-2 (Day, Valadez, and Bronson v. Carroll and Elias) continue to oppose further record releases by directing the County Attorney to continue to oppose revision of Judge Michael Miller's ruling to include additional records of past elections and/or records of future elections. Some on the Board (Ann Day) even seek the intervention of the Arizona Secretary of State into the issue.

- The Pima County Administrator, Chuck Huckelberry, has gotten behind one of the election integrity movement's suggestions to digitally scan all ballots cast and place them on the internet (PDF) so that anyone may count them. The motive may be to stave off further pressure to access tabulation databases in the future, but the effect of providing another method of checking election outcomes is laudable.

- The election integrity movement is working hard to analyze the data that has been released from 2006. This is largest collection of this sort of data available and is unleashing creative efforts across the country to study the data and to build tools for analysis of such data.

- Planning for a hand-count of the 2006 RTA bond election continues.

Pima County Election Integrity Standoff Ends

And so it ends, not with a bang, but with a whisper of data flowing between two computers. The Democratic Party and it's staunch allies, the Republicans (try to get used to that idea, at least on this issue...) and the Libertarians, and a great number of Independent active citizens, have prevailed in the battle for the databases.

Pima County activists have won an absolute first: the first ever complete time-series GEMS databases of multiple elections in progress. This is a national treasure for the election integrity movement. Now, of course, comes the hard work of analyzing that which has been won, fully understanding the architecture of the normal data operations of an honest election, and building tools to sniff out signs of fraud. A team of top experts from across the political spectrum is assembling from across the county and they are calling themselves: The Royal Purple Team.

They are setting up a wiki to collaborate on analysis of the data and the tool building and distribution. Let the word go forth to the world, Pima County has the map to the Diebold fortress of security through obscurity, and we fully intend to take over the fortress and replace their silly, increasing etiolated topiary maze with real security measures and millions of citizens' eyes on the prize which that fortress protects: our democracy.

Huzzah!

Pima County's Election Integrity Moment of Truth

Will they? Or won't they?

It seems like a happy victory-day dance is in the works for the many committed citizen activists who have worked for years here in Pima County to improve election security and assure proper public oversight of our entire elections process by the political parties.

The Board has voted unanimously to release all the databases for 2006 elections, including the contentious RTA bond election. The County Administration has produced a memo outlining the process of release (PDF) listing all the materials agreed to be released, the relevant testimony and motions from the Board meeting on 1/8/8, and the proposed logistics of the process for actually turning over the records. It would seem to be the end of the story and perhaps the beginning of a new phase. Time to move on and move forward.

But this battle, and the unreasoning and seemingly inexplicable intransigence of the Board and the Administration to give the public access to these records, right up to the point of a veritable yuppie riot in the Supervisor's chambers, has fractured the trust of many.

There are persistent and nagging rumors and doubts among the growing community of election integrity activists. Will the County deliver as promised, or will they try yet again to drag their feet or throw a spanner in the works in the hopes of thwarting public access to our election records?

I think it may be premature to speculate about who is doing what behind the scenes to pull their hash out of the fire at the last minute, though there is plenty of such speculation bouncing around the email lists and phone trees, and for perfectly sound reasons, not the least of which is the broken trust I mentioned.

We deserve to trust that our public officials are looking out after the public interest, not just their own backsides. That trust grows when the processes of government are transparent and publicly accountable. That is what a self-governing polity is all about. That is what democracy is all about. That is what this fight is all about.

I don't expect forensic analysis of the databases will demonstrate any insider fraud in our elections. But it may certainly provide a great deal of embarrassment over incompetence, poor judgment and maladministration, however. And isn't that sufficient reason for the culpable parties to deny public access if they can? More importantly, the process of analysis will provide the experience, expertise, and tools we need to help the hundreds of counties who haven't yet begun to realize how vulnerable their own votes are to insider corruption.

So, we wait, expectations raised. Ready to pleasantly surprised as our government delivers promptly and honestly on its word. But also ready to be furious, and to bring the righteous wrath of that growing community of active and committed citizens from every part of the political spectrum down the heads of any who would seek to deny us.

Pima County Board of Supervisors Advances Election Integrity with Vote to Release All 2006 Election Databases

At today's hearing at the Pima Board of Supervisors, after a number of false starts, the Board voted unanimously to release the entire database series from the 2006 primary, general, and RTA elections and to drop the appeal of Judge Miller's ruling. The records release greatly exceeds the records required to be released by Judge Miller's ruling, demonstrating a great deal of leadership on election integrity by all the members of the Board.

