Former Trump campaign lawyer Kurt Olsen recently petitioned the US Department of Commerce to ban half of the nattion's voting machines. This proposal, which stems from unverified claims about the 2020 election, aimed to fundamentally alter how American elections are managed.

The Department of Commerce's investigation into a 50% machine ban

The US Department of Commerce reportedly began examining legal pathways to implement a ban on half of the nation's voting hardware. According to the report, this investigation was triggered by requests from Kurt Olsen, who sought to restrict the technology used in American elections.

While some officials within the Department of Commerce initially explored how such a mandate could be legally justified, the effort ultimately failed to gain traction. As the report indicates, the initiative was abandoned because Olsen and other administration staffers were unable to provide the necessary evidence to support the proposed restrictions.

Kurt Olsen’s push for manual ballot counting

In addition to the proposed machine ban, Kurt Olsen advocated for a scheme that would require affected states to perform manual hand-counts of all ballots. This proposal was framed as a way to ensure election accuracy, though it faced significant critiism from election professionals.

Election experts have noted that a transition to hand-counting would be significantly more time-consuming than using electronic systems. furthermore, these experts warned that manual counting is inherently more prone to human error, which could potentially undermine the very election integrity the proposal claimed to protect.

The effort to transfer election authority from US states to the federal government

The attempt to restrict voting machines appears to be part of a larger effort to move election management from the state level to the federal government . By utilizing federal agencies like the Department of Commerce, the proposal sought to bypass the traditional authority held by individual US states over their own electoral processes.

This move mirrors broader efforts to challenge the decentralized nature of the American voting system. By centralizing control, proponents of these measures aim to create a more uniform, federally-managed election landscape, though such a shift would represent a massive departure from current constitutional norms.

The missing evidence behind the Commerce Department's review

Several critical details regarding the Department of Commerce's internal deliberations remain unknown. While the report states that the effort ended due to a lack of evidence,it does not specify what kind of documentation or proof Olsen was expected to provide to satisfy federal officials. Additionally, the source does not identify which specific voting machine manufacturers or specific models were the primray targets of the proposed ban. The report provides details on the proposal and the expert backlash, but it does not include a direct response from Kurt Olsen regarding the lack of evidence.