Georgia bill to strip QR codes from ballots would cost tens of millions of dollars

[SARose]

By Jessica Huseman

Tucked inside a massive elections bill passed last month by Georgia’s legislature is a provision that requires the state to spend millions of dollars to overhaul the state’s existing voting system, or to purchase a new one before 2026.

Election officials and experts say it’s an impossible timeline, and that the vague language of the bill may prevent the use of electronic tabulators altogether. Lawmakers allocated no money for the change, which would remove computer-readable QR codes and other barcodes that the state’s voting system relies on to accurately tabulate ballots.

“We’re talking about an expense of about $25-to-$26 million, to about $300 million, depending on how you want to do it,” Gabe Sterling, the chief operating officer in the secretary of state’s office, told the House Governmental Affairs Committee on March 20, eight days before the bill passed the House. If lawmakers wanted to proceed, Sterling told them, they should write the legislation to make the changes contingent on appropriating enough money to pay for them, and move the effective date back to give election officials more time.

Lawmakers have already pushed the effective date back two years — from 2024 to 2026 — but did not make the change contingent on providing funding. So if the governor signs the bill now, it’s not clear where election officials will get the money.

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I thought only Texas legislators were this stupid. Hey y’all! 👋 Welcome to crazy town!

[yellowdogintexas]

1. In Texas equipment choices are made by the county.

We use the Hart system here. There is a QR code but it does not contain the voter's choices. The choices are printed on the ballot by the DUO machine which is where we vote and then print our ballots. Our scanner picks up the written description, giving us a 100% paper trail.

The QR code contains the ballot number precinct and ballot form information The ballot number is added when the ballot is printed. Our ballots are blank when we start out

[SARose]

4. No funding

Georgia spent over $100 million in 2020 to upgrade their systems. Now the legislature has passed a bill that will render the existing voting machines unusable. In their infinite wisdom they failed to provide funding for a new system that doesn’t exist.

[louis-t]

2. If the RNC wasn't paying Skippy's legal bills

they could pay for the whole thing.

[patphil]

3. The real reason they don't want QR codes is that it makes it much harder to insert fake ballots into the vote stream.

And, since each vote has a QR code that insures it's validity, you know when and where the vote was cast.
Republicans don't like that, since it reduces the possibility of fraud, and gives them less leverage on their whole "stolen election" mantra.

[ga_girl]

5. I've not liked the QR codes since they were introduced

I've worked as an assistant poll manager for 20 odd years and one stint during Advanced In Person voting. When I first had training on the Diebold equipment, I tried to scan the QR code, which of course did not release any information. Since the QR is the official recording of vote selections, not being able to see what it contains is wrong.

My suggestion would be to provide a machine that would scan the ballot and display the selections, placed at every ballot scanner at a precinct. Obviously there would have to be privacy screens, but those already exist around each voting station.

Gwinnett County

[yellowdogintexas]

6. that is how the Hart system works. The QR has no vote information

Just the precinct and ballot form information and the number assigned to the ballot when it is printed. This is in lieu of prenumbered ballots