A consortium of technical experts of the three recognized political parties will work with Pima County's technical advisor John Moffitt to provide the records to all the parties as soon as practicable. The parties should have access to the databases by the end of the week.

This decision by the Board to drop the appeal and release more records than required by court order is a major statement of openness and transparency by the county. Providing the entire series, rather than only the final election file as ordered by Judge Miller's ruling, allows forensic experts from the parties to verify that database contents that should not vary during the counting of an election have, in fact, not been altered. Such verification is a critical piece of evidence whether or not an election has been tampered with by insiders. It also allows further investigation of forensic methods by which to test and verify that elections insiders have not acted improperly in running the election.

The agenda item was originally disposed of by voting 4-1 not to appeal Judge Miller's ruling (with Ray Carroll the dissenting vote, after his amendment to release all database files the parties are requesting was rejected). Chairman Elias cut off public comment after 5 speakers with more than 30 citizens still waiting to speak.

After a near yuppie riot, Chairman Elias reversed himself by moving directly to public comment period at the urging of Ray Carroll. After a  dozen or so citizens spoke to the issue of a full public release of election databases, Carroll urged a motion to reconsider the lawsuit issue, and Chairman Elias allowed it and it was passed unanimously. Chairman Elias then himself motioned that the RTA series of databases also be released. After some input from experts such as John Denker, John Moffitt, and Jim March about the proper scope of the motion, the motion was finalized as a release of all database files pertaining to the 2006 primary, general, and RTA elections. The motion passed unanimously.

This was a very contentious meeting with some very vocal citizens. John Brakey courted ejection or arrest several times in order to keep the Board focused on the issue and to vindicate the people's right to be heard. There were continual interruptions of the proceedings with applause, jeers, and chants. I gotta say, I didn't envy Chairman Elias the task of trying to keep order under the circumstances: angry constituents, leaders of both parties with the crowd, television camera rolling. I give him full credit for dealing with it with aplomb and ultimately steering the Board to the right decision.

Pima Couny Election Integrity Goes Back to the Board of Supervisors

The Pima County Supervisor's regular meeting on January 8th at 9am is swiftly approaching this Tuesday. If election integrity matters to you, you should be there. Discussion of the lawsuit will be one of the very first items on the agenda, so try to be at the Board's Chambers by 9am.

One of the best things you can do is to contact the Supervisor's offices and let them know that is a critical issue for you. Sources near the case indicate a belief that the Board will vote to appeal unless Ann Day decides to vote with Ray Carroll. She should be the target of heaviest lobbying. Ray Carroll is already in support of election integrity; call and thank him for his leadership on this issue.

Ann Day, District 1
(520) 740-2738      

Ramón Valadez, District 2
(520) 740-8126   

Sharon Bronson, District 3
(520) 740-8051      

Ray Carroll, District 4
(520) 740-8094

Richard Elías, Chairman, District 5
(520) 740-8126

The County Attorney has filed an apparently unauthorized notice of appeal, presumably purely on the word of County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry or on the initiative of County Attorney's office itself. Only the Board has the right to make a decision as to whether to appeal the court's ruling, and they haven't yet met and made any decision on the matter. See the Democrat's Motion to Strike (Download Mot_to_Strike.pdf) for more details.

The Democrats have also taken issue with several of Judge Miller's findings of fact as not supported by the testimony, and some of his conclusions of law as erroneous. See Democrats Motion to Amend (Download Mot_to_Amend.pdf) for more details. I will take a closer look at this when and if the County Attorney responds. In my first reading, however, Bill Risner make a powerful case that Judge Miller would be hard-pressed to ignore that the Judge quite simply got several points wrong in his under-advisement opinion.

Pima County Election Integrity Public Hearings

Please see the Election Integrity Homepage for complete coverage and the latest news.

Pima County held some public meetings following the trial to which the public was invited to express their views and make suggestions. Interestingly, the public hearings were set during the pendancy of Judge Miller's verdict. I wonder how much of the motive for these hearings is sincere desire for public input, and how much is purely public relations management? The Board's credibility on this issue is running pretty thin at this point. How much weight will be given this public input is an open question that only the Board of Supes can answer, but I suspect I know that answer.

Here is some footage of two of the paladins of election integrity speaking their truth to power.

AuditAZ co-founder John Brakey:

Pima Democrats' trial lawyer Bill Risner:

Pima County Election Integrity Trial: Judge Miller Orders Release of 2006 Primary and General Election Databases, But Not RTA Election

Please see the Election Integrity Homepage for complete coverage and the latest news.

