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42–709 2008

GAO BRIEFING TO THE TASK FORCE: REPORT 

ON THE FINDINGS IN THE INVESTIGATION 

INTO THE FL–13 CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT 

ELECTION 

MEETING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON HOUSE 

ADMINISTRATION 

TASK FORCE FOR THE CONTESTED ELECTION IN 

THE 13TH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT OF FLORIDA 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

HELD IN WASHINGTON, DC, FEBRUARY 8, 2008 

Printed for the use of the Committee on House Administration 

( 

Available on the Internet: 

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/house/administration/index.html 


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COMMITTEE ON HOUSE ADMINISTRATION 

ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania, Chairman 

ZOE LOFGREN, California, 

Vice-Chairwoman 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

SUSAN A. DAVIS, California 

ARTUR DAVIS, Alabama 

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan, 

Ranking Minority Member 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

KEVIN MCCARTHY, California 

S. ELIZABETH BIRNBAUM, Staff Director 

WILLIAM PLASTER, Minority Staff Director 

TASK FORCE FOR THE CONTESTED ELECTION IN THE 13TH CONGRESSIONAL

DISTRICT OF FLORIDA

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas, Chairman 

ZOE LOFGREN, California KEVIN MCCARTHY, California 


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GAO BRIEFING TO THE TASK FORCE REPORT 

ON FINDINGS IN THE INVESTIGATION INTO 

THE FLORIDA-13 CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT 

CONTESTED ELECTION 

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2008 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

TASK FORCE ON FLORIDA-13, 

COMMITTEE ON HOUSE ADMINISTRATION, 

Washington, DC. 

The task force met, pursuant to call, at 10:09 a.m., in Room 

1310, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Charles A. Gonzalez 

(chairman of the task force) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Gonzalez, Lofgren, McCarthy, Ehlers 

and Lungren. 

Staff Present: Liz Birnbaum, Staff Director; Thomas Hicks, Senior Election Counsel; Janelle Hu, Election Counsel; Jennifer Daehn, 

Election Counsel; Matt Pinkus, Professional Staff Member/Parliamentarian; Kyle Anderson, Press Director; Kristin McCowan, Chief 

Legislative Clerk; Daniel Favarulo, Legislative Assistant, Elections; 

Gineen Beach, Minority Election Counsel; and Bryan T. Dorsey, 

Minority Professional Staff Member. 

The CHAIRMAN. I will call to order at this time the Committee 

on House Administration’s Florida-13 Task Force, and I apologize 

for the slight delay. But we were having problems getting over 

here, obviously, with traffic and such. So my apologies. 

We are going to attempt to be brief today and hear the final report by GAO. But first I think that it would be appropriate for me 

to extend my thanks, of course, to my fellow members of the task 

force; and that would be Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren and Kevin 

McCarthy from California. I also want to extend my thanks to Congressman Dan Lungren, who was not an official member of the 

task force but, nevertheless, attended some of the meetings and offered some very constructive advice which actually was followed. 

And so, Dan, I want to thank you. 

To the majority and minority staff, again thank you. Because, at 

the end of the day, of course, all of the work is truly predicated on 

the product that they produce for us as we go through the machinations of the task force. 

And definitely to the late Congresswoman Juanita MillenderMcDonald—and you see her portrait in the back of the room—for 

her fine service and the individual who actually created this task 

force with the simple charge of: Get it right and get to the truth, 

which hopefully that is what we have done. 


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I also want to extend the task force’s and the committee’s sincere 

thanks to the Government Accountability Office for their fine work. 

I think when we first selected them, they entered it with some reservation. 

I think the concern of any agency or department many times is 

that Congress or Members of Congress will drag them into a political debate, which would not serve, of course, their mission nor 

their purpose and would jeopardize their objectivity. That did not 

occur, and we appreciate that they were able to assist us to the degree and the fine manner in which they did. 

I will be making an opening statement. Then I will be recognizing the members of the task force for opening statements. 

Clive Thompson, writing in the January 6, 2008, issue of the 

New York Times magazine in an article entitled ‘‘Can You Count 

on These Machines?’’ makes the following observation: ‘‘The mistrust of touch-screen machines is thus equal parts technological 

and ideological.’’ Technology is subject to empirical analysis. Ideology is not. So today we address that which we are capable of resolving through the scientific method, that is, the technological 

mistrust surrounding the November, 2006, election for the office of 

the United States Representative from Florida’s 13th Congressional 

District. 

