BATON ROUGE – Louisiana’s secretary of state has pulled the plug on a request-for-proposal (RFP) process to choose a new voting machine vendor and upgrade the state’s aging elections technology, citing misinformation that has hurt voter confidence in the system.
After consulting with leaders in the state legislature, Kyle Ardoin moved to cancel an RFP to replace the state’s three-decade-old voting machines as of March 3. One of the companies that had been competing for the contract, Dominion Voting Systems, has been subject to accusations of fraud after the Nov. 3 presidential election, leading some Louisiana residents to oppose contracting with Dominion. The company has denied any wrong-doing and is suing its accusers.
Questions also have been raised about how state-mandated direct recording electronic (DRE) voting machine technology will be applied and how this will affect the bidding process, according to Ardoin.
“It is imperative that we seek prompt engagement of the Louisiana legislature to help our office clarify these matters of law and to ensure that our citizens receive the highest level of competition in this important procurement,” he said in a statement. “... I am withdrawing the RFP to spend the next few months seeking to undo the damage to voter confidence done by those who willfully spread misinformation and disinformation.”
Dominion, which recently filed a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against Rudy Giuliani, former President Donald Trump’s attorney, for allegedly spreading disinformation against the company, expressed support for Ardoin’s position.
“Dominion understands the secretary of state’s decisions, and we are appreciative of all attempts to move forward,” Dominion’s CEO, John Poulos, said in a statement emailed to the Louisiana Record. “Unfortunately, months of baseless allegations of election fraud have adversely affected the state’s procurement process, creating an untenable environment for fact-based deliberation.”
Poulos also said the company would continue to make the case that it could provide a voting system that serves Louisiana’s needs as the vendor selection process evolves.
“We pledge to continue our commitment to offering innovative, reliable election technology tailored to individual states’ requirements,” he said.
State Sen. Sharon Hewitt (R-Slidsell) last month wrote a sharply worded letter to Ardoin urging him to put the voting machine project on hold, suggesting that there hasn’t been enough discussion about election security.
“In the current RFP process, you solely determined Louisiana’s standards for election machines, greatly expanding the state’s statutes, and sidestepping input from the public election experts, the vendors and the legislature, before the issuance of the RFP,” Hewitt wrote.
Both Louisiana Speaker of the House Clay Schexnayder and Senate President Page Cortez both supported Ardoin’s move to cancel the RFP process.