Now that question assumes the system is in fact broken…is it? Now the answer is "well…that depends." We know that the media–main stream, alternate, Facebook, twitter, and bloggers–has convinced us the election system has issues and some of that may be justified. We know "ballot zombies" or dead people voting is a thing. We know "ballot harvesting" is a thing. We know some jurisdictions will have large numbers of ballots just turn up in the wee hours of the morning. We know some jurisdictions take days on days to get their counts done. We know electronic ballot machines are in the news for issues. In short elections have a Public Relations problem.
Can we fix this? Yes. Will we fix it? Probably not, but I have a plan.
Let's consider that we need to abandon all forms of electronic voting machines. I've played around with and done professional level IT off and on most of my life, and if it can be written it can be hacked. Beyond that at this point electronic machines have a very bad reputation–be it deserved or not. No, there is no proprietary or open-source code or machine that will stop a malicious attempt to corrupt something. No, there is no think tank or "big brain" that will come up with the solution to hacking electronics. We also have to deal with if a machine is compromised can we really trust the receipt that it issues?
So we swing back to the old fashioned paper ballot. There is no real way to hack paper, and get this it leaves a paper trail, it is readily auditable, it is repeatable, if you count it 10 times it should by rights always have the same total.
But what about the vans and trucks full of ballots that turn up out of nowhere? That is a fixable issue too. We are in the 21st century, we have dependable and reliable ballot tabulators that are air gapped so no internet connection, they are calibrated before an election, certified, and sealed, they can't randomly change a vote total because they just count, seriously that's all they do is count. We as a nation are also running shorter and shorter, of poll workers across the country, and add in the aging demographics of our nation and we have a storm brewing. So the obvious choice is to shift to vote by mail for all elections in all jurisdictions, but we need some updates and we may as well make a few changes at the same time.
Updates:
We need to issue a unique RFID chip to each addressed mail receptacle in the country. Why? This benefits both elections and general mail as it gives a unique identifier to every address. It allows a chip reader to scan the chip and another chip in say tracked packages, letters, or mail in ballots to be scanned and ensure they went where intended. Yes you can "copy" an RFID chip but it isn't something you can do without getting unwanted attention.
So how would this work?
We literally put a chip on a sticker and attach it to the mail receptacle. On the posted item end like say a mail in ballot we attach a corresponding chip to the ballot return envelope. Now this is as simple as tap and pay at the gas station, or bodega, or fast food, the mail delivery person taps the mail box sticker, a scanner now knows where the postal worker is, they now tap the ballot envelope in say the top left corner, the scanner knows where that chip is supposed to be if the address matches "ding" green light drop and go, does not match "boop" red light try again. At the moment there is a match we have a time stamp for the ballot's arrival at its destination. The elections board gets that info and we have established chain of custody from printer to voter.
Once the voter has completed the ballot they put it back in their mailbox, and the postal worker picks it up basically in reverse, scan ballot, scan box, move along. It is possible to add a near field that would catch the ballot or other mail when it enters the mail bag as a fail-safe as well giving us double the chance it is in the system. We now have again established chain of custody for the ballot from the voter to the mail carrier and bonus, by scanning we also know if the ballot was picked up from the correct mail box and when allowing the elections board to scrutinize the ballot for fraud if need be.
Now we have a unique identifier zipping through the postal system that guarantees chain of custody, but does that matter? Yes! Why? Because now there is no way "extra" ballots can be introduced because they have no chain of custody by the postal system.
The beauty of vote by mail is that we know exactly how many ballots were printed. We know exactly how many were mailed. We know exactly the maximum number of ballots that can be returned and in my system we also know who returned them and when.
Now we just eliminated the day of registration as well which let's face it this seems really problematic to start with. We also have to eliminate ballot drop boxes as they create a gap in our custody chain. We need to cross check our "dead people" database though to ensure the dead don't vote. We eliminate empty lots voting too because they have no mail receptacle.
Now is also the perfect time to institute ranked choice voting since you'll be casting your ballot from home you have time to research who this person is running be it for a Judge, or "now who is this running for the Libertarian or Constitution Party?" How will amendment Z affect me? All those pesky questions we can't deal with at the ballot booth. Ranked choice also allows us to exit the "lesser of two evils" mentality and maybe bring some sanity back to politics…maybe.
We should also eliminate early returns as it just heats animosity and makes for click bait, no election results released before 00:01 the day after election day.
No ballot counted that did not arrive on or before election day–we have the chain of custody so we know if they did or not.
The big central office tabulators can whip through a postal truck of ballots very quickly so we can have a certified election result within a few days with no issues.
Beyond the obvious here we also take a lot of money out of election infrastructure as we no longer need remote tabulators, election booths, electronic voting machines, or renting of space to use for the election, plus all the logistical headaches involved in running a polling place or vote center. We eliminate exit polling, and what I call "poll vultures" aka electioneers searching for a last second vote. Lastly we cut out the think tanks, and people that are just grifting on elections as well.
Did I leave holes and gaps? Probably, but this is a thought exercise after all.
Maura out.
