Electronic Voting Machines
We have been told that electronic voting machines can provide fair elections. They cannot. These machines are instruments by which our elections and our Republic can be stolen from under our very noses. The state of the art theory in computer security says that these systems are not and cannot be relied upon to be secure.
Recent studies have shown that electronic voting machines are not only insecure but also more expensive than tried and true technologies that have worked for years. In Maryland the cost of elections has grown to 10 times as much as it did 7 years earlier. As your representative I will ensure that Minnesota elections remain secure and affordable.
REAL ID Act of 2005
This federal law imposes certain security, authentication, and issuance standards for driver licenses and identification, in order for them to be accepted by the federal government for "official purposes", as defined by the Secretary of Homeland Security. Few if any of the provisions in the law tie any federal monies to the additional burden these requirements place on the States.
The Real ID system will consolidate information about the citizens of our States to an unprecedented degree. This system will be a prime target for every hacker, rogue government, and enemy or our State and nation. Security breaches in this system will precede identity theft on a massive scale. We must not trust that our federal government can secure this data. Every day we see examples of this in reports of laptops with sensitive military or financial data being lost.
Representative Bob Barr wrote: "A person not possessing a Real ID Act-compliant card could not enter any federal building, or the office of his congressman, senator, or the U.S. Capitol. This effectively denies that person their fundamental rights to assembly and to petition the government as guaranteed in the First Amendment."
As your representative I will say no to these unconstitutional, unfunded mandates from the federal government.