Comments on: State voting machines secure at private facility

By: Al Girón

Al Girón — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 21:25:44 +0000

Given the entirely predictable consequences for anyone who works for the state who's foolish enough to become a 'whistle blower', it's hard to begin to imagine how the former director of elections could end up profiting from his resignation, much less that anyone with any experience of how Democratic party politics work would make a choice to in effect rock the boat because of some opportunistic expectation of being rewarded – particularly when even the lowliest state employee knows all too well how easy it is to suddenly find oneself turned into a radioactive leper by the powers that be.
Accordingly I'd suggest questioning Mr. Salazar's motivations might include asking why anyone in his position (and with a $95K a year salary) would commit such a seemingly irrational and self-destructive action – unless of course one accepts his explanation that he acted to protect his license to practice law.

By: Al Girón

Al Girón — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:25:44 +0000

Given the entirely predictable consequences for those in our state government who're foolish enough to become a 'whistle blower', it's hard to begin to imagine how the former director of elections could end up profiting from his resignation, much less that anyone with any experience of how Democratic party politics work would make a choice to in effect rock the boat because of some opportunistic expectation of being rewarded – particularly when even the lowliest state employee knows all too well how easy it is to suddenly find oneself turned into a radioactive leper by the powers that be.
Accordingly I'd suggest questioning Mr. Salazar's motivations might include asking why anyone in his position (and with a $95K a year salary) would commit such a seemingly irrational and self-destructive action – unless of course one accepts his explanation that he acted to protect his license to practice law.

By: GimmieAMilk

GimmieAMilk — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:21:51 +0000

While Mary Herrera has some serious internal problems at the SOS office, I wouldn't put my entire trust in AJ Salazar either! He has the reputation of being an opportunist during his work history. Make your point, back-it up and move on! It sounds like AJ is seeking fame and glory for future aspirations!

By: Mel Haney

Mel Haney — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 14:29:23 +0000

Obviously AES is in the cat bird seat since it has the contract to print all of the ballots for our state and local elections; a no-bid maintenance contract to clean, adjust and test all of New Mexico's voting equipment and is the only company that's certified to service all of the state's voting machines thanks to a sole-source (no-bid) procurement deal facilitated by the secretary of state’s office.
Nothing to look at here citizen, just go about your business and stop pestering Mary Herrera so she can get back to business as usual.

By: Philip Cochran

Philip Cochran — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:47:17 +0000

It certainly sounds like 'she' did – however it's becoming increasingly evident that there's no adult supervision within that agency and the legislators and people within the Attorney General's office who should be concerned about what's going on in the Secretary of State's office are turning a blind eye to it, so it hardly matters if the procurement code or for that matter any other laws of the state of New Mexico are being violated.

By: Lise Hamel

Lise Hamel — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 01:35:13 +0000

Believe nothing that you hear and only half of what you see.

Trust nothing you cannot afford to lose.

Thank you. Great post.

By: BlackBoxVoting

BlackBoxVoting — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 21:24:08 +0000

You cannot really "secure" machines against their own custodian. Note the following:
"chain-of-custody paperwork and regular inventories are kept for those machines" -- by AES. If AES destroys or omits or forges anything, the chain of custody paperwork means nothing.
"-- it is unclear how their integrity could be compromised" -- Then let's make it clear: The EVEREST study commissioned by the Ohio Secretary of state describes exactly how the M100 machines can be compromised. Here is the report: http://www.bbvdocs.org/ESS/EVEREST-ESS.pdf
"--Access to the machines is strictly controlled and logged" -- by AES, unless someone at AES doesn't do it. Let's be clear: The public is required to place total trust in AES.
“-- We have video and audio surveillance,” Rainey said. -- Unless AES turns the thing off, or does something the video surveillance isn't pointed at, and who can see the video surveillance anyway, since it is a private firm and difficult to extract public records from? In our experience, voting machine video surveillance tapes, even when maintained by the government, are usually only for a short period of time and are difficult for the public to obtain.

--“Our (computer) system monitors all visits to the building." -- Except that their computer system is entirely controlled by AES.

"-- We give regular inventory reports to the Secretary of State." -- prepared by AES.

And then he flat-out lies: "The (M100) has no software in the machines at all .”

Read the EVEREST Report. All the optical scan systems contain software, but they sometimes call it "firmware" because it resides on a chip rather than a hard drive.

Now the jist of this is that the owner of AES is telling the public to trust him -- in other words, to transfer control of a system that conceals the counting of the vote from the public to him and AES employees. That's untenable in a real democratic system, but sillier still is his assertion that AES deserves "trust" while he is misleading the public about things like whether the optical scan computers contain software. He knows they do.

By: daviddiggins

daviddiggins — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 19:08:31 +0000

They are providing this service "as a courtesy???" It sure raises some issues in my mind since the New Mexico Procurement Code does not have such a "courtesy" provision for storage of machines.

It looks really suspicious to me especially in light of the fact that this AES company has a sole source, no bid contract worth over $13 million dollars!

How hard is it to write a simple contract for storage? Why is the secretary selectively lending out voting machines to municipalities and not following normal procedure where it is the counties that do so for municipal elections?

Why did the secretary initially deny that these machines were even in the custody of AES?

There are many questions yet to be answered. It is nice to know that AES has a secure, climate controlled facility--but what about the integrity of the machines when they are being loaned out. How do I know that when I go to vote in June or November that none of these machines have been tampered with??? How do I know that my vote will count??? I

It sure gives me a warm fuzzy to know that the machines will be warm in the winter and cool in the summer, but does that solve the question about the "courtesy" storage which is in violation of New Mexico Law? NO!

Did "Madame" just admit to this procurement code violation through her spokesman???