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| For Immediate Release | |
| Mar 22, 2001 | Contact: Press Office 202-646-5172 |
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Judicial Watch Preface Florida Recount Investigation Judicial Watch, Inc. was founded in 1994 to investigate and prosecute government corruption and abuse. In performing that mission, Judicial Watch engages in public interest litigation and education efforts. In the years since it was founded, Judicial Watch has found that neither major political party could be trusted to root out public corruption within its own ranks. After last year’s presidential election, Judicial Watch led the way in the investigation of the Florida election controversy. Just three days after the election on November 7, 2000, Judicial Watch sought access under Florida’s “Sunshine Laws” to the presidential ballots. Following Judicial Watch’s lead, media organizations also sought access several weeks later. As the election results were being litigated by representatives of both the Democratic and Republican parties, Judicial Watch saw the need for an independent, non-partisan analysis of the ballots at issue and the process used to count those ballots. Both political parties sought to block Judicial Watch’s access to the ballots; Al Gore and the Democrats in Palm Beach County, and George W. Bush and the Republicans in Broward County. Judicial Watch was pleased to work with media organizations also seeking ballot access to combat and defeat the vested political interests who sought to keep these public documents away from the American people. Leading by example, Judicial Watch quickly set the parameters for how the independent recount would proceed. As others with partisan intent, such as Jesse Jackson, were talking of counting ballots and changing the election results, Judicial Watch hired an expert accounting firm to not only examine the ballots, but to conduct, as much as circumstances would allow, an independent audit of the recount process in individual counties. The media quickly followed suit -- also hiring accounting and other entities to do their “counting.” In fact, Judicial Watch’s count of the Palm Beach ballots was interrupted by the contest trial before Judge Sanders Sauls in Tallahassee. Judge Sauls ordered that the ballots be brought to Tallahassee, so Judicial Watch followed them. Judicial Watch thus was designated, in the public interest, as an official observer by Judge Sanders Sauls in the historic election contest trial in Tallahassee. Judicial Watch was also authorized by Judge Sauls to monitor any recount he might eventually authorize and oversee. Of all the parties involved in the Florida election recount controversy, Judicial Watch was the only entity independent of the candidates and not linked to any political party or media organization. By announcing early on that it would “audit” the canvassing boards, Judicial Watch believes that many of the canvassing boards became even more careful in how they handled and recounted the ballots in the recount process. Over 1,000 volunteers sought to help Judicial Watch conduct its recount and many played a helpful role, in particular in the initial review of the ballots in Palm Beach and Broward counties. Judicial Watch thought it important to conduct an independent analysis of the Florida election – an analysis separate and apart from the Republican and Democratic partisans in the presidential campaign and on the local canvassing boards. In addition to the inherent historical and public interest in these “primary” documents, Judicial Watch wanted to provide a report to the public that could be used to enact any needed reforms in Florida’s election systems, as well as throughout the nation. Judicial Watch hired the accounting firm of Johnson, Lambert & Co., a firm with expertise not only in the counting of ballots, but in the detection of fraud. The company has offices not only in Washington, DC, but in Florida as well. The firm immediately found problems in some of the key counties. In Palm Beach County, for example, Johnson, Lambert found discrepancies in the numbers produced by Palm Beach County officials, who simply could not reconcile the results of each of their counts in the days after the election. In Broward County, the accounting firm found that Broward County officials changed standards as they recounted ballots, lost track of ballots, and had no consistency in how they awarded votes to individual candidates. It became clear to Judicial Watch that the canvassing boards in these counties did not have the desire or expertise necessary to conduct a trustworthy recount. As the citizens of the state of Florida and throughout the nation consider more modern voting systems, they should also consider how to minimize the impact of political biases of local election officials, while maximizing these officials’ expertise in accounting techniques to better assure accurate election results. The attached report by the independent accounting firm Johnson, Lambert has several conclusions that will be of interest to the American people. Of primary importance is that, after analyzing 42,724 of the 62,605 ballots reported as undervotes in Florida, it is the stated view of the independent accounting firm that a statewide recount of the Florida undervotes would not have changed the outcome of the presidential election. The independent accounting firm hired by Judicial Watch went beyond merely describing and counting ballots; the firm tried to critically analyze the recount procedures used by the key counties of Broward and Palm Beach. The accounting firm found that the counties’ procedures resulted in numbers that were unverifiable. For instance, in Palm Beach, the firm found that Palm Beach officials wrongly awarded at least 62 votes to Mr. Gore that should have gone to Mr. Bush. In Broward County, in the middle of the recount process, officials changed to a new, more liberal standard for adjudicating ballots. This change in standards in the middle of the recount may have worked to Mr. Gore’s benefit. Based on the attached report and the independent observations of the independent accounting firm and Judicial Watch representatives and volunteers, Judicial Watch makes the following suggestions: * Canvassing Board officials should receive better training in basic accounting methods to ensure that any future recounts are performed according to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. * Canvassing Board officials should consider consulting with accounting firms to help ensure that proper systems are in place to assure the public that the “certified” results are accurate. * Uniform standards for judging votes should be used during any recounts. These recounts should be done by independent accountants or auditors and not by partisan officials. * Judicial Watch observed that the simple act of recounting did affect the characteristics of the voting cards, causing additional chads to fall off. Any new voting system should use ballots whose physical characteristics would be unaffected by any recount. * As for the “dimple mystery,” Judicial Watch used a sample voting machine and ballots from Broward County in an attempt to test how the observed dimples there were created. Judicial Watch could not recreate, using the machine, the types of dimples seen on many of the Broward County ballots. These unexplained dimples raise the specter that the dimples were created by someone other than a voter. Ballot and voting security, to help protect against fraud and the perception of fraud, ought to be a priority in any reform of Florida’s and the nation’s election system. As a public service, Judicial Watch will present this report to Governor Jeb Bush, Secretary of State Katherine Harris and state and local officials in Florida, the appropriate committees in the U.S. Congress, Attorney General John Ashcroft, and the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, for their consideration and use in reforming our electoral voting systems. Most importantly, this report will be made available to the American people on the Internet at www.judicialwatch.org. In this way, the American people can draw their own conclusions in the ongoing debate about the 2000 presidential election. To obtain a hard copy of the report, contact Judicial Watch at:Respectfully submitted, Larry Klayman Chairman and General Counsel Thomas Fitton President |
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