Voters Trust Paper Over Electronic Technology

Voting is the backbone of a democracy. And if citizens are to believe in their democracy, they must believe the counting of votes is done properly and correctly. Sadly, most Americans don't believe the machines currently being used in most of the country can be counted on to deliver an accurate count.

I understand that people have become used to getting results quickly after the polls close, and they like that. The old way of hand counting each paper ballot sometimes delayed tabulating the results for many hours. That method could be trusted (and is trusted by 57% of voters), but in this fast-paced world it is unlikely to be accepted (and requires a massive amount of manpower).

But the computer voting machines used in many counties are not trusted. People think they can be hacked (and this has been shown to be true by hackers). Additionally, they have no paper trail, so they cannot be a recount if it's suspected a machine produced a faulty result. A faulty machine will just reproduce its initial results no matter how many times it is asked to recount.

So, what is to be done to restore voter faith in the counting of ballots? There are two solutions.

The first is to make the computer voting machine produce a paper ballot (which the voter can check for accuracy and then drop in a ballot box). If there is any questions about the machine's result, those paper ballots can be recounted. About 71% of voters say they would trust such a system.

I think an even better solution is to vote on paper ballots, and then insert those ballots into a scanning counting machine. The machine cannot be hacked, the results will be known within a few minutes after the polls close, and you have the paper ballots if a recount is needed. As a precinct judge, I have used this system in the past and it works very well. About 69% of voters say they would trust such a system.

Electronic machines with no paper trail are unacceptable. Voters don't trust them. All counties need to stop using them. Trust in the counting of votes is just too critical in our democracy.

The chart above is from the Morning Consult Poll -- done between February 7th and 9th of a national sample of 1,996 registered voters, with a 2 point margin of error.