12 September 2024

How secure and reliable are US elections? You’d be surprised

Zachary B. Wolf

With election season underway, you’re bound to hear from former President Donald Trump that an army of undocumented immigrants is trying to vote in the presidential election. You may hear from Democrats that GOP efforts to pass new voting laws is a form of voter suppression.

Despite that rhetoric, you might be surprised to hear the argument that voting in the US — the act of casting a ballot and the guarantee it will be counted — is better now than at any time in the country’s history.

That’s what you’ll get from David Becker, founder of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, a nonpartisan and nonprofit group that gets most of its funding from charitable foundations and aims to improve and build confidence in US elections.

I had a long phone conversation with Becker, a former senior attorney in the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division who has been working for decades to improve US elections. Our conversation, edited for length, is below:

Actually, voting in the US is better than ever

WOLF: Your first point in talking about US elections is that the system we have is really good and has never been better. Explain that.

BECKER: The fact is, our elections right now — as voters are thinking about whether it’s worthwhile to cast a ballot in this election — our elections right now are as secure, transparent and verifiable as they’ve ever been.

No comments: