Louisiana vets new voting systems as Trump doubles down on false fraud claims

This story was originally published by the Louisiana Illuminator.

Louisiana Secretary of State Nancy Landry’s office hosted a public demonstration Tuesday of a Texas company’s voting systems technology as part of the state’s long-troubled efforts to replace its decades-old machines that have fallen into disrepair.

Parish clerks, registrars of voters and members of the public gathered at the Old Governor’s Mansion to inspect and try out a version of the technology Louisiana voters could start using as soon as next year’s congressional midterm elections. Landry’s office used the mansion’s spacious ballroom to host the first of six public demonstrations from companies hoping to qualify to compete for Louisiana voting machine business. 

The demonstrations are required as part of the state’s process to certify prospective voting systems. 

Vendors must have their voting machines certified by the secretary of state before they can compete for a long-overdue state contract to replace Louisiana’s 35-year-old machines, many of which have broken down and cannot be repaired because replacement parts are no longer made.

Companies that will hold their public demonstrations over the next few weeks are: Clear Ballot on Sept. 9; Election Systems & Software, Sept. 11; Democracy Live, Sept. 15, Dominion Voting Systems, Sept. 16; and VotingWorks, Sept. 18. All demonstrations will take place from 9 a.m. to noon at the Old Governor’s Mansion. 

Hart InterCivic’s new Verity Vanguard 2.0 system received federal certification last month. Its system uses a total of three small suitcase-sized machines and a collapsible plastic lockbox to store paper ballots. 

The first machine is used by election officials to check in a voter and print a small paper ticket, roughly the size of a credit card, known as a “voter pass.” It bears a QR code indicating the voter has checked in at the polling location. The voter takes the pass and a blank paper ballot and inserts both into a second machine, an electronic ballot-marking device with a digital touch screen. The voter uses the screen to mark the ballot, and the machine ejects the marked paper ballot. The voter pass is also ejected, with a large black rectangle printed over the QR code to prevent it from being reused. 

Finally, the voter takes the paper ballot to a third machine, a high-speed optical scanner that reads the words and markings on the ballot. Its digital screen allows the voter to confirm the scanned information is accurate. The voter can then press a button to cast the ballot, both in digital and paper form. 

The scanning machine records and tabulates the ballot, storing digital copies on a removable hard drive and a second internal memory drive while dropping the paper ballot into a locked bin attached to the bottom of the machine. The scanners can also read hand-marked paper ballots.  

Hart InterCivic’s machines do not connect to the internet and have redundant tamper-prevention features that include security seals, locking doors, audible alarms and triggers that disable the machines if any of its ports are accessed.

The multi-paper, multi-screen, multi-station system is more complex than Louisiana’s current voting machines, which feature just one piece of equipment. 

Ascension Parish Clerk of Court Bridget Hanna, who attended Tuesday’s demonstration, said she’s concerned that a three-machine system might be a challenge for older election commissioners to handle. 

They might not have the energy to lug around and set up the machines for each voting line, she said in an interview. Her office has been actively trying to recruit younger commissioners, but the current pay rate of $200 per 13- to 14-hour election day is not enough for many, especially when factoring in the 16 hours of unpaid training required to work at polls, Hanna said. 

A multi-station system could also use up a lot of precious space at certain voting locations, she added. 

“For a clerk on Election Day, you’re always thinking about space,” Hanna said. “Two or three pieces of equipment is something we’d have to work out.”

Whichever new voting system Louisiana adopts, it is likely to be more complicated thanks to new state voting laws that require hybrid digital-paper ballot systems. 

In 2018, Secretary of State Nancy Landry’s predecessor, Kyle Ardoin, was finalizing a contract with Dominion Voting Systems, one of the nation’s largest vendors, when competing vendors tanked the deal with accusations of an unfair bidding process. When Ardoin tried to reopen bidding in 2021, the process was halted again when supporters of President Donald Trump mounted a pressure campaign against election officials across the nation. 

The small but vocal group bogged down several committee hearings at the State Capitol that year with far-fetched conspiracy theories and false claims of election fraud against Dominion and SmartMatic, another voting machine company. The group offered no actual evidence to support their allegations but called for a return to the hand-marked, hand-counted paper ballot systems of the previous century. Some Republican state lawmakers embraced the disinformation and adopted changes to the state’s process for buying voting machines.

Landry’s spokesman, Joel Watson, said the secretary of state hopes to have a contract in place by the end of the year for at least a pilot system that can be tested in a few parishes during the 2026 congressional midterms.

However, Louisiana’s current efforts to replace its voting machines could encounter the same political pressure that foiled its earlier attempts.

Last week, Trump announced he plans to sign an executive order to eliminate voting machines and mail-in voting. Adopting false claims his supporters made five years ago, the president said the country should instead use “Watermark Paper” for the 2026 congressional midterms. 

Election law experts have said such changes in the federal voting process would have to originate from Congress.  

Trump’s announcement came at around the same time as news that Dominion agreed to a $67 million settlement with the conservative television network Newsmax, stemming from a defamation lawsuit that accused the outlet of knowingly airing false fraud claims about the company in the 2020 election. 

In 2023, Dominion received a $787 million defamation settlement from Fox News, which also spread some of the same conspiracy theories.

Louisiana Illuminator is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Louisiana Illuminator maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Greg LaRose for questions: info@lailluminator.com.