Mark Ruffalo: “I’ve helped to pass the [Voting Integrity and Verification Act of New York.] … in the State Senate three times, but it keeps getting blocked in the Assembly,” Ruffalo wrote. “It’s frustrating and needs to pass this year.”
In 2022, Rufffalo shared a City & State article on the issue on X. “@CarlHeastie please protect NY voters & pass A1115C so that we don’t have the same voting machines & issues as states like Georgia,”
COMMENT: Georgia now bans barcode voting. Citing security concerns, Colorado was the first state to stop counting ballots with printed barcodes. When will New York step up? Urge your Assemblymembers and the Governor to pass VIVA NY now!
Mark Ruffalo is obsessed with NY politics
City & State New York (cityandstateny.com)
Ruffalo advocacy has focused largely on fracking and the environment, but he has also been involved in the fight to keep paper ballots in New York and several other issues. .... He may play a scientist on the silver screen, but he said he likes to elevate the real brainiacs on the issues he cares about. “I am glad to be able to use my platform to help put the spotlight on the issues, activists and scientists who are really leading the way forward and pushing New York state to be a national and international leader.”
Ruffalo has also dedicated some of his platform to ensuring that New York continues to use paper ballots. “I got involved with protecting our paper ballots for voting because this was something that former Assemblymember Barbara Lifton was so proud and passionate about,” Ruffalo wrote to City & State, referencing the former Ithaca-area lawmaker who helped shift the state to hand-marked paper ballots in 2006 and flexing his bona fides on local political knowledge. (Lifton now chairs the state Public Campaign Finance Board.) But the law left the state open to touch-screen voting machines, which election security experts warn pose many risks. Ahead of a vote by the state Board of Elections to allow the machines – which they ultimately did approve – Ruffalo encouraged New Yorkers to make their voices heard in opposition to the machines.
Even before that vote, Ruffalo had been an advocate for legislation that would require hand-marked paper ballots, like the Voting Integrity and Verification Act of New York. “I’ve helped to pass that bill and similar ones in the State Senate three times, but it keeps getting blocked in the Assembly,” Ruffalo wrote. “It’s frustrating and needs to pass this year.”
In 2022, he shared a City & State article on the issue on X. “@CarlHeastie please protect NY voters & pass A1115C so that we don’t have the same voting machines & issues as states like Georgia,” Ruffalo wrote to the Assembly speaker, referencing a bill that would have banned touch-screen voting machines. “If this bill doesn’t pass again, @NYSAssembly will be to blame!” At the time, the state Senate was poised to pass a ban for the second time. “(Ruffalo has) been a strong advocate for all of the bills to protect New Yorkers’ right to continue voting with pen and paper or (ballot-marking device),” said Lulu Friesdat, co-founder and executive director of Smart Elections, an election integrity advocacy group.