Former Diebold Sales Rep Becomes Registrar of Voters in San Diego

[The Straight Story]

Former Diebold Sales Rep Becomes Registrar of Voters in San Diego

Diebold Deborah Seiler, a former sales representative for Diebold Election Systems, has been made the new registrar of voters for San Diego County in California. Diebold makes the voting machines used in San Diego. I previously wrote about Seiler's prior appointment as registrar of Solano County in 2004 -- a one-time Diebold county. From that story:

As the Diebold sales rep, Seiler sold Solano County nearly 1,200 touch-screen machines that were not federally tested or state certified. When the state banned the machines because of Diebold's business practices, the county had to find a replacement for the machines and pay Diebold more than $400,000 to get out of its contract.

Joining Seiler in the San Diego elections office is another election official beleaguered by controversy -- Michael Vu. Until recently, Vu was the elections director in Cuyahoga County in Ohio. He resigned in the wake of a number of critical reports depicting problems with how his office conducted elections and how machines made by Diebold performed. His resignation also followed the conviction of two election workers in his office who were found guilty of rigging a recount in the 2004 presidential election. Vu was recently made assistant registrar of voters in San Diego.

The announcement was made today by San Diego's interim registrar, Mischelle Townsend. Townsend was previously the registrar of voters in Riverside County but left that office under the cloud of a financial conflict-of-interest controversy involving Sequoia Voting Systems -- the company that made the machines used in Riverside. Townsend has been acting as registrar of voters in San Diego until the county could find a permanent registrar.

Seiler will start her new job on June 4th.

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/05/former_diebold_.html