CNCounty News

House moves to kill election-security agency

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House Committee on House Administration advances  Election Assistance Commission Termination Act

The House of Representatives’ Committee on House Administration voted 6–3 along party lines to advance the Election Assistance Commission Termination Act (H.R. 634).

H.R. 634 would eliminate the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), an independent, bipartisan agency created to help states secure their voting systems and the only agency responsible for making sure voting machines cannot be hacked.

After the 2000 presidential election, EAC was directed to convey federal help to states to update and improve their voting systems. In recent years, EAC’s top responsibilities have been to ensure elections are accessible to all individuals, develop and promote election best practices and allocate funds for elections technologies. While H.R. 634 aims to eliminate the EAC, it does not propose new agencies to take care of its responsibilities.

In response to the vote, several voting rights organizations have expressed concerns to the committee about the security of the United States’ election system and public confidence in the general election system. These concerns have been heightened due to possible foreign interference in the recent U.S. presidential election.

H.R. 634 will now move to the full House for a vote.

County officials are traditionally responsible for overseeing the allocation of voting machines, managing polling locations and ensuring the integrity and efficiency of the voting process in partnership with federal, state and other local election officials. Counties take deliberate steps to ensure the security of voting systems, from ensuring that voting machines are not connected to the internet or to each other to establishing a specific chain of custody for voting records.

Before the 2016 presidential election, NACo released a new fact sheet on the role counties play in administering and ensuring the integrity of America’s election process. It can be viewed online at www.naco.org/vote.

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