In act of transparency, White House delays release of report on voting machine vulnerabilities ahead of US midterms

Are these the same vulnerabilities that we were told don't exist and which one company entered into a defamation lawsuit over?

Tuur said:

Are these the same vulnerabilities that we were told don't exist and which one company entered into a defamation lawsuit over?

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A vulnerability is a danger, a way something could be compromised. This is not the same thing as an actual compromise. Almost all IT professionals are concerned about potential vulnerabilities in voting machines. However I know of no evidence that there have been significant compromises. No knowledgable person denies the risks. But there are well known ways to mitigate them.

In my area in NJ, I select the candidate on a screen. But it prints a list of my votes, which I must look at and approve. That allows hand recounts, and a random sample could be used to verify that things are working. That’s what I would recommend. Even if not every voter actually looks at the paper, it doesn’t take everyone checking to find errors.

Acording to Wikipedia, “In the U.S., 98.5 percent of registered voters live in jurisdictions offering some form of paper ballot, whether hand-marked or VVPAT. Only 1.4 percent use electronic systems with no paper record.” (VVPAT is their term for the scheme I described.)

The suit was about a specific claim that seems to have been false.

essentialsaltes said:

No, these are the same vulnerabilities that "have long been known".

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Well, now: We have an interesting situation:

When Republicans point out problems, they're called baseless. We're told over and over "There is no fraud, there is no fraud." So trying to make it into a Democrat talking point is an exercise in double-think. IF there is no fraud, then there is no concern. But if there's concern, then there's a chance of fraud.

Tuur said:

Well, now: We have an interesting situation:

When Republicans point out problems, they're called baseless. We're told over and over "There is no fraud, there is no fraud." So trying to make it into a Democrat talking point is an exercise in double-think. IF there is no fraud, then there is no concern. But if there's concern, then there's a chance of fraud.

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A toaster oven is like what, a foot-square? Yes?
It gets hot enough to cook food.
My oven is tiny, though the ”range” is large, it too, heats food.
A glass furnace gets very, very hot and so therefore requires a lot more space.

If there were widespread “voter-fraud” going on, there’d be telltale signs that that was happening. Envisioning the possibilities that widespread voter fraud is occurring, as it actually happening, is a misuse of empathy rationality.

[Edit-to-add:

The thing though is, the side that cheats first will be the side that ultimately, loses.

I believe that many of my Republican friends and family members are honorable people who wouldn’t knowingly cheat in an election to win it. I like to think that they think the same of me.

If you truly believe “the other side” is going to cheat, then I don’t what what to tell you.
Think better of us, all of us. We’re still mostly good people.
[/edit]

Tuur said:

We're told over and over "There is no fraud, there is no fraud."

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No you're not. But feel free to prove otherwise.

Tuur said:

if there's concern, then there's a chance of fraud.

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That's not how cause and effect work

Tuur said:

Well, now: We have an interesting situation:

When Republicans point out problems, they're called baseless. We're told over and over "There is no fraud, there is no fraud."

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When Republicans create lies (such as what Giuliani did in 2020, yes, those lies are baseless. As just one example, Republicans had concern in Detroit because trucks would pull up to a loading dock at the Detroit Convention Center, where the vote counting was taking place, and unloaded boxes of ballots. This is how the system was designed, with a check to ensure the boxes were legitimate before they were allowed in the building, and that loading dock is where all ballots were to be delivered. The boxes were sealed at the precinct with representatives of both parties ensuring the box was properly sealed and only actual ballots were put in the box. When coming in the building, the boxes would be inspected to ensure they were legitimate votes from a precinct with the correct seal, paperwork, and that the box/seal had not been tampered with. In the counting room, the seal would be inspected to ensure there was no tampering and only opened and counted if correct, again in the presence of representatives from both parties.

Some Republicans, who showed up to be "observers" but didn't go to the pre-Election Day training, claimed it was "fraud," that Democrats were bringing fake ballots in to be counted. Obviously, their claims were baseless and were proven to be baseless over and over.

And Democrats were claiming that there was no institutional fraud, that there was not enough fraud to change the results of the election. Yes, every election has something like 1 in a million voters that commits fraud. Oddly, most of the cases of actual fraud in 2020 was from people who were Republican, such as the Trump voter in Pennsylvania who sent in an absentee ballot for his dead mother. There was also the woman in Minnesota who did the same thing in 2024. Yes, there are isolated cases of fraud in every election, but, again, isolated cases.

Tuur said:

So trying to make it into a Democrat talking point is an exercise in double-think. IF there is no fraud, then there is no concern. But if there's concern, then there's a chance of fraud.