The challenge presented before the task force was to determine 

the merit and validity of the central allegation contained in contestant’s notice of contest that the electronic voting machines in 

Sarasota County malfunctioned, resulting in 18,000 undervotes, 

thus bringing into question the reliability of the vote totals determining the winner of the election as reported by the Florida State 

officials to the United States House of Representatives. 

The task force at the outset decided that it would not entertain 

testing and findings by opposing experts designated by the contestant and contestee, thus avoiding a ‘‘dueling experts’’ dilemma. 

Rather, the task force unanimously decided that the United States 

Government Accountability Office, with its credentialed resources, 

would serve as the impartial and independent expert. 

The task force further agreed that it would abide by the GAO’s 

findings barring some substantial basis to question those findings. 

Today, the Government Accountability Office will formally 

present its final report. 

Following established task force procedure, GAO did make a preliminary briefing before the task force on February 6, 2008, of its 

draft report. 

I want to make an important point. The task force has respected 

GAO’s established procedures and protocols. Until a final draft is 

prepared and presented, GAO’s draft report remains a work in 

progress. On February 6, at the preliminary briefing, task force 

members determined that the contestant and the contestee or their 

representatives should have a copy of the draft report. This was to 

allow them to review the materials and convey any questions or 

concerns to the task force in preparation for today’s meeting. 

I am aware that the draft report was made publicly available, 

contrary to the spirit of cooperation and respect for GAO’s procedures and protocol. I apologize to the United States Government 

Accountability Office for this was not what I preferred and was 


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contrary to what I stated and requested at the February 6th briefing. This development is not conducive to creating and maintaining 

a healthy working relationship between Congress and GAO based 

on trust and mutual respect. 

With that, I will recognize the minority member of the task force, 

Congressman McCarthy, for an opening statement. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Well, thank you, Chairman Gonzalez. 

Before we begin, I do want to thank the GAO for the work they 

have done. 

I also notice Kurt Browning, Secretary of State of Florida is here 

and thank you for the work you have done. You did the study before; and, as GAO went down, they were very complimentary of 

how you opened it up and made sure as we went all the way 

through. 

And I want to thank this committee and especially Chairman 

Gonzalez, because I think you have laid the groundwork of how 

contested races in the future should be handed out. I thought every 

decision or every vote we came to a conclusion was in a bipartisan 

manner. 

And going to the GAO was something new. And with my own experience, actually having been a staffer and worked on contested 

races before, I think this is one that has been more thoroughly analyzed than any one before it. So I do appreciate the work you have 

done and all the committee, as well as Zoe Lofgren; and I thought 

everybody worked in a bipartisan manner. So thank you for that. 

Today we will hear the report of the GAO’s investigation on this 

most studied election. The results are as clear as we can objectively 

expect. After thoroughly combing and analyzing past studies and 

conducting its own studies to confirm past results, there is no evidence suggesting any malfunction of the processing and counting of 

ballots on the DREs. 

We will hear from the GAO today and ask about its report that 

concludes that the machines counted votes accurately. With this 

final objective confirmation, I hope that we can finally put to rest 

for the people of the 13th District of Florida the notice of contest 

that the challenger, Christine Jennings, filed asking the House to 

overturn the election results against Congressman Vern Buchanan 

and send a strong message to the American people that results of 

the 2006 election and this particular election have been and were 

always correct. And I look forward to hearing the rest of the report. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. 

And the Chair will recognize Ms. Lofgren. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I would just add that I think I agree with the 

other members of the task force. This has been an endeavor that 

has been bipartisan. I think all of our votes have been unanimous. 

We entrusted the analysis to experts at the GAO, and we didn’t 

interfere with them in any way. We let them go through their 

study, and now they have reached a conclusion. 

And I would only note that if we had had, as the GAO has noted, 

if we had had a paper trail, we would have certainly not had to 

go through this exercise. So this will never happen again in Florida, because Florida, pursuant to the Governor’s direction I think 

in the legislature, no longer uses these machines and there will alVerDate Aug 31 2005 05:52 Jul 09, 2008 Jkt 042709 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A709.XXX A709

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ways be a paper trail. So this will be the last such contest we will 

see from the State of Florida. 

