W.Va. ES&S Touchscreens Switching Votes to McCain

West Virginia has the ES&S iVotronic touchscreens with toilet paper ballots. This is a problem in the calibration of the touch screen.   How did the machines get that way? This is an easy to abuse feature.  How many people had their votes switched and didn't notice before it was finally corrected? Does this feature always favor Republicans? Often but in early voting in Craven County NC in October 2004, some votes saw their votes switched from Bush to Kerry.

Isn't it nice that with optical scan ballots, the little circles don't jump back and forth?

Some early W.Va. voters angry over switched votes   October 18, 2008  By Paul J. Nyden Staff writer

Virginia Matheney and Calvin Thomas said touch-screen machines in the county clerk's office in Ripley kept switching their votes from Democratic to Republican candidates.

"When I touched the screen for Barack Obama, the check mark moved from his box to the box indicating a vote for John McCain," said Matheney, who lives in Kenna.

When she reported the problem, she said, the poll worker in charge "responded that everything was all right. It was just that the screen was sensitive and I was touching the screen too hard. She instructed me to use only my fingernail." Even after she began using her fingernail, Matheney said, the problem persisted. . .

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