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Why is Hugo Chávez Involved With U.S. Voting Machines?
RealClearPolitics ^ | March 28, 2006 | Richard Brand

Posted on 03/28/2006 9:32:53 AM PST by RWR8189

 The greater threat to our nation's security comes not from Dubai and its pro-Western government, but from Venezuela, where software engineers with links to the leftist, anti-American regime of Hugo Chávez are programming electronic voting machines that will soon power U.S. elections.

Congress spent two weeks overreacting to news that Dubai Ports World would operate several American ports, including Miami's, but a better target for their hysteria would be the acquisition by Smartmatic International of California-based Sequoia Voting Systems, whose machines serve millions of U.S. voters. That Smartmatic -- which has been accused by Venezuela's opposition of helping Chávez rig elections in his favor -- now controls a major U.S. e-voting firm should give pause to anybody who thinks that replacing our antiquated butterfly ballots and hanging chads will restore Americans' faith in our electoral process.

Consider the lack of confidence Venezuelans have in their voting system. Anti-Chávez groups have such little faith in Smartmatic's machines that they refuse to run candidates in elections anymore as reports surface of fraud and irregularities from Chávez's 2004 victory in a recall referendum. Yet somehow Smartmatic International and its Venezuelan owners were able to purchase Sequoia last year without the deal receiving any scrutiny from federal regulators -- including the Treasury Department's Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), which is tasked with determining whether foreign takeovers pose security risks.

CFIUS generally investigates such transactions only when the parties voluntarily submit themselves to review -- which Smartmatic did not do. But it retains the authority to initiate an investigation when it suspects a takeover compromises national security.

Smartmatic has a brief but controversial history. The company was started in Caracas during the late 1990s by engineers Antonio Mugica and Alfredo Anzola. They worked out of downtown Caracas providing small-scale technology services to Latin American banks. Despite having no election experience, the tiny company rocketed from obscurity in 2004 after it was awarded a $100 million contract by the Chávez-dominated National Electoral Council to replace Venezuela's electronic voting machines for the recall vote.

When the council announced the deal, it disingenuously described Smartmatic as a Florida company, though Smartmatic's main operations were in Caracas and the firm had incorporated only a small office in Boca Raton. It then emerged that Smartmatic's ''partner'' in the deal, Bizta Corp., also directed by Anzola and Mugica, was partly owned by the Venezuelan government through a series of intermediary shell corporations. Venezuela initially denied its investment but eventually sold its stake.

When the vote finally came, exit polls by New York's Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates showed Chávez had been defeated 59 to 41 percent; however, when official tallies were announced, the numbers flipped to 58-42 in favor of Chávez. Venezuela's electoral council briefly posted machine-by-machine tallies on the Internet but removed them as mathematicians from MIT, Harvard and other universities began questioning suspicious patterns in the results.

Flush with cash from its Venezuelan adventures, Smartmatic International incorporated in Delaware last year and purchased Sequoia, announcing the deal as a merger between two U.S. companies.

Smartmatic says the recall vote was clean and that it is independent of the Chávez government. Responding to my inquiries, Smartmatic-Sequoias sent a written statement: ``Sequoia's products consist only of voting devices and systems, all of which must be federally and state tested and certified prior to use in an election. As Sequoia's products do not have military, defense or national security applications, they do not fall within the parameters of the matters governed by CFIUS.''

In fact, Smartmatic International is owned by a Netherlands corporation, which is in turn owned by a Curacao corporation, which is in turn held by a number of Curacao trusts controlled by proxy holders who represent unnamed investors, almost certainly among them Venezuelans Mugica and Anzola and possibly others.

Why Smartmatic has chosen yet again to abuse the corporate form apparently to conceal the nationality and identity of its true owners is a question that should worry anyone who votes using one of its machines. Congress panicked upon hearing that our ports would be run by an American ally, Dubai, but never asked whether America's actual enemies in Venezuela have been able to acquire influence in our electoral process.

Richard Brand is a second-year law student at New York University and a former staff writer for The Miami Herald. Email: rmb381@nyu.edu

This article first ran in The Miami Herald. It is reprinted with the author's permission.



TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: cfius; chavez; electionfraud; hugochavez; hugoping; sequoia; smartmatic; venezuela; votingmachines
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1 posted on 03/28/2006 9:32:58 AM PST by RWR8189
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To: RWR8189

Because he can't get anyone else to date him?


2 posted on 03/28/2006 9:33:45 AM PST by RexBeach ("There is no substitute for victory." -Douglas MacArthur)
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To: RWR8189; Mo1; Howlin; Peach; BeforeISleep; kimmie7; 4integrity; BigSkyFreeper; RandallFlagg; ...

WTF!?!?


3 posted on 03/28/2006 9:34:57 AM PST by OXENinFLA
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To: RWR8189
The greater threat to our nation's security comes not from Dubai and its pro-Western government, but from Venezuela, where software engineers with links to the leftist, anti-American regime of Hugo Chávez are programming electronic voting machines that will soon power U.S. elections.

This is not going to end well and if the next election turn out well and if all Red states go blue next election, we now know how they cheated.