And, hopefully, as States change their election systems, we will 

never have this type of situation again. 

I would like to thank again the staff, members of the committee 

and especially you, Mr. Chairman, for your terrific leadership in 

this not-an-easy endeavor. But I think we have done our duty to 

the institution fairly and under the Constitution. 

Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. 

And, even though not a formal member of the task force, but 

members, of course, of the full committee to which we will be making a recommendation, hopefully, at the end of this meeting today, 

I do want to recognize for brief opening statements, and that would 

be the ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Ehlers. 

Mr. EHLERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and the majority of the 

statement that I want to say is to commend you and the other 

members of the task force. 

It is obvious to me that your judicial experience has been invaluable to you and that your judicial demeanor in handling this has 

been exemplary, and I deeply appreciate it. I have served on several task forces and chaired one. I know how difficult the task can 

be. And you have been very fair, thorough and evenhanded in the 

handling of this. You have set an example for all the task forces 

of the future, and I really commend you for that. 

The second comment I would like to make is a very important 

side benefit of what we have gone through with this. The use of 

the GAO and their work done on this, I think has set a good example not just for us but for the Nation. It will restore the confidence 

of the public in the process. 

It was not a coincidence that four of the contests were filed from 

Florida. There was only one contest that was filed outside of Florida, and that had to do with residency, not machines. But four, the 

other four were filed from Florida, and they questioned the machines. Obviously, because of the experience Florida has had over 

the past decade, there is a spillover here. The public has lost confidence in the results. And I think the result of this is going to 

demonstrate to the public that the voting process, by and large, is 

proper, correct and believable and that the public should not question the accuracy of election results as they have done for the past 

8 to 12 years. 

So you have set an example and a standard that is very helpful 

to the Nation as well as in resolving this case, and I thank you for 

it. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much for your kind words. 

And the Chair will recognize Mr. Lungren for some brief opening 

remarks. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, thank you for your indulgence in allowing me to participate in the hearings of this task force although I was not a 

member. 

Some more than 20 years ago I was a member of the full body 

when there was a contested election, the results of which caused 

bitterness in the House; and partisanship was exacerbated. I genuVerDate Aug 31 2005 05:52 Jul 09, 2008 Jkt 042709 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A709.XXX A709

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inely did not want us to return to those days and was most interested in how this contest would be handled. 

And while I did not know the chairman well before the hearings, 

I did serve with his father and enjoyed my relationship with his 

father and only knew the chairman by reputation. But I want to 

thank you not only on my behalf but on behalf of all Members for 

the way that you conducted this task force. This was somewhat of 

a test of our House as to how we would handle this, not only because there were questions raised about the election results but the 

nature of the contest. And I think your judgment in having GAO 

get involved, which was adopted unanimously by the other members of the task force, was very, very essential in the manner in 

which this was handled. 

And while I know we are still awaiting the report, I have looked 

at the draft report; and I think I know what they are going to tell 

us. And I think this does help restore confidence in the ability of 

this House to be able to handle touchy matters like this, but, also, 

it is an example to the American people of where we can work in 

a bipartisan basis, where it is easy to be partisan otherwise. 

And I thank the chairman and the other members of this task 

force. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Lungren. 

The CHAIRMAN. At this time, we’ll proceed with the final report 

by the representative from the United States Government Accountability Office. 

STATEMENT OF NABAJYOTI BARKAKATI, PH.D., ACTING CHIEF 

TECHNOLOGIST, APPLIED RESEARCH AND METHODS, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman Gonzalez, members of the task force, we have submitted the formal statement for the record, and I am going to summarize briefly. 

As our statement says I am here today to present the findings 

on our Florida-13 review, based on the testing we conducted on 

iVotronic voting machines used in the 2006 general election in 

Sarasota County, Florida. 

I would like to begin by thanking the task force for its overall 

support of our efforts and specifically for the assistance provided in 

obtaining the resources of the House recording studio, which were 

critical in successfully completing our tests. 

At the October 2, 2007, meeting of the task force, we proposed 

and you asked us to proceed with three tests—firmware verification 

test, ballot test and calibration test—in order to obtain increased 

assurance that the iVotronic voting machines did not contribute to 

the large undervote observed in the 2006 elections in Sarasota 

County. 

