The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine has released a report with concrete ideas for how we can fight back against election fraud and expected foreign interference in the absence of a well-coordinated national plan going into the 2018 midterms.
Several similar reports have been issued lately, but this one is different. It not only carries a blue-ribbon pedigree from the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, but it also suggests ways to address allegations of domestic voter fraud, which Republicans have leveled for years.
The report notes the significant challenges of securing elections. In 2016, Americans voted in 178,217 precincts and 116,990 polling places. Under the Constitution, each state controls its own election procedures, and officials jealously guard their authority against federal interference. The rules vary so wildly that uniform standards are almost impossible.
However, the report offers six key recommendations.
1. Use paper ballots to establish a backup record of each vote.
Even if voter databases and other equipment aren’t connected to the internet, experts said, it will be hard to protect computer systems from cyber threats. As a result, they recommend that by 2020, every voting machine nationwide should generate a backup paper record of each vote.
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2. Outlaw any kind of internet voting — for now.
Many states now allow some votes to be cast online, usually by armed forces members and other Americans living abroad. Twenty states and the District of Columbia let some voters submit ballots by email, rather than by mail. But the report recommends an outright ban on voting over the internet, or via any machines that are connected to the internet.
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3. Verify election results.
With public confidence in elections declining, the panel said states should require public, transparent audits of all elections to guarantee their integrity, including audits of processes — like voter registration, preparing ballots and reporting of results — that normally get little scrutiny. The audit data, scrubbed of any private voter information, should be made public so outsiders can verify the results themselves.
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4. Crosscheck voter registrations nationwide to weed out duplicates.
The report urges all states to adopt some method of comparing their registration databases with those of other states to eliminate duplicates from voters who have moved. That would eliminate instances in which voters cast ballots in two locations undetected.
The NYT goes on to point out that duplicate voting is extremely rare.
5. Make voting by mail more secure.
Voting by mail is now the standard in Colorado, Oregon and Washington and is rapidly gaining popularity elsewhere. But mailed-in and absentee ballots are at greater risk of theft, forgery and other kinds of fraud ...
Although this kind of voting fraud is also quite rare, the report urges all states to adopt systems that let voters easily verify whether ballots have been mailed to them and whether marked ballots have been received and accepted by election offices.
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6. Spend more to make elections trustworthy.
Again and again, the report hammers home the message that federal and state authorities pinch pennies when it comes to protecting the constitutional right to vote. The experts call for “appropriate” funding of the United States Election Assistance Commission, a little-known advisory body that plays a crucial role in improving election administration.
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6 Ways to Fight Election Hacking and Voter Fraud, According to an Expert Panel (NYT)