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Tell me, do you lock your house when you leave and no one is home? Do you lock your car? If you are like most people, you lock your house and your car to prevent theft, even if no one has ever robbed you. We handle elections in much the same way. Yes, there is little fraud but, to ensure there continues to be little to no fraud, we examine voting systems to look for vulnerabilities. We then look for ways to protect against those vulnerabilities from being exploited, to use the analogy, we "lock the doors."

So, since there might be vulnerabilities in the software, we update the software on the voting machines when they release new versions that "fix" those vulnerabilities. This is little different from your cell phone; Apple/Google find vulnerabilities in iOS/Android and release patches and people update iOS/Android on their phones to protect themselves from those vulnerabilities. Every state reviews their voting rolls and updates them; to remove voters who have died, to remove voters that have moved, etc. It is not because there is any worrying amount of fraud, it is so we continue to have safe and secure elections.

essentialsaltes said:

Your falsehoods are not very interesting. Nobody claims the system is perfect. This thread has uncovered no fraud. These systems have known vulnerabilities that can inform how we handle elections now and in the future.

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Well then, if voter fraud claims are falsehoods, then why get knickers in a wad over not reporting vulnerabilities? This thread is trying to have it both ways, but all it does is undercut the "no fraud" claim. If there is no fraud, then no report doesn't matter. If, however, there is fraud, then it matters a great deal.

It seems that Republicans are in favor of exposing and eliminating vulnerabilities, exploitation and fraud in the voting system. While Democrats seem to be against it.

Tuur said:

Well then, if voter fraud claims are falsehoods, then why get knickers in a wad over not reporting vulnerabilities? This thread is trying to have it both ways, but all it does is undercut the "no fraud" claim.

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The existence of vulnerabilities does not imply the existence of fraud, but that does not mean that those vulnerabilities should not be addressed.

Tuur said:

If, however, there is fraud, then it matters a great deal.

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Curious, then, that the people alleging fraud are holding back the report.

(staff edit of quote of a post that is not visable now.)


All of this is nothing more than conspiracy theory rantings, all have been proven false. Most of these claims were "adjudicated" -- though, honestly, the Trump team didn't allege in court there was fraud because they knew they would be sanctioned since the had zero evidence. Regardless, they lost everyone of those cases. Most of them are merely things people claimed on Twitter, which had no factual basis or evidence.

It is also worth noting that these conspiracies led to multiple people having multi-million dollar judgements against them, after they were sued by Dominion (such as Fox News, Sydney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and Newsman; it appears all of them, other than Lindell, settled their cases and paid Dominion millions of dollars. While Mike Lindell did have his case dropped by Liberty Voting (the new name after Dominion was purchased by a Republican businessman), it is worth noting that Lindell was found to have defamed a Dominion employee based on the same conspiracy claims, and Lindell was sanctioned ($50,000) for filing false counter-claims against Dominion when those claims were heard.

The Michigan case I had to remind myself, it is where an individual in the county, William Bailey, sued the county over the election results. He sought to do a full audit, Michigan responded by having both a county and a state controlled hand recount of the paper ballots (created when the person voted, and verified by the voter that it reflected their vote). The counts verified the Election Day count done by the machine.

The judge ruled that the citizen was not allowed to do a full audit but gave him access to some thumb drives and other items used in the election but no access to the machines. What was quoted above was from the audit, which was done by Russell Ramsland, Jr. Ramsland was a person who pushed a number of conspiracies about the 2020 election, under the guise of being an "election security analyst." To quote from Business Insider (a rather conservative publication), "The allegations about voting systems and fraud made by Ramsland and ASOG were unsubstantiated and widely debunked by data-security experts." Yes, the judge put it in the trial record, since it was an exhibit submitted by the plaintiff but still ruled against Bailey (see appeals court decision linked above) -- the fact that it was put in the court record does not mean the report was credible (which it wasn't).

The court basically found a number of issues with the plaintiffs claims and ruled for the county. Bailey appealed and the Appeal's Court disagreed with some of the reasoning the trial judge used in reaching his decision but agreed with his ruling for the county, basically saying there was no evidence to support the plaintiff's claim (despite the claims by Ramsland that were entered into the trial record).

Of course, the most damning piece of evidence is that Trump's own Election Security Group, that he founded within the Department of Homeland Security in 2018, found no basis to any of these claims. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which Trump created and appointed his own people to fill, in their report stated, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised.”