To conduct the three tests, we developed test protocols and detailed test procedures. We met with officials from the Sarasota 

County Supervisor of Elections and the Florida Department of 

State and Florida Division of Elections in order to make necessary 

arrangements to obtain access to the voting machines and to schedule and conduct the tests. 


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Thanks to everyone’s cooperation and help, we have been able to 

successfully complete our testing during November 26th through 

December 4, 2007, in Sarasota County’s voting equipment facility 

in Sarasota, Florida. 

Our tests on the randomly selected iVotronic machines in Sarasota County did not identify any problems that would indicate that 

the machines were responsible for the undervote in the Florida-13 

race in the 2006 general election. 

In our firmware verification test, we extracted the firmware from 

a random sample of 115 iVotronics and found that in each case the 

firmware extracted from the machines matched the firmware that 

was escrowed and certified by the Florida Division of Elections. 

The statistical approach that we used in selecting these machines enables us to say with a 99 percent confidence level that no 

more than 60 of the 1,499 iVotronics that were used in the 2006 

election could have been running a different version of software. 

Consequently, we were able to place more confidence in the tests 

that we conducted on a smaller number of machines, both we conducted as well as the ones that were conducted by others in the 

past, the results of which have indicated that the iVotronics did not 

cause the undervote. 

Prior to the Sarasota testing, on November 19, 2007, we had visited the manufacturer of the voting machine, ES&S, in their Rockford, Illinois, facility and observed as they rebuilt the firmware 

from the source code that was previously held in escrow by Florida 

Division of Elections. The software that was rebuilt from that 

source code, we observed that that software matches the firmware 

that was held in escrow and that was certified by the Florida Division of Elections. This provides further confidence in the prior 

source code reviews that were conducted by a team from Florida 

State University and by us. 

For the ballot testing, we cast predefined test ballots on 10 

iVotronic machines and confirmed that each ballot was displayed 

and recorded accurately. The test ballots represented 112 ways a 

voter may have interacted with the iVotronic to cast a ballot in the 

Florida-13 race. These test ballots were cast on nine machines that 

were configured as election day machines and repeated on one machine configured as an early voting machine. 

Finally, we conducted the calibration testing by miscalibrating 

two of the iVotronics and casting some of the test ballots on them. 

Our tests, involving 10 different miscalibration patterns and capturing a total of 39 votes on the two machines, found that, although the machines became more difficult to use with 

miscalibration, the selections that were displayed on the screen for 

the Florida-13 race, were the same ones that appeared on the review screen and then recorded when the ballots were cast. 

Based on the testings that we have conducted, we have obtained 

increased assurances that the iVotronic voting machines used in 

Sarasota County’s 2006 general election did not contribute to the 

large undervote in the Florida-13 contest. Although the test results 

cannot be used to provide absolute assurance, we believe that these 

test results, combined with the other reviews that had been conducted by the State of Florida, us and others, have significantly reVerDate Aug 31 2005 05:52 Jul 09, 2008 Jkt 042709 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A709.XXX A709

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duced the possibility that the iVotronic machines were the cause of 

the undervote. 

At this point, we believe that adequate testing has been performed on the voting machine software to reach this conclusion, 

and we do not recommend further testing in this area. 

Given the complex nature—complex interaction of people, process 

and technology that must effectively work together to achieve a 

successful election, we acknowledge the possibility that the large 

undervote in the Florida-13 race could have been caused by factors 

such as voters who intentionally undervoted or voters who may not 

have properly cast their ballots on the iVotronic machine potentially because of issues relating to interaction between the voters 

and the ballot. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes a summary of my written statement. I would be happy to answer any questions that you or other 

members of the task force may have at this time. 

Thank you. 

[The statement of Mr. Barkakati follows:] 


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The CHAIRMAN. The Chair is going to recognize himself for some 

preliminary questions and then, of course, turn it over to my colleagues. 

But, Dr. Barkakati, I have a couple of questions. First of all, that 

you were specifically charged with simply looking as to whether the 

electronic machines malfunctioned and may have been the culprit 

in the undervote; is that correct? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes, sir. 

