亚特兰大——不久前，安·宾顿不得不挤进一个投票站，一边是共和党的投票观察员，另一边是民主党的，大声朗读她的投票选择，这样她的选票就可以被标记出来，选择也就被验证了。
出生后就失明的比灵顿欢迎近年来配备了技术的电子投票机的兴起，这些技术使她和其他残疾人士能够私下独立投票。
但是现在，作为选举由于担心在冠状病毒大流行期间亲自投票，官员们计划通过邮件进行一次大规模的投票，比灵顿担心她会被排除在外。当堪萨斯州的总统初选上月完全通过邮件举行时，这位72岁的托皮卡居民不得不告诉她的丈夫她想如何投票，以便他能为她填写选票。
“我回到了我们开始的地方，”比宁顿说。“我已经失去了独立的自由，失去了确保自己被标记的自由，失去了我希望自己被标记的自由。”
最近几周，盲人权益倡导者在密歇根州、纽约州和宾夕法尼亚州提起法律诉讼，寻求使用现有系统，以电子方式向军方和海外选民发送选票。盲人选民可以使用自己的电脑和辅助技术自己阅读和完成投票。
“这是关于平等的，”起诉团体之一，全国盲人联合会的克里斯·丹尼尔森说。“如果无记名投票对你很重要，对盲人也很重要。”
由于这些努力，所有三个州都同意在初选期间向残疾选民提供电子投票，而且在11月之前可能会有更多的行动。
投票技术专家对这种基于互联网的投票系统提出了安全问题。他们还警告说，要实现一个如此接近选举冒着与今年爱荷华州党团会议同样的问题，当时仓促开发的移动应用程序失败了。
“我真的没有好的解决方案可以提供。爱荷华大学计算机科学教授道格拉斯·w·琼斯说。“不好的一面是接受某人帮助标记你的选票。更糟糕的是匆忙投入完全未经测试的技术，而我根本没有理由相信这些技术。”
残疾人权益倡导者说，他们多年来一直呼吁选举官员提供安全的电子缺席投票。但是只有少数州这样做了。
据估计，美国有700万成年人患有视力残疾，支持者担心，有些人可能会选择今年完全不投票，而不愿冒感染病毒或让他们的投票隐私受到损害的风险。
在亚特兰大，多萝西·格里芬通常依靠拼车到达投票站。作为一名糖尿病患者，她担心在拥挤的投票站等待时会感染冠状病毒。
格里芬要求在周二的佐治亚州初选中进行缺席投票，但她放弃了等待，决定在提前投票的最后一天亲自投票，以避免选举日的拥挤。作为佐治亚州全国盲人联合会的主席，格里芬要求该州提供电子投票箱，但是没有得到。
格里芬说:“我绝对不想去，但我觉得这是我唯一的选择，因为我没有收到选票。”。“我很高兴我能够独立投票。但我很生气，因为我没有提前拿到缺席投票，尽管我几个月前就发出了请求。”
围绕电子选票的大部分担忧都集中在如何返还选票上。在某些情况下，这些选票必须由选民打印，并通过邮件或亲自返回到当地选举办公室。但在其他地方，这些选票可以通过电子邮件或传真退回，在少数情况下，可以通过在线门户网站退回选举办公室进行打印和计票。
在给选举官员的一份备忘录中，包括联邦调查局在内的四个联邦机构评估称，以电子方式发送选票的风险很低，但发现允许以电子方式返还选票的风险很高。
当特雷西·卡乔内听说她5月12日在新泽西蒂内克的地方选举将完全通过邮件进行时，她对自己说:“我到底要怎么做?”
然后，59岁的计算机程序员卡乔内(Carcione)得知，她所在的县正在试点项目下向盲人选民提供以电子方式接收选票的选项。在收到一封带有链接和个人识别码的电子邮件后，卡乔内去了一个网站，在那里她签署了一份宣誓书，声明自己是盲人，并获得了一张电子选票。
她用电脑程序阅读新闻故事，并填写表格，在她支持的每个候选人旁边打一个分数。在通过电子邮件发送了她填好的选票后，她的地方选举办公室打印出来，以便在选举日进行计票。
“这一切都非常简单明了，”卡乔内说。"如果我有选择的话，我会再做一次."
但是这个选项在7月7日的全州初选中是不可用的。新泽西选举官员说，他们认为该系统不需要，因为可以进行一些亲自投票。
卡乔内不确定她是否会去投票站。如果投票站在城市的另一边，她不愿意坐出租车，也不愿意排队等候。
“这不是一个很好的选择，”卡乔内说。“我可能会抓住机会，希望我的邻居是我认为的正派人。”
在试点项目中，新泽西与“民主生活”(Democracy Live)合作，后者是一家总部位于西雅图的技术公司，与包括加州、德克萨斯州、俄亥俄州和佛罗里达州在内的几个州的选举办公室合作，为军方和海外选民提供电子投票。
在特拉华州，残疾选民可以通过内部系统在最近的选举中获得电子选票，该系统已经退休，转而支持民主直播平台。它将在该州7月7日总统初选的试点项目中使用。
特拉华州选举专员安东尼·阿尔彭斯说，官员们正在密切监视，以确保安全。“民主生活”的总裁布莱恩·芬尼说，该公司已经与外部公司合作进行安全审查，并希望让研究人员参与改进其平台。
“这是美国;我们可以做到，”芬尼说。“另一种选择是继续剥夺国内外数百万选民的选举权，因为我们没有专注于实际解决问题。”
今年早些时候，在西弗吉尼亚州，立法者将电子投票扩展到身体残疾的选民。国务卿麦克·沃纳倡导这项法律，称确保没有选民被剥夺权利是很重要的。
“存在安全顾虑，但这种情况发生的可能性相当小，”他说。“这样做有风险回报的好处。奖励是让那些没有投票权的人投票。”
Blind voters fear loss of privacy with shift to mail voting
ATLANTA -- Not that long ago, Ann Byington had to squeeze into a voting booth with a Republican poll watcher on one side and a Democrat on the other reading her voting choices out loud so her ballot could be marked for her and the selections verified.
