California Secretary of State Debra Bowen and I are friends on Facebook, and she’s a member of of our Facebook group. We also interviewed her for the second episode of our vlog.

So, this morning I was curious when she posted to her Facebook status that she was going to make a major announcement later today. Four hours ago, her status changed: “filing suit against [voting machine manufacturer] ES&S after an investigation revealed that the company sold 972 machines that were never certified.”

Brad Friedman at BRAD BLOG has the complete press release. The AP reports that “Bowen will seek damages of up to $50,000 per violation plus reimbursement of money paid by the counties. Calls to ES&S were not immediately returned on Monday.” Earlier this year Bowen was in the spotlight for pulling the certifications of several types of voting machines used in California citing security concerns.

No word yet if other Secretaries of State will begin adopting the Facebook strategy.

* Tuesday AM Update: The San Fransisco Chronicle has the story. It quotes Bowen as saying “ES&S ignored the law over and over and over again, and it got caught [...] I am not going to stand on the sidelines and watch a voting system vendor come into the state, ignore the laws and make millions of dollars from California’s taxpayers in the process.”

* Add E&S Statement: John Myers of Capital Notes and KQED posts the manufacturer’s response.