Phone: (440) 306 3834
 856 Irving Park Boulevard  Sheffield, OH 44054
$0.00

SHOP

Ohio Election Reform

The events that led up to the security breach of the Capitol building have been percolating for years. The American people do not trust the federal government.  This is not a big shocker for anyone paying attention. For years politicians and bureaucrats have taken the august attitude that we work for them, instead of them working for us. There are a variety of  reasons for this - but mainly, the American people are tired of being dismissed out of hand, being ridiculed, and having their opinions marginalized.

Whether real or imaginary - the specter of election fraud is very disconcerting to those that take their liberty serious. There are no real and tangible assurances from Secretary of States' across the country that show the election process being audited from stem to stern and making that information available. Instead of giving us proof of a fair election - time and again - they tell us to prove fraud. Many times fraud is almost impossible to prove because the data is either not available or has not been collected.

Secretary of States' around the country have for far too long proclaimed that there is no election fraud without providing substantive proof - they expect our trust. No, they demand our trust. After the events at the Capitol building many Republican are making some demands of their own.

In-Person Voting (standard voting)

  1. No voting machine may have the capability of a wireless connection to the internet (this includes scanners). Voting machines may be physically plugged in to the internet to run diagnostics and updates. These diagnostics and updates will be recorded in a report that will be made available to the public. No voting machines may be plugged in to the internet  on the day of the election and until the votes have been certified. No voting machines may be programmed to transmit vote totals over the internet. All machines will record counts on removable media. Once the media is removed it is copied to a computer that transmits the data to the Ohio Secretary of State's office. The media is then sent by courier to the Ohio Secretary of State's office and once they receive the media - they compare the totals to the totals that were transmitted to them. Typically the process would go like this: Polls close and each scanner runs a hardcopy report of the totals. The removable media is removed and sent with the hardcopy by different couriers to the local Board of Elections office and copied onto a computer that will transmit the data to the Secretary of State's (SOS) office. Before the data is transmitted it is double checked to the hardcopy to make certain that couriers did not tamper with the data. Once verified, the data is sent by the internet to the SOS. The removable media is sent to the SOS's office along with a copy of the hardcopies from each voting machine by courier. This deters the alteration of media sent to the Secretary of State.
  2. Serialized anonymous ballot receipts. When you go to vote and after you are verified - you select a two part carbonless ballot at random. You fill out the ballot.  You tear off the top carbonless copy of the ballot which has a serial number on it. The ballot you put into the scanning machine has the same serial number on it. After polls close, you can go online to look up the serialized number to see if your ballot was counted correctly. Additionally, a serial number with the proper software, will prevent any ballot from being counted more than once. This allows another point of audit (to check for duplicates). This deters the programming of machines that may switch votes. This deters running the same ballots through the machines multiple times.
  3. Election officials at all polling locations must keep a list of all voters that sign in to be verified to vote. The verified voter list for every voting location shall be made available to the public. This helps to deter ballot box stuffing.
  4. Once the polls close, the verified voter list at every polling location is compared to the total votes cast. They must equal. If not, a recount occurs and if the recount supports it, election fraud is registered. A polling location with too much voter fraud or too many instances will be observed by law enforcement for subsequent elections. If the difference is too great - then that precinct will scrap its count and reschedule the election again. This helps to deter ballot box stuffing.
  5. All verified voter residence addresses are plotted on a graphical map on the internet. This map will be made public. This allows everyone in Ohio  to become an election auditor. Any Ohioan can check the addresses in their neighborhood to see who voted in the election. It can easily be used to determine if someone is claiming to live somewhere they are not. This helps to deter ballot box stuffing.
  6. When you vote, if you have a cell phone number or email address on file with your board of elections - you will get a message thanking you for voting. If you have none of this information on-hand a postal letter will be sent by mail to your address on file thanking you for voting. This helps to deter election fraud identity theft.
  7. Once polls close, and ballots have been counted, then all polling locations should be open to at least three independent auditors. One of the independent auditors should be from the Auditor of State's office. The other two should be from a non-profit or from a political action committee. They may randomly draw previously counted ballots in stacks of 10. These ballots will be hand-counted by the auditors present and ran back through the paper ballot scanning machine. They must draw up to 10 stacks of 10 ballots each. If the machine count equals the hand count then the count can go forward with certification. For every error they receive - they must draw 10 more stacks of 10, and keep auditing until there are no more discrepancies. Every polling location shall prepare an Audit Count Accuracy and Discrepancy Report and this report will be made public. This helps to ensure that the scanning and counting machines are working properly.
  8. Ohio should scrap signature verification by humans in favor of biometric data comparison by machines and humans. So when you register to vote your biometric data will be collected. This can be facial recognition, fingerprint recognition, iris recognition, or palm vein recognition. So the process would be to provide a photo identification or equivalent when you vote and then have that confirmed with biometric data such as facial recognition. This prevents poll workers from falsely identifying someone who they are not. Alternate to a photo identification can be fingerprinting for those like the Amish who do not have photo identification cards. This also deters murderers, rapists, and lawbreakers from voting.
  9. If you want to vote provisionally and do not have your identification - that is fine. Poll workers will photograph and fingerprint you before you vote. The intent here is to dissuade anyone from voting that is trying to game the system. This deters outright voter fraud.
  10. All voting machines must utilize open-source code for software and firmware - including scanning machines. This allows the code to be rigorously examined. This deters sophisticated cheating by altering the code of machines to produce fraudulent results.

