Paper Ballots, Or Else… (feat. Barbara Simons)

Wavemaker Conversations: A Podcast for the Insanely Curious

Some people recognize potential threats to our democracy before others. My guest, Barbara Simons, is one of those people. 15 years ago, not long after the infamous “hanging chads” threw the Bush v Gore vote count into turmoil and computerized voting became the new rage, Simons, a computer scientist, and some of her colleagues, concluded that in order to protect the integrity of the vote count, we would have to move to paper ballots – everywhere. Simons became a co-founder of VerifiedVoting.Org, which is racing to inoculate America’s voting systems against hackers. In the beginning, Simons got nowhere. But she persisted. With 228 days until the mid-term elections, her voice and message need to be urgently spread. And for those of you who may not find your calling early in life, Simons will share her journey from college dropout to Ph.D.