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38 ¦ DECEMBER 7, 2020 EXPERT OPINIONS

Return to Normalcy Necessitates
Acknowledging Reality

By Mark Dubois

The Trump/Republican lawsuits challenging
the results of the presidential election aren’t
getting much traction, which is no surprise,
but the reason why may be a bit more nuanced
than the press has been reporting. Though I don’t
profess any expertise in the area, I do have some
experience.
As a young lawyer, I was first staff counsel and
then the political appointee corporation coun-
sel for a small city. During one hotly contested
election, which was decided by only a few dozen
votes, there was a challenge by the losing candi-
date, who pointed out that in one voting machine
in one district the total votes cast for the mayoral
candidates was markedly lower than the totals CLT columnist and former state Chief Disciplinary
for the mayor’s line in every other machine in ev- Counsel Mark Dubois.

ery district, and also well below the total votes on counters, rows of numbers from 0 to 9 on little
for other items further down the ballot in that wheels which advanced every time the lever was
specific machine. It appeared that something had thrown.
gone wrong. I volunteered to pick up the expert at the air-
The challenging party brought in a math- port. On the trip from the airport, he told me he
ematics professor from the local university who was certain that nothing was wrong with the ma-
testified that the odds of such an irregularity chine. He’d worked for the company his whole life
were astronomically small. I don’t remember if and had never seen a machine jam. “Voters do
it was millions, billions or trillions to one, but funny things is all.”
whichever, it was clear that there was probably Sure enough, the next day court was recon-
something wrong. Though my job was to defend vened at the voting venue, an elementary school.
the process, I also wanted to make sure things The mechanic disassembled the machine while
were done right. narrating what he was doing for all to hear. “No,
We agreed with the challengers to bring in the nothing’s wrong here. The machine worked as it
head mechanic from the company who made the was supposed to”
machine. These were the old steel machines with After cross examination, the judge told the me-
a lever which drew the curtains and, after all the chanic to return the machine to its original state,
little levers indicating your choices were clicked recessed court and went to talk with a class of
into place, recorded the vote when the returned students who had come into the gymnasium for
to position. The machines were fully mechanical, recess. Fascinated by the machinery, I lingered to
no electricity involved. The results were tabulated watch him reset the counters. He seemed to have

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