Judge Michael Miller, in a carefully reasoned and balanced opinion, today ordered the release of the final MDB and GBF database files for the 2006 RTA election primary and general elections. The judge denied without prejudice access to every MDB and GBF file for the 2006 elections, which would include the RTA election, until and unless the plaintiffs can address remaining security concerns which might arise from that larger release.

For background and commentary on the case and why it is critical to election integrity, please see my earlier posts cataloged on the trial's home post.

The immediate goal of the Democratic party - to be able to look closer at the final election databases - is satisfied by the ruling. But the broader goal of being able to look at a time series of backups for discrepancies or discontinuities that could indicate manipulation of the RTA election specifically is stymied for the moment. John Denker has some very useful additional commentary on the judge's apparent strategy.

It is still unclear whether the judge will grant on-going injunctive relief to turn over the final database files from every election going forward. The denial of access to the entire series of database files indicates that the court may still need to be satisfied as to any remaining concerns about security resulting from on-going and multiple disclosures of this type of data before granting such an injunction.

The ruling will allow the Democratic party to perform the forensic analysis required to search for any evidence of wrong-doing. It will also allow the experts for the Democratic party to begin to more closely address the unquantified and unspecified potential security threats from the public disclosure of the data in these files claimed by the County. This access will be crucial in satisfying the court that there is little or no practical threat to elections integrity posed by this information being in the public domain. Once that task is complete, broader public access to these files (the entire backup history of the election and that of future elections) can be secured.

There is no doubt that the factual findings of the court and this ruling are an resounding and unqualified victory for transparency in our elections process. However, there are further battles that must be fought: to access the entire time-series of backup database files, and to gain permanent injunctive access to the files of future elections without having to litigate each time.

As I digest the ruling and get feedback from the principals in the case, I will continue to update this post.

Here is Judge Miller's ruling in PDF format: Download MillerRuling.pdf

UPDATE:

Having had a chance to digest the ruling fully and consult with Bill Risner, I have a few additional comments.

The bottom line is that the public will get access to the final databases in the 2006 RTA election primary and general elections and all future elections, though the timing of future releases remains indeterminate.

The possibility for getting all database versions throughout the election process remains open pending further demonstration that there is no security issue. To my mind, the judge has adopted the County's burden shifting standards of 'plausible' or 'possible' security harms, when the legal standard requires that the County demonstrate a specific probable harm attendant to the release of a public record. However, I don't think this final reservation will long stand in light of the factual findings the court announced in this ruling.

A question that comes up often is whether this ruling will be appealed by the Board of Supervisors. I think there is really only one person who know that answer to that question: Chuck Huckelberry. My recommendation is that if you are concerned about his decision whether to appeal, you should call his office and let him know how you feel about that possibility.

Detailed analysis of Judge Miller's Under Advisement Ruling after the flip...

Pima County Election Integrity Trial Home

This post has been superseded by a new Homepage.

Latest News:

Judge Michael Miller has issued his ruling granting the plaintiffs access to the final databases for the 2006 Primary and General elections, but denying without prejudice wider access to all database files for the election in the possession of Pima County until and unless they are able to demonstrate the wider access will not compromise election security. This means that the mid-year RTA election and the backups made during the multi-day process of counting ballots remain out of reach for now.

The Board of Supervisors has put the release of limited files the court has ordered released on the agenda at their Jan. 8 meeting, which starts at 9 a.m. Board members are slated to discuss whether they will give the files up, or of they will appeal the ruling. Interested parties may want to show up and have a say.

Complete trial coverage after the flip...

Pima County Election Integrity Trial: Closing Arguments

Please see the Election Integrity Homepage for complete coverage and the latest news.

Bill Risner's closing arguments for the Democrats:

Click To Play

The central theme of Democrats' attorney Bill Risner throughout the trial was that the elections belong to the people, not the government. The people's political parties have a legitimate role to play in assuring the integrity of our elections, and it is not appropriate for the government to rely on security through obscurity to protect our elections. Americans want and deserve real security, based on transparency and good design. We don't want dirty little corporate secrets to be the only thing standing between our votes and those who would subvert our democratic process.

The contrasting style and substance of the opposing parties was on display in these closings, and speaks volumes about the contending philosophies that are clashing in this trial. Sparks flew, and the rhetoric was strong. The judge asked the parties to put aside the legalistic arguments and focus on persuasion. The plaintiff's attorney did so, but the county seemed unable to rise to the occasion. The simple fact is that it is not really possible to wax eloquent about keeping Diebold's dirty laundry hidden in the closet, so I wasn't really surprised.

