Tag: election integrity

Legal Firestorm in Louisiana: New Lawsuit Questions If State’s Election Software Breaks the Law

A major lawsuit in Louisiana is challenging the legality of the state’s election software, alleging that Secretary of State Nancy Landry is using systems that haven’t been properly certified under state law. Here is what this means for the future of voting in the Pelican State.

HEADLINE: Legal Firestorm in Louisiana: New Lawsuit Questions If State’s Election Software Breaks the Law

SUMMARY

• Legal Challenge: A new lawsuit filed in Louisiana alleges the state’s current election software is operating outside the bounds of state law.

• The Defendant: Secretary of State Nancy Landry faces scrutiny over the certification process of the voting systems.

• The Core Issue: Plaintiffs argue the software used by Election Systems & Software (ES&S) has not been properly vetted according to specific state statutes.

• Transparency Concerns: The suit demands a halt to the use of uncertified tech, citing a need for total transparency ahead of major election cycles.

Questions of election integrity are back in the spotlight, this time centering on a courtroom in Louisiana. A high-stakes lawsuit is challenging the very foundation of how the Pelican State counts its ballots, alleging that the software currently in use hasn’t cleared the legal hurdles required by state law. As voters look toward the next trip to the polls, the legal battle raises a fundamental question: Is the technology we trust to secure our democracy actually legal?

The lawsuit, which names Secretary of State Nancy Landry, centers on the technicalities of election machine certification. At the heart of the complaint is the software provided by Election Systems & Software (ES&S). Under Louisiana law, voting system software must undergo a rigorous approval process, including a “source code” review, to ensure it meets state standards for security and functionality.

The plaintiffs argue that the state has been cutting corners. They claim the current iterations of the software being used in parishes across Louisiana were never properly certified following updates, meaning the machines are essentially operating “out of bounds.” This isn’t just a clerical dispute; legal experts say that if the software isn’t compliant with state statutes, the validity of the election results themselves could be called into question by skeptics.

Secretary Landry’s office has previously defended the state’s election infrastructure, maintaining that Louisiana’s “paper trail” and existing protocols are among the most secure in the nation. However, this lawsuit seeks to force the state’s hand, demanding a full audit of the software’s legal status and an immediate move toward systems that are fully transparent and compliant with the letter of the law

As this case moves through the courts, it underscores a growing national trend of litigation aimed at the “black box” of election technology. For Louisiana, the stakes couldn’t be higher. With a presidential election on the horizon, the state must now prove that its digital gatekeepers are not only secure but are operating strictly within the lines of the law. We will be watching the Bayou State closely as this legal challenge unfolds.

The Anatomy of a Manufactured Scandal: Why the Michigan ‘Vote Dump’ Graph is Fiction, Not Fraud

TL;DR Summary:

• A viral graph claims a sudden 6:31 AM spike of 149,772 votes in Michigan proves 2020 election fraud.

• This was not a fraudulent “vote dump,” but a scheduled, legal upload of mail-in ballots from heavily Democratic Wayne County (Detroit).

• Michigan law prohibited the early counting of mail-in ballots, forcing this massive batch to be reported all at once early Wednesday morning.

• The meme’s math is also fundamentally flawed, and multiple Republican-led investigations have entirely debunked the claim of fraud.

Screenshot

I look at this graph, and I completely understand why it makes people angry. When you are staring at a timeline of an election and suddenly see a vertical blue line shooting into the stratosphere at 6:31 in the morning, your first instinct is that somebody, somewhere, is stealing something. The people who created and shared this image are counting on that exact visceral reaction. They are banking on the fact that you will trust your gut instead of demanding the context. But my job isn’t to coddle a manufactured outrage; my job is to give you the facts so you can form an opinion based on reality.

The reality is that this graph isn’t a smoking gun. It is a picture of democracy functioning exactly the way the state legislature designed it to function. We are going to break down exactly what happened in Michigan on the morning of November 4, 2020, because nothing is more important to a functioning republic than a well-informed electorate.

The Facts Behind the 6:31 AM Update:

• The Law Dictated the Timeline: The most critical piece of context missing from this graphic is Michigan state law. In 2020, the Republican-led state legislature prohibited election workers from processing or counting mail-in ballots prior to Election Day. That meant workers at Detroit’s TCF Center were legally forced to wait until the polls opened to begin opening envelopes, verifying signatures, and feeding hundreds of thousands of mail-in ballots into tabulators. They worked through the night and into the early morning. When a massive batch was finally finished, the system uploaded it to the state’s feed all at once. That is what a bulk data upload looks like on a line graph. It’s not a “dump” of illegal votes; it’s the culmination of hours of legally mandated counting.

• The Geography Explains the Margin: The meme gasps at the idea that Joe Biden would receive the vast majority of these votes. But let’s look at where these votes came from: Wayne County, which includes the city of Detroit. Detroit is an overwhelmingly Democratic stronghold. In the final tally, Joe Biden won roughly 94% of the vote in Detroit. Expecting a 50/50 split in a batch of ballots from this specific area is like expecting a 50/50 split of Red Sox and Yankees fans in a South Boston sports bar. The data perfectly matches the demographics of the county.

• The Pandemic Shifted Voting Behavior: We also have to remember how we voted in 2020. We were in the middle of a once-in-a-century pandemic. Democratic voters overwhelmingly chose to vote safely via mail, while Republican voters, urged by their party’s leadership, overwhelmingly chose to vote in person on Election Day. Because the in-person votes were counted quickly on election night, and the mail-in votes were counted last (due to the law mentioned above), it was a mathematical certainty that the late-arriving batches would heavily favor the Democratic candidate. Election analysts warned us for months that this exact scenario—a “red mirage” followed by a “blue shift”—was going to happen.

• The Math Fails Basic Scrutiny: If we are going to allege the greatest crime in American political history, we should probably check our division. The graphic boldly claims that Biden receiving 134,886 votes out of a 149,772 vote batch is “96% of the batch.” I’ll save you the trip to the calculator: 134,886 divided by 149,772 is 90%. A 90% margin aligns exactly with the expected partisan split for mail-in ballots in Wayne County. The creators of this meme couldn’t be bothered to do simple middle-school math before screaming fraud.

• The Official Investigations Have Spoken: I don’t expect you to just take my word for it. In 2021, the Republican-led Michigan Senate Oversight Committee concluded a massive, months-long investigation into this exact claim. Their final report was unequivocal: there was no evidence of widespread fraud, and the so-called “ballot dumps” in Detroit were simply the reporting of legitimate mail-in ballots. Even former Attorney General William Barr investigated the Detroit counting process and confirmed to the administration that this was simply the normal vote-counting process.

The jig isn’t up, as the social media post claims. The only game being played here is the one where bad actors use out-of-context data to erode your faith in your own country’s elections. We owe it to ourselves to be smarter than that.