Commissioners of the United States Election Assistance Commission

As previously reported on Etopia Media Voting News, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to kill the SERVE Internet voting program for military and overseas voters and the U.S. Senate voted to delay but continue the program.

Now, as is customary, a House-Senate conference committee, this one assigned the task of reconciling the House- and Senate-passed versions of the 2005 Defense Authorization Bill, which contained the two different versions of what to do about military Internet voting, has issued its final report, which contains the House-Senate consensus on what to do about letting soldiers and ex-pats vote remotely over the Internet.

As can be seen by looking at Section 567 of the conference report, the U.S. Congress has opted neither to kill remote Internet voting (as called for in the House version) nor to delay and continue the program (as specified in the Senate version).

Instead, the Congress has chosen to allow remote military Internet voting only after "the Election Assistance Commission notifies the Secretary [of Defense] that the Commission has established electronic absentee voting guidelines and certifies that it will assistant the Secretary in carrying out the project."

A call from Etopia Media Voting News to the Election Assistance Commission for comment on their role in assigning themselves this crucial position in the process of creating an Internet voting platform and on their plans (if any) to develop "electronic absentee voting guidelines" or to assist the Department of Defense in carrying out remote, Internet, voting projects had not been returned as this report was posted on Friday, October 8th.

As long ago as 1997, requests had been made to the federal elections agency then responsible for developing voluntary voting standards, the Federal Elections Commission, asking it to create "electronic absentee voting guidelines," according to which potentially viable remote Internet voting systems could be certified for use by states.

This was never done, up until the time when responsibility for developing voluntary voting system standards was transferred from the FEC to the EAC, where now, apparently, it includes, as it always may have included, the option of developing "electronic absentee voting guidelines" for military, expatriate, and (possibly) domestic civilian remote Internet voting.

That's seven years, now, and counting, on adapting the American voting enterprise to take advantage of the latest in electronic technology.