Georgia buys new voting machines for 2020 presidential election
AJC CONTINUING COVERAGE: VOTING
July 30, 2019
EXCERPT
Dominion, a Denver-based company, won the contract in large part because it offered Georgia the lowest-cost system among three companies that submitted bids, according to evaluation score sheets. Though ES&S scored higher on the government’s criteria for a replacement voting system, Dominion came out on top when the price of its system was taken into account.
Election officials now must quickly install the voting technology before its first statewide test during the March 24 presidential preference primary. The new voting system is expected to be quickly challenged in court by voters who say it remains vulnerable to hacking and tampering, despite the addition of paper ballots.
Like Georgia’s existing machines, voters will make their choices on touchscreen machines. But after picking their candidates, instead of tapping a button that says “cast ballot,” they’ll click on a button that says “print your ballot.” The printer attached to the machine will then print a ballot on a full sheet of paper, which voters can then review for accuracy before inserting into a scanner for tabulation. The paper ballots will be locked in a ballot box for retrieval as needed for audits or recounts.
Before the contract was awarded, some voters speculated that the state would continue doing business with its current elections company, ES&S, which has close ties to Gov. Brian Kemp’s administration.
Dominion has connections, as well. One of Dominion’s lobbyists, Jared Thomas, has worked on Kemp’s political campaigns since he first won a state Senate seat in 2002. He also worked previously for Kemp in the Secretary of State’s Office. Another Dominion lobbyist, Barry Herron, was vice president of Diebold Election Systems, the company that originally sold Georgia its electronic voting machines in 2002.
Notice they conveniently left out the ties between Dominion and Clinton and Pelosi. It is the AJC after all.
Thanks, Maggie!!