Pima County's closing arguments footage coming soon...

The closing for the defense came first as they have the burden of persuasion, and it was delegated by Christopher Straub to Thomas "Tad" Denker. Denker claimed that Merle King was "the most authoritative expert to testify here." That might come as some surprise to Dr. Tom Ryan, Dr. Chris Gniady, Dr. John Moffatt, and 37 year veteran NSA programmer Mr. Mickey Duniho. In fact, if you actually look at King's credentials, what is notable is his lack of experience in actual computer science, programming, and information security.

Denker continued to harp on the unknown unknowns, dragging his burden-shifting sins over into the county's closing. His alarmism seemed to know no bounds, even claiming that release of the database could shut down some elections, saying, “Even the ability to conduct some of these elections could be called into question.”

Denker tacitly admitted the weakness of the county's security argument when he claimed that the “most serious risk is mayhem and chaos.” Not a specific attack, mind you, but generalized chaos of the reputational suicide attack form. I'm put in mind of the scene from Ghostbusters in which Dr. Venkman warns the mayor of dire consequences:

Dr. Peter Venkman: This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions.
Mayor: What do you mean, "biblical"?
Dr. Ray Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath-of-God type stuff.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly.
Dr. Ray Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies. Rivers and seas boiling.
Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness. Earthquakes, volcanoes...
Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria.

If the dogs and casts living together is the most serious risk, I think we can maybe live with that.

Denker further tipped his hand when he made the claim that, “there are people out there who have an interest in discrediting the system, the administration, the elections, the vendors.” Just who is Denker and the county really seeking to protect? Well, look at his list. Whether by "the administration" Denker means Chuck Huckelberry, I'll leave to others to decide, but the presence of the vendors anywhere on that list is problematic, at best. And never once does Denker mention the public interest, unless perhaps one might interpret "the elections" as a proxy - even so, we come in a distant third, behind "the system" and "the administration."

At every turn it seems Denker couldn't help but undercut his own case. He said that an attack on the election “requires an insider or the MDB from the target jurisdiction.” All along in the trial his team claimed that the release of Pima's MDBs could be leveraged against other counties with less security. Now he claims you have to have an MDB of the target jurisdiction to mount an attack? Was this an attempt to deal with the fact the Alaska MDB is already "in the wild?" A slip of the tongue? I don't know. I wonder if Tad does.

Denker suggested that the information from the MDB could help elections activists put together an attack to discredit our system. Unfortunately, that's how security is improved when secrets are the only real security measure being used. He pointed to the trouble stirred up by these elections activists already, and how they ginned up an "innocent keystroke error" into an Attorney General investigation. But that investigation recognized severe security problems with the GEMS software. Is it a waste of public resources to bring such a serious problem to light?

Denker proclaimed that there is a significant risk of these systems being discredited through hacking. If hacking can discredit a system, it should be discredited. Hacking is just exploiting obscure or secret information to subvert security measures. If your security relies on secrets, you are going to get hacked. And you might even deserve it. And ultimately, if your hackers are the kind who seek a worthy goal, you might even benefit of it.

Denker repeatedly said that he thought "the court gets it." What exactly 'it' was, isn't so clear. If 'it' is the justice and rightness and preponderance of the county's case, I think Denker's touching faith in the judge's ignorance of the security issues, susceptibility to alarm, tendency to err on the side of extreme caution regardless of the cost to countervailing public values, and over-reliance on a mercenary expert like Merle King, is misplaced.

Near the end, Denker made an emotional plea, laced with a touching, though naughty, bit of vouching, on behalf of the "much maligned" Bryan Crane and the entire cast of characters who run our elections. In this process, Denker claims, "decent, honest, hard-working people have been defamed and slandered." Such a legal conclusion can be a dicey matter to be bandying about in a public forum. Denker had enough wisdom not to name any of the parties who are responsible for these torts, but the culprits are clear enough. I ask you, as did Jim March in a message typed on his laptop as he sat at the counsel's table while Merle King testified about naughty hackers, "Gee, you think he's talking about me?"

Finally, Denker finished with perhaps the greatest irony I've ever heard in a closing: he bemoaned the fact that Bryan Crane may never get the chance to clear his name. Well, in fact, if the county prevails, Denker is absolutely right; he won't. However, if the Democrats prevail and the MDB is released for forensic study, Crane will absolutely get that chance to have his name cleared and his reputation publicly restored.