4 posted on 03/28/2006 9:35:24 AM PST by Paul C. Jesup
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To: RWR8189
After the left has so incessantly screeched about the VRWC, Halliburton and everything eeevil being tied to voting machines, it will, of course, turn out to be the left who tampers with them.

It's the same old "accusation as confession" strangeness from the Dems. What ever they are yelling the loudest, most passionately about, you can bet your bottom dollar it's what they're doing.

5 posted on 03/28/2006 9:36:23 AM PST by TChris ("Wake up, America. This is serious." - Ben Stein)
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To: RWR8189
The greater threat to our nation's security comes not from Dubai and its pro-Western government, but from Venezuela, where software engineers with links to the leftist, anti-American regime of Hugo Chávez are programming electronic voting machines that will soon power U.S. elections.

This is not going to end well and if the next election may NOT turn out well. Also, if all Red states go blue next election, we now know how they cheated.

6 posted on 03/28/2006 9:36:50 AM PST by Paul C. Jesup
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To: proud_yank

Ping.


7 posted on 03/28/2006 9:38:34 AM PST by tuliptree76 (What part of "no" don't you understand?)
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To: TChris
You are correct. Evil always accuses everyone else of doing the very thing that they are doing.
8 posted on 03/28/2006 9:39:03 AM PST by EggsAckley
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To: RWR8189

I always liked paper ballots, myself.


9 posted on 03/28/2006 9:39:56 AM PST by SittinYonder (That's how I saw it, and see it still.)
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To: OXENinFLA; pinz-n-needlez; onyx; ohioWfan; Texasforever; BigSkyFreeper; Tamzee; mrs tiggywinkle; ...
but from Venezuela, where software engineers with links to the leftist, anti-American regime of Hugo Chávez are programming electronic voting machines that will soon power U.S. elections.

What idiot ok'd this????

10 posted on 03/28/2006 9:40:00 AM PST by Mo1 ("Stupidity is also a gift from God, but it should not be abused." Pope John Paul II)
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To: Mo1

Bump this thread.


11 posted on 03/28/2006 9:40:44 AM PST by Montfort (Check out the 200+ page free preview of The Figurehead by Thomas Larus at lulu.com/larus)
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To: Mo1

Good Lord!


12 posted on 03/28/2006 9:42:05 AM PST by tiredoflaundry (I'll admit it , I'm a Snow Flake !(Snoq) The rest of my tagline redacted by court order.)
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To: OXENinFLA
Homeland Security asleep at the switch again!

I'm amazed how big Homeland Security is, yet they're still the last to know, or to act on these issues! Makes one wonder what their daily work load consists of?

13 posted on 03/28/2006 9:42:50 AM PST by Smartass (Si vis pacem, para bellum - Por el dedo de Dios se escribió)
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To: SittinYonder

I liked paper ballots until I was introduced to the term "preagnant chad" in 2000. I will never forget the picture of the 'BEMF' looking at a ballot trying to decide "voter intent".


14 posted on 03/28/2006 9:43:48 AM PST by BlueStateDepression
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To: RWR8189
Why is Hugo Chávez Involved With U.S. Voting Machines?

Because the global effort to destroy American sovereignty and devastate our domestic economy is gathering steam.

Clearly if the "free traders" in our government say Chinese communists are allowed to operate our ports, then they can say that Venezuelan communists can run our elections.
15 posted on 03/28/2006 9:44:16 AM PST by hedgetrimmer ("I'm a millionaire thanks to the WTO and "free trade" system--Hu Jintao top 10 worst dictators)
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To: RWR8189
"Sequoia's products consist only of voting devices and systems, all of which must be federally and state tested and certified prior to use in an election. As Sequoia's products do not have military, defense or national security applications, they do not fall within the parameters of the matters governed by CFIUS."

An accurate vote is not a National Security issue?

"He who votes, doesn't count, only he who counts the votes counts" - Stalin

16 posted on 03/28/2006 9:44:49 AM PST by null and void (Perhaps hating America is for those for whom hating Jews just isn't enough. - Philippe Roger)
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To: Mo1

Must be the voting machine manufacturer.


17 posted on 03/28/2006 9:48:30 AM PST by My2Cents ("The essence of American journalism is vulgarity divested of truth." -- Winston Churchill)
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To: SittinYonder; Tijeras_Slim; elkfersupper

NM's return to paper ballots looking better all the time, provided the Pubbies chain themselves to the ballot boxes to prevent tampering before the votes are counted.


18 posted on 03/28/2006 9:51:22 AM PST by CedarDave
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To: Smartass

"I'm amazed how big Homeland Security is, yet they're still the last to know, or to act on these issues! Makes one wonder what their daily work load consists of?"

It's humongous.

Note: Maryland is switching to paper ballots in 2006.


19 posted on 03/28/2006 9:52:00 AM PST by GAB-1955 (being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the Kingdom of Heaven....)
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To: BlueStateDepression
until I was introduced to the term "preagnant chad"

I suspect - whether it actually happens or just Democrats claim that it happened - the next term you won't like will be "vote hacking." It's just amazing to me we got along with paper ballots for 230 years without the country falling apart.

20 posted on 03/28/2006 9:52:44 AM PST by SittinYonder (That's how I saw it, and see it still.)
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