Independent political group pushing for election results to be tabulated by hand
MILWAUKEE- With the fall elections just a few months away there's a new push to count every single vote cast in Wisconsin by hand.
John Washburn, with Wisconsin Fair Elections, says hand-counting would eliminate any voting issues.
"Every single study that has every been done that examines these (voting) machines has found significant problems," said Washburn to Newsradio 620 WTMJ's "Wisconsin's Afternoon News with John Mercure."
But Reid Magney with the Government Accountability Board says in two recent recounts in Wisconsin -- one for the state Supreme Court race in 2011 and one for the Senate seat in Racine County in 2012 -- that prove the machines work fine.
"The numbers of votes when they are hand-counted matched up very, very, very closely with the numbers the machines reported on election nights," said Magney to "Wisconsin's Afternoon News with John Mercure."
Critics of hand-counting the ballots say it would take too long and cost too much, but Washburn doesn't believe that.
"No one's every done the study, no one's ever sat down and said 'we're going to count this many ballots with this many people and see how long it takes."
Most Wisconsin municipalities rely on electronic voting machines to tally votes from paper ballots. The electronic totals are recorded and added to late-arriving absentee ballots during a post-election canvass.
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