Publications
Voting Technology
Is America Ready to Vote?
This report asks, in the face of election system problems, what procedures has each state put in place to ensure the integrity of every citizen’s vote? Put another way, in the event of voting machine problems on Election Day, how prepared is each state to ensure that every voter can vote, and that all of those votes will be counted?
– 10/16/08
Better Ballots
Eight years after the 2000 election, and billions of dollars spent on new voting technology, the problems caused by poor ballot design have not been fully and effectively addressed on a national level. Year in and year out, we see the same mistakes in ballot design, with the same results: disenfranchisement.
Authored by: Lawrence Norden, David Kimball, Whitney Quesenbery, and Margaret Chen
– 07/20/08
Post-Election Audits: Restoring Trust in Elections
With the intention of assisting legislators, election officials and the public to make sense of recent literature on post-election audits and convert it into realistic audit practices, the Brennan Center and the Samuelson Law, Technology and Public Policy Clinic at Boalt Hall School of Law (University of California Berkeley) convened a blue ribbon panel. Included are several practical recommendations for improving post-election audits, regardless of the audit method that a jurisdiction ultimately decides to adopt.
Authored by: Lawrence Norden, Aaron Burstein, Joseph Lorenzo Hall and Margaret Chen
– 08/01/07
Post-Election Audits: Restoring Trust in Elections (Executive Summary)
Executive summary of practical recommendations put forth by the Brennan Center and Samuelson Clinic for improving post-election audits, regardless of the audit method that a jurisdiction ultimately decides to adopt.
Authored by: Lawrence Norden, Aaron Burstein, Joseph Lorenzo Hall and Margaret Chen
– 08/01/07
An Agenda for Election Reform
This memorandum sets out a comprehensive election reform agenda for the 110th Congress and explains the reasons for each policy reform.
Authored by: Wendy R. Weiser and Jonah Goldman
– 03/07/07
The Machinery of Democracy: Protecting Elections in an Electronic World
“This book not only systematically identifies 120 potential threats to voting technology, but it offers specific remedies and countermeasures that election officials can employ to make these attacks more difficult to perform.”
Authored by: Lawrence D. Norden and Eric Lazarus
– 02/01/07
The Machinery of Democracy
First ever comprehensive, empirical analysis of electronic voting systems. This full, four-chapter report includes sections on Voting System Security, Accessibility, Usability, and Cost.
Authored by: Lawrence Norden (project director)
– 10/10/06
The Machinery of Democracy: Voting System Accessibility
This report is designed to help state and local jurisdictions improve the accessibility of their voting systems. We set forth a set of critical questions for election officials and voters to use when assessing available voting systems, indicate whether vendors have provided any standard or custom features designed to answer these accessibility concerns, and offer an evaluation of each architectures limitations in providing an accessible voting experience to all voters.
– 10/10/06
The Machinery of Democracy: Voting System Usability
The performance of various voting systems and their ability to allow voters to cast valid ballots that reflect their intended choices without undue delay or burdens discussed here. The report also makes a number of recommendations to increase the accuracy and ease of use of electronic voting machines, no matter what system a jurisdiction has chosen.
– 08/28/06
The Machinery of Democracy: Protecting Elections in an Electronic World
2006 Brennan Center report on voting system security
Authored by: Lawrence Norden et al.
– 06/27/06