SimplyMe said:

All of this is nothing more than conspiracy theory rantings, all have been proven false. Most of these claims were "adjudicated" -- though, honestly, the Trump team didn't allege in court there was fraud because they knew they would be sanctioned since the had zero evidence. Regardless, they lost everyone of those cases. Most of them are merely things people claimed on Twitter, which had no factual basis or evidence.

It is also worth noting that these conspiracies led to multiple people having multi-million dollar judgements against them, after they were sued by Dominion (such as Fox News, Sydney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and Newsman; it appears all of them, other than Lindell, settled their cases and paid Dominion millions of dollars. While Mike Lindell did have his case dropped by Liberty Voting (the new name after Dominion was purchased by a Republican businessman), it is worth noting that Lindell was found to have defamed a Dominion employee based on the same conspiracy claims, and Lindell was sanctioned ($50,000) for filing false counter-claims against Dominion when those claims were heard.

The Michigan case I had to remind myself, it is where an individual in the county, William Bailey, sued the county over the election results. He sought to do a full audit, Michigan responded by having both a county and a state controlled hand recount of the paper ballots (created when the person voted, and verified by the voter that it reflected their vote). The counts verified the Election Day count done by the machine.

The judge ruled that the citizen was not allowed to do a full audit but gave him access to some thumb drives and other items used in the election but no access to the machines. What was quoted above was from the audit, which was done by Russell Ramsland, Jr. Ramsland was a person who pushed a number of conspiracies about the 2020 election, under the guise of being an "election security analyst." To quote from Business Insider (a rather conservative publication), "The allegations about voting systems and fraud made by Ramsland and ASOG were unsubstantiated and widely debunked by data-security experts." Yes, the judge put it in the trial record, since it was an exhibit submitted by the plaintiff but still ruled against Bailey (see appeals court decision linked above) -- the fact that it was put in the court record does not mean the report was credible (which it wasn't).

The court basically found a number of issues with the plaintiffs claims and ruled for the county. Bailey appealed and the Appeal's Court disagreed with some of the reasoning the trial judge used in reaching his decision but agreed with his ruling for the county, basically saying there was no evidence to support the plaintiff's claim (despite the claims by Ramsland that were entered into the trial record).

Of course, the most damning piece of evidence is that Trump's own Election Security Group, that he founded within the Department of Homeland Security in 2018, found no basis to any of these claims. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which Trump created and appointed his own people to fill, in their report stated, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised.”

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It's important to note: just because no fraud was found doesn't mean there are no vulnerabilities in voting machines, or that we should relax oversight. VULNERABILITY IS NOT FRAUD. It opens the possbility for fraud, except that the fraud would almost certainly be caught becaue of the paper backups.

hedrick said:

It's important to note: just because no fraud was found doesn't mean there are no vulnerabilities in voting machines, or that we should relax oversight. VULNERABILITY IS NOT FRAUD. It opens the possbility for fraud, except that the fraud would almost certainly be caught becaue of the paper backups.

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I think I said something similar above. I think I used the analogy that, even though my car has never been stolen, I lock my car. I guess to add to it a bit, even though I drive thousands of miles per year and don't get in an accident, I still have a dash cam so I can prove what happened if I happen to be hit by someone. Our elections are much the same way; we secure the elections even though there is no massive fraud and run various types of election security so we can catch those people that attempt to commit fraud (such as the guy who sent a mail in ballot for his dead mom).

RocksInMyHead said:

Curious, then, that the people alleging fraud are holding back the report.

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Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner! That is the main issue here. That can be pointed out without the double-think "There is no fraud / there are vulnerabilities in election machines." It prevents whirling dervishes at trying to spin not reporting vulnerabilities around claims there is no fraud.

Tuur said:

Ding! Ding! Ding! We have a winner! That is the main issue here. That can be pointed out without the double-think "There is no fraud / there are vulnerabilities in election machines." It prevents whirling dervishes at trying to spin not reporting vulnerabilities around claims there is no fraud.

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I suggest you re-read the OP then - you're the one who decided to start talking about people claiming "there is no fraud."

Servus said:

It seems that Republicans are in favor of exposing and eliminating vulnerabilities, exploitation and fraud in the voting system. While Democrats seem to be against it.

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I can't agree with that, particularly when Republican states left Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). We had an entire thread on it, a few years ago, on Christian Forums.

For those not aware of what ERIC is, it was a national database to help prevent voter fraud. For example, if a person moved and registered in a new state, the new state would enter the persons name into ERIC, along with identifying information, so the previous state would remove the person from their voting rolls. Basically any information that might affect a persons right to vote was entered. This includes things that would limit voting rights, like conviction of a felony, the voter dying, etc; so that they (or someone acting on their behalf) could not register to vote in another state.