Absentee Voting (mail-in voting)

  1. Mail-in voting shall be discontinued for all but active duty military personnel. This deters the possible chicanery that may happen through the post office and postal carriers.

Blockchain voting (premium at-home voting)

  1. Blockchain technology is the same technology that is instrumental in the storage and transfer of crypto-currencies. It is a very robust and mature technology. It is almost an impossibility that it could be successfully hacked and votes changed. Unlike all of Ohio's current electronic voting machines that do not use blockchain technology.
  2. Ohio's blockchain voting technology will utilize open source technology and open source code. This way the code can be robustly examined. Ohio's current voting machines are written in code that cannot be examined because it is not open-source.
  3. Each County Board of Elections shall maintain a node (block-chain server).
  4. Non-profit Ohio organizations and news organizations may maintain nodes on the network.
  5. Not only is your vote kept secure with encryption - if anyone wanted to try to hack and change your vote they would have to hack at least 88 nodes (servers) within minutes - making hacking almost an impossibility.
  6. When you vote in your county - your vote is recorded on all nodes (servers) on the network.
  7. The secrecy of the ballot is always maintained through encryption. No one can ascertain how you voted except for you.
  8. When your vote is cast by blockchain - your ballot is auto-printed at your local county board of election with a serial number and it is scanned like any other ballot. Your vote is printed and considered cast when the polls close on Election Day. Unscanned vote totals will be immediately available on election day when polls close. If you vote early with blockchain you will be able to see the vote totals for all candidates and issues at the time you vote. Because you can change your vote this information can never be considered final or accurate. This can give candidates and voters some insight to election results. This would allow you to see any massive swings in voting that may be considered impossible at a later date or in the 11th hour so to speak.
  9. You may vote early with blockchain voting and you may then go back and revise your vote up till the day of the election. This gives voters that may have cast a vote early to change it if they no longer like the candidate they originally voted for.
  10. You are verified just as you would be in person - you must use the camera on your phone to take a picture of the front and back of your driver's license. You will take a picture of yourself that will be compared to facial recognition. If you are verified on the Parler social network this is a very similar process to their verification. Optionally, you could use a fingerprint recognition appliance on a laptop to verify yourself. If facial recognition or other method doesn't do its job - poll workers at the board of elections can review the information you have submitted and manually approve you.

Proposed Differences for Premium Voting versus Standard Voting

At the Committee for a Better Ohio - we believe that Ohioans should have a choice between Premium and Standard Voting.

Standard voting means you will always have the ability to vote and it will never cost you a dime.

Premium voting equates to greater security, the ability to vote from home or remotely, and to be able to change your vote before polls close, and the ability to vote early. All of this will cost $5 per year ($50 for 10 years).

What we believe should happen.

 

STANDARD VOTING

PREMIUM VOTING

Early Voting 7 days in advance


X

_

Early Voting 30 days in advance

_


X

Biometric Information Collected

X

X

Redundant Biometric Information Collected

_

X

Ability to Change your vote up until polls close

_

X

Ability to vote remotely from a smart device

_

X

Rewards up to $1,000 for identifying voter fraud

X

_

Rewards up to $10,000 for identifying voter fraud

_

X

Ability to see realtime vote totals for candidates and issues

_

X

Unique identifying phrase option

-

X

 

We believe that absentee ballot voting should be eliminated for all but our military personnel, in favor of Premium voting. Premium voting is free for those older than 65 years of age and older.

Premium voting allows you to vote from anywhere you can connect a smart device to the internet. You can vote with a compatible phone or computer. With standard voting, you are stuck with voting at a polling location.

Premium voting allows you to vote 30 days in advance of election day and allows you to change your ballot before polls close. With standard voting, you cannot change your vote once it is cast. You may only vote in person up to 7 days before Election Day.

With Standard Voting, you must re-register every 4 years. With Premium Voting, you only need to register every 10 years.

Premium voting and Standard voting would require identification by biometric means and premium voting has additional biometric redundancies for you in case standard recognition fails. So while standard voting would be accomplished solely by facial recognition or fingerprint - premium voting records have redundant biometrics in case facial recognition or fingerprint recognition does not work (e.g. optical iris recognition, finger vein recognition, palm vein recognition, etc, etc.)

The premium voting app will show real-time tabulations for candidates and issues for those casting votes using the voting app.

If you are a premium voting subscriber and identify voter fraud that leads to an arrest or conviction the State will pay you $10,000 instead of $1,000 for standard voters.

You can ask to guard your voting app on your device with a unique identifying phrase that is recorded at the time you register. So when you download the app it will implement this additional level of security.

With premium voting you can set reminders to remind you to vote before Election Day.

Both Premium and Standard voters would be able to go online and confirm that their vote was counted correctly.

With premium voting you don't have to worry about being harassed at polling locations.

The main attractiveness of blockchain voting is reduced cost (massive savings), security, speed, accuracy, and transparency.



The Committee for a Better Ohio is a 501(c)4 Non-Profit
Donations made to Committee for a Better Ohio are not Tax Deductible by Law

menu-circle