That particular polling machine should've been shut down and examined right then, but they continued to let people use it," said Tarrant County voter James Carpenter.
Carpenter posted a video on social media that has now racked up millions of views. In the video, he claims he voted for one political candidate, but his printed ballot marked a different one. The elections administrator said it was the voter's error, not the machine.
"This is not uncommon, and there's a practice in place called pooling the ballot to handle this," said Clint Ludwig, Tarrant County Elections Administrator.
Concerns over the election system are also being heard in Dallas County. The elections office said on Monday that several machines glitched and duplicated ballots, causing long lines and frustrated voters.
Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price said the issues were isolated.
"It's always challenges on the third day here, and we are beginning to run as expected," said Price. "All ballots were counted, all maintained, were spoiled with an initial and observed."I type a lot of these posts on a tiny keyboard using one finger, so it’s single letter by single letter. I rely heavily on the AI to finish words for me. When I don’t, I’m quite sure I know what I’m typing, but my attention is on the virtual keyboard, and what winds up on the screen is gibberish. Rather like typing on a real keyboard, with your fingers displaced, right or left, by one letter. I’m quite sure about what I’m typing, but when I look up, I wonder what the hell I’ve been doing.
Texas eliminated the choice to mark your ballot by party a few years ago. Before that, I checked the “Democratic” box, then reviewed my entire ballot before I cast it, to be sure I had fulfilled my wishes.
You can’t do that now, so I scrolled laboriously through 70 screens to finish voting, one by one ticking a box on the screen, making sure of my choice before pressing “NEXT.” Then I reviewed my choices, on the screen, before inserting the paper ballot, printed it, and reviewed the ballot before turning it in. Had there been an error at any point, I’d accept that I did it and gone back to correct an entry, or asked for a new ballot.
Rather like I don’t blame this phone for my poor one-finger typing skills (if I used my thumbs, I’d hit three letters at once; with each thumb).
In another story on this incident, the voter says he wants to consult an attorney. But his ballot was spoiled and a corrected (I won’t tell you the gibberish I typed for that word, which AI corrected for me) one was cast. He insists it wasn’t his fault, but what evidence does he have? And what harm was done? If he couldn’t correct his error, that would be one thing. Removing a machine every time a voter misused is rather like the adage that an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. The rest of us have to suffer for the foolishness of one person who insists he never does wrong, so it must be the machine the rest of us used without incident (like as not he wasn’t the first voter that day). How can it be human error when a conspiracy theory will do?
And that’s the problem with conspiracy theories: the absence of evidence for them is proof only outside a court of law. Courts rely on evidence; and conspiracy theories never supply that. I have to respect the voting officials, who treated this incident as it should be treated.
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