Be Less Stupid host, Jon Hotchkiss on election day, 2017.
I wanted to know if our elections are safe, fair and honest. To find out, on Election Day 2017, I personally observed every step of the election process from voting… to the counting of the actual ballots from elections held in Los Angeles, California (SEE VIDEO BELOW FOR MORE).
My day started with visits to 5 polling places south of downtown Los Angeles. I met the people who volunteer at the polls, who check voters in, explain the voting process and hand voters their ballot. I watched as ballots were inspected and then marked by voters…Watched as marked ballots were scanned to ensure the ballot had been marked correctly.
I watched as the ballot gets deposited inside the scanning machine until the polls close… I watched as volunteers handed out “I voted stickers”… or they handed out a free gun if the voter said they were a Trump supporter.
When the polls close in California, the ballots are removed from the scanning machine and placed inside a paper red box with a see-through lid and sealed. Next, poll workers deliver the boxes from their precinct to a centralized location where they’re met by the Los Angeles police. Next, the police deliver the ballots to the office of the LA County Registrar in Norwalk, CA.
Inside the Registrar’s office, volunteers break the seal on the red box and hand inspect each ballot. Next, piles of ballots are placed in long metal drawers and hand delivered to the technicians operating the optical scanners which read each ballot.
Observers can watch the results of ballot counting in real time on a monitor.
OK. So, those are the mechanics. But, what else did I find in my investigation?
- Our voting systems and processes are not secure. They are easily hackable and shockingly vulnerable to manipulation.
- Plus, during my investigation, I easily stole someone else’s identity and pretended to be that person, in order to fraudulently cast a vote in a California election.
- My investigation will also reveal exclusively, a data breach of astonishing scale that includes millions of voter’s names, address and phone numbers.
(You can watch the investigation’s preview now)
Jon Hotchkiss is the host of Be Less Stupid and a 14 time Emmy nominee. See the Election Investigation by liking our Facebook page when it premieres the week of November 13th.