[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 13 (Wednesday, February 9, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Page S1205]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. ENSIGN (for himself, Mr. Reid, Mr. Burns, Mrs. Feinstein, 
        Mr. Nelson of Florida, Mr. Chafee, Mr. Sununu, Mr. Durbin, and 
        Mr. Dayton):
  S. 330. A bill to amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require 
a voter-verified permanent record or hardcopy under title III of such 
Act, and for other purposes; to the Committee on Rules and 
Administration.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, in the November 2004 elections, Nevadans 
entered a new frontier for casting their votes. We became the first 
state in the nation to require that voter-verified paper audit trail 
printers be used with touch-screen voting machines.
  Not only did our election go off without a hitch, but voters across 
Nevada left the polls with the knowledge that their vote would be 
counted and that their vote would be counted accurately.
  I understand better than most the importance of the integrity of the 
ballot box. I was at the mercy of a paperless-machine election in my 
1998 race for the U.S. Senate. When the votes were tallied with a 
difference of only a few hundred, I asked for a recount in Clark 
County, the only county at the time using electronic voting machines. 
The result of the recount was identical to the first count. That is 
because there was nothing to recount. After rerunning a computer 
program, the computer predictably produced the same exact tally.
  I conceded that race and was elected to Nevada's other Senate seat in 
2000. But that experience made me realize the importance of ensuring 
Americans that their votes will count--it is absolutely fundamental to 
our democracy.
  That is why I led the fight for voter verification paper trails in 
the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) that President Bush signed into law in 
2002. A voter-verified paper trail would allow voters to review a 
physical printout of their ballot and correct any errors before leaving 
the voting booth. This printout would be preserved at the polling place 
for use in any recounts. This is exactly what Nevadans experienced when 
they voted in November.
  Unfortunately, the language that is contained in HAVA has not 
resolved this issue for most other states. Now, I am working to ensure 
voting integrity across the country. By introducing the Voting 
Integrity and Verification Act, I want to ensure that HAVA is clear--
voters must be assured that their votes will be accurate and will be 
counted properly. A paper trail provides just such an assurance.
  Technology has transformed the way we do many things--including 
voting. But we cannot simply sit on the sidelines and assume that our 
democracy will withstand such changes. We recently witnessed the birth 
of democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq and watched as citizens risked 
their lives to cast their votes. Our continued work to ensure that each 
vote counts here in the United States underscores the idea that we must 
always be vigilant in protecting democracy--whether it is brand new or 
more than 200 years old. The Voting Integrity and Verification Act 
protects democracy by protecting the sanctity of our vote.
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