Blind since birth, Byington welcomed the rise in recent years of electronic voting machines equipped with technology that empowered her and others with disabilities to cast their ballots privately and independently.
But now, aselectionofficials plan a major vote-by-mail expansion amid fears of voting in person during the coronavirus pandemic, Byington worries she is being left out. When the presidential primary in Kansas was held entirely by mail last month, the 72-year-old Topeka resident had to tell her husband how she wanted to vote so he could fill out the ballot for her.
“I’m back to where we started,” Byington said. “I’ve lost all my freedom to be independent, to make sure it’s marked how I want it to be marked.”
In recent weeks, advocates for the blind have filed legal actions in Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania seeking access to systems already in place to deliver ballots electronically to military and overseas voters. Blind voters could then use their own computers and assistive technology to read and complete their ballots themselves.
“This is about equality,” said Chris Danielsen with the National Federation of the Blind, one of the groups suing. “If a secret ballot is important to you, it's important to a blind person, as well."
Because of these efforts, all three states agreed to make electronic ballots available during the primaries to voters with disabilities, and more actions are likely before November.
Voting technology experts have raised security concerns about such Internet-based voting systems. They also warn about implementing a new process so close to anelection, risking the same sort of problems that derailed this year’s Iowa caucuses when a hastily developed mobile app failed.
“I really don’t have a good solution to offer. We seem to have bad and worse,” said Douglas W. Jones, a University of Iowa computer science professor. “The bad is accepting someone helping to mark your ballot. And the worse is rushing to put in totally untested technology that I don’t have any reason to trust at all.”
Disability advocates said they have been calling on election officials for years to provide secure electronic absentee ballots. But only a small number of states have done so.
An estimated 7 million adults in the U.S. have a visual disability, and advocates worry that some might choose to skip voting altogether this year rather than risk catching the virus or having their ballot privacy compromised.
In Atlanta, Dorothy Griffin typically relies on ride-share to get to her polling place. A diabetic, she worries about catching the coronavirus while waiting in a crowded polling place.
Griffin requested an absentee ballot for Georgia’s primary Tuesday, but she gave up waiting for it and decided to cast a ballot in person on the last day of early voting to avoid crowds on Election Day. As president of the Georgia affiliate of the National Federation of the Blind, Griffin asked the state to provide electronic ballot delivery, but it wasn’t available.
“I definitely did not want to go, but I felt like it was my only choice because I didn’t receive my paper ballot,” Griffin said. “I was happy I was able to vote independently. But I was angry that I did not get my absentee ballot ahead of time even though I sent my request months ago.”
Much of the concern surrounding electronic ballots centers on how they are returned. In some cases, these ballots must be printed by the voter and returned by mail or in person to a local election office. But elsewhere these ballots can be returned by email or fax and, in a small number of cases, via an online web portal to an election office for printing and counting.
In a memo to election officials, four federal agencies, including the FBI, assessed the risk of sending ballots electronically to be low but found allowing such ballots to be returned electronically was a high risk.
When Tracy Carcione heard her local election in Teaneck, New Jersey, on May 12 would be conducted entirely by mail, she thought to herself: “How the heck am I going to do that?”
Then Carcione, a 59-year-old computer programmer, learned her county was offering blind voters the option to receive ballots electronically under a pilot program. After receiving an email with a link and PIN number, Carcione went to a website where she signed an affidavit stating she was blind and gained access to an electronic ballot.
She used a computer program for reading news stories and filling out forms to put a mark next to each candidate she supported. After emailing her completed ballot, her local elections office printed it out for tallying on election day.
“It was all very clear and easy,” Carcione said. “And, if I had the option, I would do it again.”
But the option won’t be available for the July 7 statewide primary. New Jersey election officials said they determined the system wasn’t needed because some in-person voting would be available.
Carcione is not sure whether she will brave a polling place or not. She is leery of taking a taxi if the polling place is across town and of waiting in a long line.
“It’s not a great choice,” Carcione said. “I might take my chances and hope that my neighbor is the decent person I think she is.”
For its pilot program, New Jersey worked with Democracy Live, a Seattle-based technology firm that works with election offices in several states, including California, Texas, Ohio and Florida to provide electronic ballots to military and overseas voters.
In Delaware, voters with disabilities were able to receive electronic ballots in recent elections through an in-house system that has since been retired in favor of the Democracy Live platform. It will be used during a pilot program in the state’s July 7 presidential primary.
Delaware elections Commissioner Anthony Albence said officials are monitoring it closely to ensure security. Bryan Finney, president of Democracy Live, said the company has worked with outside firms to conduct security reviews and wants to engage researchers on improving its platform.
“This is America; we can do this,” Finney said. “The alternative is to continue disenfranchising millions of voters both domestically and abroad because we haven't focused on actually solving the problem.”
Earlier this year in West Virginia, lawmakers expanded electronic ballot delivery to voters with a physical disability. Secretary of State Mac Warner advocated for the law, saying it was important to ensure no voter is disenfranchised.
“There are security concerns, but the likelihood of that happening is rather remote," he said. "And it gets to a risk-reward benefit. The reward is getting people who wouldn’t otherwise be able to vote.”
