Court orders judge to hear suit on Florida vote machines

8.30am

MIAMI - Florida's attempts to avoid a repeat of the 2000 election fiasco took another hit late on Monday when federal judges ordered a lower court to hear a lawsuit demanding that electronic voting machines be equipped to print receipts for voters.

While it was unclear whether any ruling on the lawsuit would be issued before the November 2 presidential election, electoral reform activists and state officials alike warned on Tuesday that with barely a month to go, there would not be enough time to comply anyway.

"It's not just, get a machine and hook it up," said Jenny Nash, a spokeswoman for Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood, the state's top election overseer.

In a decision handed down Monday evening, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a Florida district court's rejection of the lawsuit and ordered the court to rehear the case.

Nash said redesigned machines that could print a receipt would have to be certified, mass produced, purchased by county election authorities, and then poll workers would have to be trained to use them.

"So many things have to be put in place in order for that to happen and that would not be something that would be viable for the November election," she said.

The state government, run by President George W Bush's brother, Governor Jeb Bush, said on Tuesday the decision by the appeals court was "procedural" because it merely addresses the court's jurisdiction and not the merits of the case.

But US Republican Robert Wexler, a Florida Democrat who brought the suit demanding printable receipts so voters could verify their ballots were accurately recorded, viewed the ruling as a victory for voting rights.

2000 ELECTION FIASCO

"I am deeply disturbed that Gov Jeb Bush and Glenda Hood continue to be an impediment to repairing the disaster of 2000," Wexler said.

The presidential election in 2000 was such a tight race in Florida it led to weeks of ballot recounts and lawsuits, delaying the final election result until the US Supreme Court ordered a halt -- and handed Bush a 537-vote victory in the state over then-Democratic Vice President Al Gore.

The punch card ballots that led to the chaos were abandoned. Fifteen counties, including the most populous, switched to electronic voting machines and the remaining 52 counties opted for optical scanning equipment to record ballots in computers.

But the state did not ensure there would be a paper trail for the electronic voting systems so that they could be audited after the election, dismaying Democrats and activists.

Critics of the state government already won one victory when a court struck down a law banning manual recounts. The practical implications of that ruling were still being worked out with all interested parties, said Nash.

Even some proponents of paper records for votes cast on touch screen machines hoped the latest court decision would not have any implications for the November election.

"I believe we need a paper backup, we need a tangible way of looking at what's going on with these voting machines. But when it comes down to practicalities I would have to say it's too late," said Sandy Wayland, legislative chair of pressure group the Miami-Dade Election Reform Coalition.

The tussle over making voting machines auditable is just one of several issues pitting Gov Bush against activists and Democrats, and which led former President Jimmy Carter to warn on Monday that the 2004 presidential election in the state was likely to be as flawed as the last one.

Carter, whose Carter Centre foundation monitors elections around the world, accused Hood of partisan bias and Gov Bush of taking no steps to ensure free and equal treatment between voters -- charges that Nash rejected as misinformed.

- REUTERS