A federal whistleblower lawsuit has been filed against the e-voting industry, alleging that one company
sold electronic voting devices that did not perform
as promised.
But details about the suit are sketchy because of secrecy rules
surrounding whistleblower litigation, according to Matt Schultz, an
attorney at Levin, Papantonio Thomas Mitchell Echsner & Proctor
PA, the Pensacola, Fla., law firm that is handling the case.
Schultz was assigned to the suit, but the lead attorneys are Mike
Papantonio and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Kennedy, son of the late New York Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and
nephew of the late President John F. Kennedy, gained attention with
a recent story he wrote for Rolling Stone magazine in which he
questioned the outcome of the 2004 presidential election. The
whistleblower lawsuit is not related to the allegations in
Kennedy's analysis.
The lawsuit was filed approximately four weeks ago, but Schultz
was unable to divulge in which federal district the filing took
place. Nor could he discuss which e-voting machine vendor is targeted because
the document is currently under seal.
According to Schultz, insiders at one of the four major e-voting
vendors in the U.S. have testified to misrepresentations by the
unnamed company about the accuracy, reliability and security of the
direct recording electronic (DRE) devices. DRE usually signifies a
touch-screen voting system.
The lawsuit is not related to any particular election outcome.
"This is about faulty machines being fobbed off on the government
and being bought with federal money under the Help America Vote Act
[HAVA]," Schultz said. Among its other mandates, HAVA stipulated
that by last January every election precinct in the country had to
have an e-voting system that allowed handicapped voters to cast
ballots unaided.
The suit has been filed under a special legal method called "qui
tam," which means that the U.S. Attorney General's office has the
option to take the case up itself. After the attorney general's
office decides whether it will carry the suit forward or hand it
back, the details can be made public, said Schultz. The U.S.
Attorney General's office had 60 days to review the case, but was
entitled to extend that period under certain circumstances.
If the lawsuit is successful, the defendant would be required to
pay damages. While no specific dollar figure has been set yet,
damages usually include the amount of federal money spent times
three, and the figure would depend on a variety of factors, said
Schultz.
Proponents of electronically enabled voting devices such as
touch-screen or optical systems say the machines can tabulate votes
with much greater accuracy than older punch card ballot systems.
The e-voting systems are made by several vendors, including Diebold
Election Systems Inc. and Election Systems & Software Inc.
Critics, however, have long argued that electronic devices are
unreliable and subject to hacking and, without a paper trail,
cannot be properly audited. Those shortcomings leave citizens
uncertain about whether their votes will be tabulated properly,
according to critics.
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