In fact, objectively, a perpetual pall over the reputation of the entire county elections department is exactly what the county is fighting for. I have a lot of sympathy for Bryan Crane, not because he is unfairly maligned (though that may be true), but because his employers value whatever reasons are truly underlying their intransigence to transparency over the reputation of Bryan Crane.

Risner knew that the judge wanted a big picture, not a recap, and that's what he gave. He returned to the themes he had established in the opening: the fundamental value of democracy, the election belong to the people, the parties are the people's statutory agents to ensure fairness and accuracy in elections.

Risner reiterated that this case is not about what it seems to be about. It is not about overturning the RTA - the activities of election integrity activists all started long before the RTA. It is not about Bryan Crane - it doesn't matter what he has done, it's about what anyone in his position has the ability to do to subvert our elections.

Risner pointed out that the county claims activists want to wreck and disrupt elections, when in fact they have repeated demonstrated by pushing the county on security matters that their goal is to improve and secure our elections. The county pointed to all these methods of attack based on the information in the database files, but they can't explain how those attacks are feasible, can't point to a single instance of such things happening, and can merely charge that plaintiffs seek "mayhem and chaos." Oh my.

In his final and perhaps the most electric moment of the trial, Risner charged that the county was "coming up with slanders against the public in an effort to justify their secrecy."

Denker stood for his rebuttal and charged that the plaintiff's attorney had "lots and lots of conviction," but little else on his side.

The following is a summary and paraphrasing of the court proceedings, not a transcript. Thanks to David Safier for preparation of this summary.

Closing Arguments

Closing by Deputy Pima County Attorney Thomas "Tad" Denker.

[David was out of the courtroom for the first couple minutes]

If databases have to be recreated from scratch, the chances of error are increased, possibly disenfranchising voters.

Releasing databases poses the serious risk of mayhem and chaos. Many people want to discredit the system, the vendors and the administration. To create mayhem, you either need an insider or an outsider with a database file, who can mount an attack and discredit the system.

When Bryan Crane made an innocent keystroke error, it caused an Attorney General investigation.

Final Point: In the process, fine public servants had their names dragged through the mud. They were defamed. These are good people who deserve our thanks, not derision.

Closing by Democratic Party's attorney Bill Risner.

It has been my pleasure to represent lots of decent, caring, patriotic citizens.

The rock, the foundation of our freedoms is our ability to vote, to change course if we wish. That needs a vote and an honest count.

As I learned the facts of this case and its background, I sometimes broke into a cold sweat. What if our vote can be taken away from us? What if it has already been taken from us?

Testimony has revealed defects in a number of places in the elections system. The rock on which our freedoms are based is in jeopardy.

Arizona wants and expects an honest vote count.

We’ve heard that the only reason for the lawsuit is so we can go to the legislature. But, where do we go with our concerns? This is the place, the courtroom, in front of a judge who understands the issues.

This isn’t about the RTA election or any single election. We want now, and in the future, to get data that allows us to examine the vote count. This will improve the public’s confidence in elections.

Rebuttal by "Tad" Denker.

Risner worries about votes, and this is a legitimate concern. But in court, Risner has given little information on statutory considerations or on the balancing act.

There is no evidence that seeing the database files will give the Democratic Party any information  that would help them discover election fraud.

Risner has conviction but little else.

Pima County Election Integrity Trial: Testimony of Mr. John Brakey

Please see the Election Integrity Homepage for complete coverage and the latest news.

I'm not entirely sure what the county's purpose was in calling John, but they kept him dangling for days. I have to wonder if some of it was just a way to keep him out of the courtroom most of the time.

In any case, they were hoping to put a wild-eyed revolutionary on the stand to frighten the judge with, they instead got a concerned grand-dad who wants to leave a better America behind.

Please recall that the following is a condensed and paraphrased summary, not a transcript. Mucho gracias to David Safier for compiling these summaries.

Summary of testimony by John Brakey

Direct examination by Christopher Straub, Deputy Pima County Attorney.

John Brakey has no formal computer training, but is knowledgeable about computers. He is a member of local and state election integrity committees and of Audit AZ.

Brakey has no fondness for the GEMS system.

Brakey is good at recognizing patterns in databases.

He has access to a copy of GEMS software and has been working with it.

He believes most election fraud is done internally.

He has developed a simple technique to do a password switch, so a database can be given a new password and be opened in GEMS. He has published the technique to demonstrate the poor security of the GEMS software.

Asked if his