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CPUd
04-20-2016, 11:27 AM
Republicans Plan for Electronic Floor Voting at Contested Convention

Zeke J Miller / Hollywood, Fla.

11:23 AM ET Updated: 1:01 PM ET

A shift away from the imprecise voices votes of the past

Facing the prospect of its first contested convention in four decades, the Republican Party is exploring the possibility of using electronic voting in Cleveland this year.

The electronic system, which is still undergoing testing, could end the convention tradition of voice votes or state-by-state roll calls using microphones spread through the convention floor. Provisions for electronic voting have been in the party rules for several conventions, but it has never been deployed in practice.

The organizers of the Republican National Convention and staff members of the Republican National Committee have settled on Texas-based digital firm Pixl to provide the potential voting system in hopes of speeding up and ensuring the accuracy of procedural votes on the convention floor, a spokesperson said. Members of the RNC’s committee on arrangements will receive a briefing and a hands-on demonstration of the system Wednesday, and representatives of campaigns will have the opportunity to test it out as well.

Under current RNC rules, the system—which uses dedicated devices for voting—couldn’t be used for the nominating votes for the presidential and vice presidential nominees. But two members of the committee on arrangements said if the demonstrations prove successful, they would consider amending the bylaws to allow electronic balloting in all instances—which would streamline the process should the presidential nomination go to several ballots.

In previous conventions, contentious rules and credentials issues have been handled by voice vote, and sometimes by time-consuming roll-calls. The new system, in theory, would allow the convention to count votes accurately without the time necessary for a traditional roll call.

Officials emphasized that they are still working through security and technical challenges with the system, and a final decision on whether to use it will come in the coming weeks. “With advancements in technology we are taking steps to see if electronic voting can be successful for procedural votes at the convention,” said GOP convention spokesperson Kirsten Kukowski. “If we can answer several questions from technology to security and be sure we can be successful we will.”

http://time.com/4300582/republican-convention-electronic-voting-delegates/

Ronin Truth
04-20-2016, 11:31 AM
"Those who cast the votes, decide nothing. Those who count the votes, decide everything." -- Joseph Stalin

Michael Landon
04-20-2016, 12:05 PM
I can't think of a better way for the GOP establishment to rig the votes of the delegation than having them vote electronically. This year's election keeps getting better and better from a spectator's perspective.

- ML

CPUd
04-20-2016, 12:11 PM
I'm assuming it will be a system like they have in Congress where everyone can see the tally in real time, or like the one in Iowa where the reporting part was electronic with paper ballots within the delegation. But I doubt they will end up going electronic, the roll call could get a record number of viewers this time. Last time they had it on CSPAN during the day, cause Mitt's campaign was scared of getting embarrassed by all those Ron Paul votes.

truthspeaker
04-20-2016, 01:34 PM
At least Steve Munisteri (the true non-partial ex-GOP Chair) will be hired by the GOP to explain the rules and keep an eye on the rules. No matter what some may say--he IS fair. During the State Convention, he was non-partial to all GOP factions. That says a lot!

Bern
04-21-2016, 06:47 AM
Hope that Pixl system is auditable, otherwise... shenanigans!

And yes, Munisteri was very fair. I thought he did a great job chairing the RPT conventions.

Natural Citizen
04-21-2016, 06:52 AM
Ha. Here we go, boys. The fix is in. :)

I think the votes for the General Election are being electronically counted by private vendors off-shore, too. Not sure if they are foreign vendors or not, though.

fisharmor
04-21-2016, 06:57 AM
Accuracy?
Seriously?

These people want to put someone in charge of running the most powerful country on Earth, with trillions of dollars and nuclear weapons at stake, and they can't figure out how to count a thousand votes without machines?

If they have machines for voting, there are only two possible reasons for it. Either they're grossly incompetent (seriously, a seven-year-old can count to 1000), or they actually are planning on fixing the vote.

Natural Citizen
04-21-2016, 07:10 AM
Relevant reading - 2016-01-07 – Voter data breaches (http://blackboxvoting.org/voter-data-breaches/)

CPUd
04-21-2016, 08:09 AM
Accuracy?
Seriously?

These people want to put someone in charge of running the most powerful country on Earth, with trillions of dollars and nuclear weapons at stake, and they can't figure out how to count a thousand votes without machines?

If they have machines for voting, there are only two possible reasons for it. Either they're grossly incompetent (seriously, a seven-year-old can count to 1000), or they actually are planning on fixing the vote.

It wouldn't be just for "the" vote, they want to use something for floor votes, too. In place of voice votes by teleprompter.

fisharmor
04-21-2016, 09:27 AM
It wouldn't be just for "the" vote, they want to use something for floor votes, too. In place of voice votes by teleprompter.
So the real reason is because they can't be bothered spending a couple extra hours on the process... and so instead, they've decided to have a massive new IT overhead and expose the process to tampering.

CPUd
04-21-2016, 11:21 AM
So the real reason is because they can't be bothered spending a couple extra hours on the process... and so instead, they've decided to have a massive new IT overhead and expose the process to tampering.

That seems to be their way about doing things- spend half a million $$ for some shit that will probably break down and end up taking longer than if they did it the old fashioned way.