ebriefs - Restoring Voter Confidence

Statement

ebriefs - Restoring Voter Confidence

Dear Friends,

Electronic touch voting machines won't be used in future presidential and congressional elections if Congress passes a bill I filed today that bans most touch-screen devices and requires all voting machines to produce a paper receipt.

I met this morning with Florida's chief elections overseer, Kurt Browning, here in the nation's capital. As you may know, Florida recently imposed a state ban on touch-screen voting machines, and I modeled my bill, in part, after that statute. The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2007 would require all voting machines to produce a voter-verified paper trail by next year's presidential election and provides up to $1 billion for states to use for new voting equipment.

But most importantly, the bill would phase out the use of touch-screen voting machines in federal elections by 2012, a measure Browning said he supports.

A companion version of my bill in the House was passed by a key committee and awaits a vote by the full chamber.

Citizens must have confidence in the integrity of their elections. The bottom line is we have to ensure every vote is counted--and counted properly.

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