Just days after Apple CEO Tim Cook said Americans should be able to vote on an iPhone, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose called the idea “absurd.”
Following the adoption of a controversial voting law in Georgia, Tim Cook weighed in, saying the technology could be the answer to simplifying voting. In an interview with New York Times, suggested that smartphones could be a solution to voting rights problems.
But LaRose, Ohio’s election chief, said he was “aggressively” opposed to the idea. “It’s not on the clock. Not in Ohio,” he said FOX business.
“I think this is a classic example of one of them, a kind of elite, considering that they have a simple solution to a complex problem,” the Ohio secretary of state said.
As to the reason, LaRose set out a number of reasons. He said a certain degree of technological competence is needed. Although he admitted that the technology could exist in the near future, it would be “more complicated than people realize”.
For example, LaRose said voting officials should be able to verify whether a voter “who they say they are” by multi-factor authentication. In addition, the system should demonstrate that the voter is in fact the owner of the device. A paper trail for audits is also a must, LaRose argues.
“And then you have to separate the identity from the individual, so that the individual can vote secretly and not be watched by a government official, which we all believe is very strong … hard to do,” LaRose said .
He said the most important aspect of the election was “public confidence”, which means that “every vote is counted fairly and without fraud and deception”. LaRose added that maintaining public confidence is much more difficult than technological expertise.
LaRose went on to say he shares concerns that social media platforms and technology companies limit or censor conservative content.
“It’s obvious that there is a bias of many of these technology companies to the left and that the whole idea of nullifying the culture of censoring people whose opinions we disagree with is really corrosive and dangerous,” LaRose said. “Why would you want to allow the same individuals to have any control over the actual election process?”
The Ohio secretary of state added that the technology could do “a lot of good things” and that he is a fan of its adoption. However, he stopped saying that voting on a smartphone or an internet-connected device was a good idea.
“The idea of letting people use iPhones or any other mobile device to do something as crucial as voting is just absurd,” he said.