"Paper trails protected the integrity of the votes in closely watched states, thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars in federal aid, but many counties still lack that protection. States mostly rejected the riskiest voting technology — internet balloting — but a few embraced it. And a pandemic-ravaged nation managed to vote safely and reliably, but election offices are still woefully short of money and staff.
Perhaps most of all, this year also exposed the United States’ vulnerability to election threats from within, as President Donald Trump and other leading Republicans promoted discredited conspiracy theories to try to nullify President-elect Joe Biden’s victory." [snip]
"Without a paper record of every vote, it is impossible to reliably recount or audit a jurisdiction’s results, because there is no way to rule out the possibility that malfunctioning or compromised voting machines miscounted the electronic vote records. [snip]
No federal regulations govern the security of voting machines or other systems used to conduct elections, forcing individual states to try to regulate a powerful, highly concentrated industry that has drawn criticism from researchers and lawmakers alike." (our emphasis)
Funding for election security has been blocked by the Rethuglican Senate, another priority to focus on, in addition to giving the Postal Service the resources it needs to perform effectively in handling increasingly popular absentee ballots.
While members of the Dear Leader's cult will never accept an outcome that doesn't elect one of their own, for the sane majority, it's important to have a tighter system, for the purpose of inevitable court challenges and basic trust in the process.
(photo: The Fraudster-in-Chief peeks at "Melanie's" ballot to make sure she's following orders. Reuters)