The CHAIRMAN. We did not ask you to look into ballot design? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. No, we did not look at the ballot design. 

The CHAIRMAN. And we did not ask you to go and look into either 

voter apathy or just whether they were totally turned off by the 

tenor of the campaign and decided to intentionally or deliberately 

not vote in Florida-13; is that correct? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes, that is correct. 

The CHAIRMAN. In conducting your testing and the protocols—because, of course—again, for just general information, you came before the task force with your intended protocols as to how you were 

going to conduct your testing. And in arriving at that protocol, did 

you entertain suggestions, recommendations, basic input from all of 

the parties, including the contestant, the contestee, Florida election 

officials, Florida State University personnel that conducted some 

previous testing and their experts, as well as suggestions and recommendations or observations from the manufacturer of the voting 

machine? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes, sir, we did entertain all of those inputs in 

deciding the test protocols and procedures. 

The CHAIRMAN. Okay. Now, there are many individuals that are 

interested in this for a lot of reasons. Because it goes beyond this 

particular Florida-13 contested election. And as much as I’d like to 

just contain everything to the question at hand and which will basically form the basis for everything that we do—we are not going 

to expand it. However, we do have individuals out there that have 

expressed great interest; and I have one individual who e-mailed 

some information to my office this morning. And so I do want to 

go ahead and ask some of the questions that they—that he has actually posed. 

And one would be, the personalized electronic ballots, or PEB 

cards, used to activate each voter’s ballot for the DRE, the electronic voting machine, contains firmware separate from the 

firmware for the DRE itself. And this individual believes that that 

could have been a culprit, that could have been—given you some 

insight as to whether the machines malfunctioned. 

Outside of that which you may have tested specifically, how 

would you address this individual’s concern regarding the PEB 

card which you cover extensively in your final report? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Sir, the PEB, personalized electronic ballot, I 

mean, does have a little bit of capability to transmit back and forth 

information with the iVotronic machine using infrared communication mechanism. However, besides that, it is primarily a memory 

device to hold data; and it holds initially the ballot definitions that 

are going to be used to display the ballots on the screen. However, 

when you open the machine, you copy all of those into the iVotronic 

and then from that point on the PEB is only an activator device 


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and it can activate the iVotronic to get started. So there were some 

allegations that maybe the PEB was displaying different ballots to 

different people. 

However, it was copied once, and then the same ballot displays 

over and over again. And we have seen that every machine that 

was used in all the 157 precincts had votes cast on the Florida-13 

race. So we could not have had a situation where it was selectively 

not displaying ballots. 

I mean, we have checked into that part, that the PEB could not 

have been the cause of the problem, including the fact that the 

PEB is not the one that does the primary task of the calculations 

or the displaying of the ballot. It is all done in the firmware that 

is inside the iVotronic machine itself. 

As I say, the PEB does have a small capability to send things 

back and forth and that is all, to the extent it does some work. So 

what I am saying is that we looked at the whole situation that the 

PEB could be a cause—both us as well as the Florida State University review team that looked at, you know, the same scenarios— and we concluded that it could not be the reason for the undervote. 

The CHAIRMAN. All right. 

And, my second question, again taken from this particular individual—and I am going to read specifically from the e-mail: ‘‘It is 

conceivable that—and even likely that were there bugs in the user 

interface in the Sarasota machines such as intermittent smoothing 

filter problems or other anomalies. These: (A) Could have occurred 

regardless of whether the software, firmware were identical; and, 

(B) would not have been uncovered without greater volume testing 

with actual use of the interface, especially in conditions resembling 

election day use.’’

Can you respond? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes, sir. 

We actually—as you might recall, there was some mention that 

the smoothing filter—in one of those letters that came from, I 

think, ES&S to the county saying that we have a smoothing filter 

that we want to change and, you know, it will help with the performance of the machine in terms of responsiveness. 

Now, the source code review team in Florida, they—they said 

they did not find the smoothing filter. However, when we were 

looking at it—because we already knew that, you know, was an 

issue coming up, we could find certain elements that I was able to 

confirm with the manufacturer that that constituted what they 

were calling a smoothing filter. 

