National News

NY Times Editorial

The nation’s largest voting machine manufacturer, Election Systems & Software, announced last month that it was buying the United States voting machine division of Diebold, its main competitor. The sale could mean that nearly 70 percent of the nation’s voting precincts would be served by a single corporation. That raises serious antitrust questions and serious concerns about the vulnerability of future elections.

New York Times Editorial

Diebold announced last week that it has sold its United States voting machine division to its main rival, Election Systems & Software.

Given Diebold’s troubling record, it is hard to lament its departure from American elections, but this sale could make a bad situation worse. Regulators should take a hard look at the anticompetitive implications. And Congress, the states and cities need to push a lot harder for fundamental reforms in the voting machine business and the way Americans vote.

This editorial was published in the New York Times on June 22, 2009.

Electronic voting machines that do not produce a paper record of every vote cast cannot be trusted. In 2008, more than one-third of the states, including New Jersey and Texas, still did not require all votes to be recorded on paper. Representative Rush Holt has introduced a good bill that would ban paperless electronic voting in all federal elections. Congress should pass it while there is still time to get ready for 2010.