Shasta County, CA Votes to Hand Count Ballots for its 111,000 Voters. Now They Have to Pay for It.

Brian Beihl

The American Democracy Minute Radio Report & Podcast for April 13, 2023

Dominion Voting Systems DS 950, similar to those formerly used in Shasta County, CA. Photo: Dominion Voting Systems

Today’s Links

Articles & Resources:

The Guardian –  Far-right county throws out voting machines – with nothing to replace them
Shasta County –  Voter Registration Statistics
Reading Record Searchlight – Shasta supervisors elected with Dominion machines opt to hand-count ballots in local races
Reading Record Searchlight – With more costs to come, Shasta County will spend $950,000 on new voting system
Hart InterCivic –  Company website
NPR – Judge rules Fox hosts’ claims about Dominion were false, says trial can proceed
Shasta Scout – Shasta County, Here’s What Voting Rights Advocates Want You To Know About Electronic Voting Machines


Groups Taking Action:

League of Women Voters CA,  Common Cause CA,  California Voters Foundation, Asian Law Foundation, ACLU of Northern California

Today’s Script:  (Variations occur with audio due to editing for time)

You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping YOUR government by and for the people.

Showing they’d bought into President Trump’s debunked fraud allegations, the majority of Shasta County California’s board of supervisors terminated their contract for Dominion Voting Systems’ electronic ballot tabulation machines.  Then supervisors voted to hand count ballots – in a county with over 111,000 registered voters.  

In 2020, the northern California county gave the former president over 65% of the vote.   The Guardian reports that election deniers found allies on the county board of supervisors, and after contentious public meetings, voted to terminate the contract with Dominion.  According to the Reading Record Searchlight, one supervisor even communicated with My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell.  Lindell’s  group has been perpetuating the fraud conspiracies, and Lindell offered financial assistance for hand counting, and to subsidize any legal costs.

The county’s 20-year registrar of voters, Cathy Darling Allen, told supervisors that as many as 1,200 additional people would be needed to count the ballots by hand, at an estimated $1.6 million dollars.  Then last week, the county supervisors retained election equipment company Hart Intercivic to design an all-paper, hand-count infrastructure, at a cost of $950,000.   

The Record Searchlight quoted County Supervisor Mary Rickert, who voted against the move, as saying, “As a fiscal conservative, I’m highly offended by the fact that the majority of the board is willing to spend over $2 million dollars to replace the Dominion system”.    

We have links to articles and groups taking action at AmericanDemocracyMinute.org.  I’m Brian Beihl.

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