It essentially is very simple to explain. Specifically, the machine 

does not give you—as soon as you touch it, it does not assume that 

you have touched it yet. It records the point and then it waits a 

little bit, like 200 milliseconds or so, and then tries to get another 

data point to see that both are close enough. And if they are not 

close enough, then they assume that, one, maybe it is a spurious 

thing and then I would ignore it. And that is the logic built in. And 

that logic is what was called smoothing filter. 

Now, how close the two touches have to be is the threshold that 

they can play with to get it to be, like, more sensitive, less sensitive 

kind of thing. If it is like wide—as you can imagine, the threshold 

is wide—I mean, it doesn’t matter if another touch is slightly farVerDate Aug 31 2005 05:52 Jul 09, 2008 Jkt 042709 PO 00000 Frm 00055 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A709.XXX A709

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ther off, it still assumes them to be the same. Whereas if you tighten them up, it takes longer, because the touch screens do have 

some noisy, you know, data going back and forth. 

So, specifically, the bottom line was the smoothing filter was not 

more of a mystery after that. I can understand why it was there, 

and we figured it out, and the proposal they had made was to simply to widen the threshold to make it more responsive. 

Regardless of all of that, we were looking at a source code that 

handles the display and the recording of the vote. That is not going 

to be affected at all by the filter—other than the machine’s response might be slow. In other words, it might take a little time 

to get the mark to show up. 

But the machine isn’t going to suddenly misbehave because it is 

slightly slower in response, and that actually almost explains the 

other element to which you might have read, like nondeterministic 

behavior. 

Well, because the touch screen—I mean, depending on the time, 

some of the conditions—it may, you know, have other spurious 

things going on whereby that filter that I talked about, the closeness of two touches, maybe it’s not being met. And if it is not being 

met, the condition is not met, then the system waits a little bit 

longer to get another touch, you know. So it looks like it—is it 

waiting for me to get—you know, accept my input. That is what the 

user feels like. 

But the bottom line of all of that is, regardless of all of that, that 

it isn’t going to affect anywhere at all in terms of what selection 

is displayed to the user and what selection is recorded. From that 

we are concluding that, essentially, if the machine is displaying a 

selection, that will be the one displayed on the review screen and 

recorded when you press the vote button; and that is the bottom 

line that we are going after in the technological study. 

So I guess it is a very long way of explaining, but I think we did 

understand—we looked into all of that and we understood what it 

was, smoothing filter was, and what the company was intending to 

do when they sent the letter and what its effect might have been. 

And, regardless of all of that, we were able to confirm sort of like 

the same thing, that the source code review from—team from Florida State University had said, it wasn’t going to affect the vote display and recording of the machine. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Doctor. 

I will recognize Congressman McCarthy at this time for his questions. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

In reading your report and listening to you when we first started 

out and talking to you about whether you could do this work and 

setting out some parameters to look at it, you told us that the closest statistically that anyone can get is 99 percent. Now, in hearing 

your report, you say you are 99 percent sure every single vote that 

was voted has been counted and counted correctly. Is that true? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. I guess it is a bit nuanced in the sense that the 

statistical portion of it applies to the—confirming that every machine was running the same software. So that was—that does have 

a 99 percent confidence level, that most machines are running the 

same software. 


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The remaining part is based on a logic, essentially, kind of like 

an assembly line or something. When you have a lot of the widgets 

being built, you can take one and sample and it is okay because 

everybody is the same. Extending that logic, we are able to say 

that, while we test a small number of machines, they record votes 

properly and display things properly and therefore that applies to 

the whole population. And then taking the abundance of all the 

testing that has been done in the past by the State of Florida and 

others, we are basically forming the judgment which is what we 

say, that we collectively think everything has been done to eliminate the machine as the cause of the undervote. 

So, in a way, you are getting the answer, but the 99 percent 

number in a nuanced way applies only to the condition that the 

firmware is the same. But the rest should be—since that is our— basically and logically, as I explained, was the reason behind coming up with a conclusion that adequate testing has been done to 

eliminate the machine. So, essentially, you are getting the conclusion without the 99 percent number associated with it because statisticians are not going to let me say it that way. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. So in my world we say 100 percent, but I understand. 

And I will tell you—and having been an individual that worked 

on staff on some other contested races, this one has been more 

thoroughly investigated than any one I have seen. You had an 

independent Florida State review prior to it ever coming to Congress’ review, and they were—we even had some of the individuals 

that did the research on that before us testify at other times. And 

I found that to be very thorough and very correct. 

