Filmmaker turns eye on election Filmmaker turns eye on election (November 23, 2005)

Dorothy Fadiman's new film will be screened December 4 in Palo Alto

By David Boyce

Almanac Staff Writer

A new but unfinished documentary by Menlo Park resident and filmmaker Dorothy Fadiman questions the security of touch-screen voting systems.

"Who Kidnapped My Vote?" examines the November 2004 presidential election through interviews of Ohio voters, including first-person accounts of touch-screen voting machines' misreading votes.

At a screening set for 7 p.m. Sunday, December 4, at the Cubberley Community Center in Palo Alto, Ms. Fadiman will ask for feedback from local viewers as she prepares the final cut.

The film will be available as a DVD and free on the Internet; it may be screened in theaters as well.

Ms. Fadiman is a registered Democrat with 19 documentaries to her credit, and she admits to progressive views on human rights and social justice. "The issue is not who won. The issue is what went wrong," she told the Almanac. "What I'm interested in (in making films) is: How do people take responsibility for what happens to them and become part of the solution instead of a victim?"

Ms. Fadiman says she spent election day 2004 as a Democratic Party observer at a polling place in Florida.
What went wrong?

In the 2004 election, reports emerged of voting irregularities in Ohio, including exit-poll data not reflecting final tallies and allegations of too few voting machines in Democratic-leaning precincts, causing voters to wait several hours at the polls.

Part of the film shows interviews of voters in Ohio's Mahoning County, including a computer programmer, a state senator and people on hard economic times, all of whom used touch-screen voting machines.

The voters tell of their attempt to cast votes for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John F. Kerry. They would touch a button for Mr. Kerry, but the machine would initially indicate a vote for Republican candidate President George W. Bush, they say.

"I almost went on to the next (ballot) page before I realized that it was lighting for George Bush," says a man employed as a computer programmer.

"I'm pushing Kerry and it comes up Bush," says an African-American woman. "I said 'no' (and) I punched it again and it comes up Bush."

"I touched 'John Kerry,'" says an Ohio state senator. "As I touched it, it immediately went to Bush." He kept his finger there and it eventually picked Mr. Kerry, he says.

A few voters reported choosing Mr. Bush and seeing Mr. Kerry's name light up, Ms. Fadiman says, adding that she has footage of a Republican speaking on the issue but has yet to add it to the film.

The machines did not produce paper records, she says.

"Most Americans don't want to come to grips with what happened here," says one man in the film.

Ms. Fadiman says she accepts that people may be "in denial" about the 2004 election, but stresses the need to get involved. "You've got to keep fighting for it," she says. "All we want is for it to be fair."
INFORMATION

"Who Kidnapped My Vote?" screens at 7 p.m. Sunday, December 4, at the Cubberley theater at 4000 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto. Suggested donation is $25; reservations are requested. For more information, call 568-4340 or e-mail info@concentric.org.

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