DFL and GOP lawmakers in Minnesota’s House and Senate introduced bills to allow the possibility of mobile voting in municipalities.
Democrats and Republicans in Minnesota are always looking for ways to get their base to cast their ballots. While the parties often differ in what that means, there is bipartisan support at the Capitol for opening the door to potential mobile voting.
The nonprofit Mobile Voting Project put on a demonstration in the Capitol rotunda on how mobile voting could work, as they lobby lawmakers to take on the issue in the legislature’s final week.
“We’re pushing to get cities here in Minnesota to be able to offer that option,” said Michelle Feldman of the Mobile Voting Project.
The bills introduced in the House and Senate, each authored by DFL and GOP lawmakers, would allow cities to pass mobile voting options. Some cities in other states have opened up options for disabled voters or military members serving overseas, so they don’t need to rely on ballots traveling home through the mail.
Keeping this first step as simply opening the door for municipalities to consider the options has helped gain support from Republicans who see potential benefits in rural areas.
The Mobile Voting Project promises security in the product they are developing.
“Yes, at this stage, it’s getting there,” said Forrest Senti, Mobile Voting Project. “The whole idea behind this is that you’d be able to detect if something happened and be able to work on it and fix the issue.”
But skeptics are raising flags. In response to the Mobile Voting Project, 21 computer scientists, led by a Princeton professor, signed onto a statement entitled “Internet voting is insecure and should not be used in public elections.”
Lawmakers involved with this bill believe it has some chance of going somewhere this year. But Secretary of State Steve Simon, who is in charge of elections in Minnesota, has not come out with a position on this issue.
