Concerns about the integrity of electronic voting machines do not assume some grand conspiracy between equipment vendors and some political party. The problem is the simple fact that complex software always has bugs, and, even if bug-free, can be tampered with easily.
Yes, some of the voting vendors might seem shady. But that's beside the point. Even the most trustworthy vendor isn't up to the task of creating a computerized voting machine sufficiently reliable and secure to depend on for civil elections. It is beyond the state of the art.
This is why the concept of "software independence" is so important for voting systems. You can use computers, but the outcome must not depend on the integrity of software. That's the only known viable approach. Paper ballots and mandatory risk limiting audits can achieve this.
In any case, NONE of these concerns assume malice on the part of vendors or election officials. It's unfortunate that some of the rhetoric seems to, but that's not what the researchers who call for safeguards like software independence and RLAs are worried about.
