Noting that a court order requires Republican Secretary of State Mike Coffman's office “to recertify all election equipment” in Colorado, an August 27 article in The Pueblo Chieftain omitted the fact that a Denver district judge ordered the recertification after finding in 2006 that Republican former Secretary of State Gigi Dennis' office failed to properly certify voting machines used in that year's general election.

As The Denver Post reported on September 24, 2006, Denver District Judge Lawrence Manzanares had ruled two days earlier that “Dennis' office never created minimum security standards for the [electronic voting] machines -- as required by state law” and that “the state did an 'abysmal' job of documenting testing during the certification process.”

From the August 27 Chieftain article, “County unravels snags for mail election,” by Margie Wood:

County clerks were approaching panic stage earlier last week when Colorado Secretary of State Mike Coffman's office said election equipment couldn't be recertified until Oct. 1, but Coffman said Friday not to worry.

Coffman's office is under court order to recertify all election equipment, after a citizens' group filed suit in federal court challenging security measures employed in electronic voting machines.

Pueblo's county clerk, Gilbert Ortiz Jr., is planning a mail election Nov. 6 for eight other local government entities, including the City of Pueblo, both major school districts in the city and county, and Pueblo West and Colorado City metropolitan districts.

[...]

Coffman said the court order requires him to recertify the election equipment in time for the primary election next August, “so it doesn't apply to this election, since there is no statewide issue this year.”

He blamed the delay in recertification on “lack of cooperation” by the vendor companies, adding, “If the vendors had cooperated as we assumed they would, we would have been done by July 1, but we're working through that. It is a big decision to make sure these electronic machines are secure and every vote is counted.”

The Chieftain further reported, “The Secretary of State earlier in the year put Ortiz's office on 'election watch' because it determined that signature verification was insufficient for the huge tide of absentee ballots last November.” While the article added, “Neither Ortiz nor Coffman was in office at that time; both were elected in November,” it failed to mention that as the preceding secretary of state, Dennis -- formerly a Republican state senator from Pueblo West -- and her office were responsible for the lack of security and proper certification before the November 2006 general election.

As Colorado Media Matters has documented (here, here, and here), the Chieftain has published numerous articles on the subject without noting the failure of Dennis' office to properly recertify the voting machines.

In addition to the Post article on the judge's ruling, a September 26, 2006, Rocky Mountain News editorial addressing Manzanares' decision similarly stated, “The trial revealed that the process used to certify machines was laughable. The law allowed the state to hire certification 'experts' without requiring those persons to have any formal credentials -- and that's what Dennis did.” According to the editorial:

[T]he court found that Dennis failed to set even minimal security standards for the touch-screen devices before they were approved. This led to some ugly incidents, as in Mesa County, where officials pressured Dennis' expert to approve the machines with little testing so it could use them in the August primary.

It's clear that a top priority for whoever is elected to succeed Dennis in November will be rebuilding Coloradans' faith in the most basic rite of democracy.