Essex County to purchase more secure voting machines – NorthJersey.com

Essex County is looking to make upcoming elections as secure as possible with the purchase of new voting machines.

On Tuesday, freeholders voted to buy machines with paper ballots and optical scanners in an effort to circumvent questions of vote tampering and hacking. The 2016 presidential election has long been clouded with accusations of voter fraud and foreign interference, and election security remains a concern. 

“Protective measures guarding the integrity of the voting process needed to be implemented,” the board said in a press release.

Brendan Gill, president of the Essex County Board of Freeholders, said New Jersey is “lagging behind” when it comes to new technology with voting machines and is considered to be one of the most vulnerable voting systems in the United States.

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New Jersey is only one of 12 states that continue to use direct recording electronic touchscreens to record votes. Since they are not connected to the internet, they are not as vulnerable to cyber attacks. However, Gill said votes can be changed through hacking and software manipulation. Most counties put federally approved tamper-evident seals on the machines. 

Replacing the machines across the entire state could cost $40 and $63.5 million, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.

The new machines would have paper ballots with optical scanners, and the freeholders said they are supposed to be the “least vulnerable to a cyber attack” since they provide a paper record. The county’s $3.8 million contract to replace the machines was awarded to Dominion Voting Systems, Inc. and was recommended by the Office of the Commissioner of Registration and Superintendent of Elections.

The state used a portion of $10 million in federal grant money to develop a pilot program to try the new paper-based machines. In March, the program rolled out in a number of counties and voters in Montclair and Morris and Hunterdon counties gave them a trial run during the November 2019 election. 

The remaining money from the grant was slated for improvements, training and inspections of voting machines and increased security in some voting locations.

Gill said the decision to purchase the new machines was based on voter advocacy groups reaching out to the board with concerns about vote security. It was not because of a particular election.

“There have been many occasions in which an entire segment of a given electorate has been disappointed with the outcome at the polls,” Gill said. “However, we can all agree that the integrity of our voting process must be protected.”

David Harris, the co-chairman of local advocacy group SOMA Action Voters Rights, said the freeholders’ vote was “a victory for democracy.”

“Citizens advocated and educated; public officials listened and acted,” Harris said. “This is the way democracy should work.”

Kaitlyn Kanzler covers Essex County for NorthJersey.com. For unlimited access to the most important news from your local community, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kanzler@northjersey.com Twitter: @KaitlynKanzler8

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