In reading your report, you even said you miscalibrated the machines, and they still worked properly. 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes. The miscalibration was really meant to be 

a small amount and a larger amount of miscalibration to see the 

effect of it, essentially. And what we observed is that—and wanted 

to confirm that, even if miscalibrated, if it is showing you something as the selection you are making, then that would be the selection that will eventually get recorded in the memory inside the 

machine. That is what our, you know, goal was. 

And we did find that all of the machines, even with a smaller 

and larger amount of miscalibration—of course, it gets hard to use 

and they are so obvious in terms of bigger miscalibrations, become 

so obvious that—you probably will—officials have told us that they 

would probably have found that right away and put it out of service in any case. 

But, regardless—and coming back to your question—we did do 

that, and we found that in each case they definitely were displaying—if you can make any selection on the screen, that is the 

selection that is going to be essentially your choice that will be recorded. 

So we confirmed that, yes. 

Mr. MCCARTHY. That is very interesting, really, to the American 

public, too. Because Mr. Ehlers always points out to us, even when 

you went back and you just did paper and you would recount, you 

would always find one or two differences because you had human 

error touching it a number of times. And here we had individuals 


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researching numerous different ways in the computer, and it came 

out where no vote was different, and it all worked properly. So that 

is nice to know. 

Because I think our goal here was set out first when the challenger came in and wanted the election overturned and we went 

through this research here. We have found time and time again 

that every vote in the 13th district of Florida was counted properly 

and was put forward. So that is really a testament to the American 

public and to this district that they know their election was honest, 

true and correct. And I applaud the work you have done and the 

work that the others have done prior because we have never researched it this thoroughly, and I thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. McCarthy. 

The Chair will recognize Ms. Lofgren. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, you asked the questions that I was 

going to ask, so I am happy for that. 

I would just note that on page 12 of the report the GAO does 

make a suggestion that a voter-verified paper trail could provide an 

independent confirmation. And, obviously, we can’t create that 

retroactively. But, looking forward, I think that is something that 

we hope that the jurisdictions will look to do; and we will be hopefully in the near future pursuing that kind of endeavor at the Federal level. 

So, as with the other members of the task force, I—there was a 

big undervote. We don’t know why. I will say that when I looked 

at the replica of the ballot on page 10 I didn’t notice, because of 

the way it is set out, that there was actually an election above the 

State. So I—we will never know. But I think that that had an impact here. 

I think that it is important that we have discharged our duty 

here with the help of GAO in a way that has been nonpartisan 

really. Because our obligation is not as Democrats or Republican. 

Our obligation is to find out as best we can what happened and to 

make a decision based on that alone. And I think that is what we 

have done, and that is what we should have done. And I feel very 

satisfied with the process, and I am eager to put this behind us 

and get on to other business. 

So I don’t know if there are other questions. At the appropriate 

time, I have a motion to make. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Ms. Lofgren. 

And the Chair will recognize Mr. Ehlers, the ranking member of 

the full committee. 

Mr. EHLERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman; and I will be very brief. 

First of all, I just want to thank the GAO that did a very thorough job under very difficult circumstances. I commend you for 

your work. 

The other comment I would make is to agree with Ms. Lofgren 

about the ballot design. I had exactly the same experience. When 

I looked at the ballot, I actually missed the congressional race. I 

think this is a valuable experience, too, in terms that has been 

transmitted nationwide. I think every county clerk, city clerk, 

township clerk, and Secretary of State will be looking at ballot design more carefully in the future. 

With that, I yield back. 


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The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Ehlers; and the Chair 

recognizes Mr. Lungren. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Dr. Barkakati, I know statisticians don’t like to say certain 

things and so forth, but is it fair to say—to summarize in part 

what you said, that based on the work that your organization has 

done and based on your review of those other organizations that 

did testing, you do not see a need for any additional testing or are 

not suggesting to this committee that we request any additional 

testing to answer the questions you were requested to answer? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Yes, I agree with your statement. We are not 

suggesting any further testing based on all the things we have seen 

so far and done so far. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I thank you. And I join my colleagues in suggesting that the ballot design is something that needs to be looked 

at. 

But I also may be the only one willing to confess that I have gone 

to the ballot at times and intentionally not voted in certain elections to show my protest over the way the campaign was conducted. And I just note that this was a hard-fought campaign not 

only in the general, but in the primary, and voters sometimes respond in that way. And I think we ought to recognize—or at least 

I will admit I have been one that has done that. And I have been 

in similar situations. Maybe you would be investigating as to why 

I didn’t vote. 

But I thank the chairman once again for the professional way in 

which he has handled this and all the members of the task force. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Lungren. 

Now I am going to finish up with a couple of questions, one that 

was actually posed by a representative for the contestant. And even 

though this was not your charge, and we understand that. And I 

don’t want to get too far afield. But there have been some—obviously, we all have our take on what may have happened, ballot design or simply [a] voter that was simply turned off. Probably more 

ballot design, if we look at it somewhat objectively. 

And the reason for that is this only—the undervote was experienced in this degree—or extent in Sarasota. So it couldn’t be just 

the apathy or the intolerance or the disgust stopped at the county 

line and—nor was it reflected, I believe, in the absentee voting or 

those votes that were cast by methods other than the ES&S machine. 

So the question is as follows: Has the GAO reached any conclusions about whether the unusually elevated undervote rate was due 

to intentional undervoting or to unintentional human factors such 

as voter confusion caused by poor ballot design? 

Mr. BARKAKATI. Unfortunately, we didn’t do anything to determine between those two what might be the reason, except for 

knowing the other explanations. People have stated that ballot design might be an issue. We are aware of those kind of things. But 

we did not really evaluate to kind of try to eliminate one versus 

the others. So, unfortunately, I don’t think we have any conclusive 

statement about whether it was the ballot design that might have 

caused it or the intentional undervoting that caused it. That is 

probably all——


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I mean, I am aware of other—we have mentioned in a past statement that there were other, I think, experiments being done on humans—using humans to see—or human subjects to see whether 

they can miss it or not by, for instance, a professor at MIT that 

we know of. Ted Selker is the name. And then, for that one, we 

know that the work is proceeding on that area to find out whether 

ballot design might have been the reason, but he hasn’t finished 

the whole results, I guess, yet. And he was working with ES&S 

machines actually, using the same ballot layout and all. So there 

may be some report results coming out from that in the future 

which might provide, you know, more light into this area. 

The CHAIRMAN. Because I think people still want some answers. 

And, of course, again, that wasn’t the central allegation that we 

had to resolve here before the committee. 

One last observation, of course, is, this really does point out—it 

goes back to ballot design. It doesn’t matter how sophisticated and 

reliable the voting machine may be. It could even have a paper 

trail. But at the end of this whole process is that ballot design 

many times can be confusing. And we know that Florida has more 

or less been the poster child, but they have moved forward. But 

still, ballot design could still present a real, real problem as to 

whether it was the butterfly ballot in 2000 or whether it was the 

2006 Florida-13 election. 

So we understand the tremendous challenge that local election 

officials have; and we would just caution them to take, again, every 

precaution out there that they possibly could regarding how they 

designed that ballot for presentation. 

The last thing I want to say is that every candidate for office has 

a right, when they are running for the United States House of Representatives, to challenge the validity of the election if, obviously, 

they were not the victor. And that is their right. And then it is the 

constitutional duty of the United States Congress, then, to pass on 

whether someone is going to be seated and sworn in as a Member 

of the House. And I think that was our charge, that was our duty. 

We want to thank everyone that assisted us in performing that 

duty. 

At this time, I am going to recognize Ms. Lofgren for the purpose 

of making a motion. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Chairman, I move that the chairman be authorized and directed to report to the committee that the task force 

has completed its investigation related to the election of a representative from the 13th Congressional District of Florida to the 

House of Representatives, and I move further that the chairman 

report to the committee the task force’s recommendation that the 

election contest in the 13th District of Florida be dismissed. 

[The information follows:] 


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The CHAIRMAN. And at this time, task force members, if they are 

in favor, will register by signaling aye. Opposed, nay. 

It’s unanimous, the ayes; and we will proceed with this formal 

adoption of the motion and report it to the full committee for its 

consideration at a later date. 

And, with that, we stand adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 10:49 a.m., the briefing was adjourned.] 


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