Comprehensive Guide to Monitoring Computerized Elections

EDA is pleased to present for general public access, possibly the most thoroughly detailed election monitoring manual in the country. The primary author, Mickey Duniho, is a member of the Arizona Election Transparency Project and of AUDIT-AZ, an EDA affiliate organization co-founded by EDA Investigations Co-Coordinators John Brakey and David Griscom.

This manual was commissioned and published by the Election Integrity Committee of the Arizona Democratic Party.

Although prepared with specific reference to Arizona election law and procedure, this manual can be recommended as a guide to election monitoring anywhere in the US. This is because the electronic voting systems in use in the vast majority (well over 90%) of U.S. electoral jurisdictions overwhelmingly determine the conduct of elections, and vary only in slight details between the various E-voting vendors.

In-person Training Video Presenting the Monitoring Procedures Covered in the Manual

NOTE: This frame is the full 87-minute presentation in one take. Scroll further down for the presentation
divided into 7 shorter segments.

Whether or not every voting system feature or electoral procedure described in this manual correlates to a feature or procedure in your local electoral jurisdiction, this manual identifies the kinds of voting process information that must be checked and shows you where, when, and how to find and monitor these points in any computerized election process.

Scroll down past video links for Training Manual Table of Contents and Download Link.

Election Monitoring Training Video. Presentation divided into 7 segments of 5 to 15 minutes in length.

Videos by Sound & Fury Productions

Session 1

Session 2

Session 3

Session 4

Session 5

Session 6

Session 7

Table of Contents and DOWNLOAD LINK

Please download and distribute the entire manual (in PDF format) to your local teams of citizen election monitors.

We recommend that local groups modify sections of this manual to reflect election law and procedure that may differ in your state, and then upload these modified state editions to the appropriate state folder in this 50 State Directory.""

Download the Manual (PDF)

Table of Contents

Chapters

1. Introduction to Election Systems

a. Components of the elections process
i. Voter registration
ii. Voter ID
iii. Casting the ballot
iv. Counting the vote
b. Party roles and election integrity structure
c. Risk assessment

2. Breaches of Election Integrity

a. Bureaucratic problems
i. Inadequate physical security
ii. Inadequate bookkeeping
iii. Inadequately trained poll workers
iv. Lack of transparency

b. System failures
i. Registration errors
ii. Ballot errors
iii. Early voting problems
iv. Polling place problems
v. Counting problems

c. Vintage intentional methods
i. Deny poor people the opportunity to register
ii. Purge valid voters from the registration rolls
iii. Direct voters to the wrong polling places
iv. Require ID at the polls
v. Prepare false early ballot entries
vi. Stuff the ballot box at the polls
vii. Render valid ballots unreadable or unacceptable
viii. Replace batches of valid ballots with fake ones

d. Modern technological intentional methods
i. Program computer to count incorrectly
ii. Change the totals in the computer after scanning ballots
iii. Report fraudulent results from polling places

3. Your rights and responsibilities

a. Statutory rights and responsibilities
i. Review voter registration lists
ii. Conduct logic and accuracy tests
iii. Appoint Election Board members
iv. Appoint observers to watch every step of ballot processing
v. Randomly select precincts and races to be audited
vi. Appoint audit workers to hand count some of the ballots
vii. Supervise the audit

b. Actions not legally specified but desirable and useful
i. Obtain copies of computer logs, election department reports, databases
ii. Analyze all the data collected by observers and from the Elections Department
iii. Ask questions about any procedure that seems incorrect or insecure

4. People involved in ensuring election integrity

a. Election Boards-paid employees of the County elections department
i. Accuracy Certification Board
ii. Poll workers-Inspectors, Marshals, Judges, Clerks
iii. Early Boards
iv. Duplication Boards
v. Receiving Boards
vi. Inspection Boards
vii. Provisional Boards
viii. Write-in Boards
ix. Audit Board

b. Election Observers – for every Board

c. Other election integrity people
i. Recruiters
ii. Coordinators
iii. Planners
iv. Liaisons
v. Researchers

5. Ensuring election integrity at the polls
a. Voters rights and likely problems
b. Poll watchers’ limitations
c. Getting help
d. Recruiting and training poll watchers

6. Ensuring election security

a. Security of ballots
i. Accounting for ballots printed and delivered to the County
ii. Accounting for ballots used
iii. Accounting for ballots not used
iv. Transporting ballots from one location to another
v. Other chain of custody issues
vi. Tamper-revealing seals

b. Security of election machines
i. Physical Security
ii. Checking the software on the election machines

c. Security of the central count system
i. Early ballot counting computer security
ii. Computer audit logs
iii. Security camera monitoring and logs
iv. Party observers’ role in maintaining security

d. Security of vote-total reports printed before the end of Election Day
i. Being alert to anything and everything coming out of the printer
ii. Sealing early reports and recording seal numbers
iii. Checking all seal numbers after Election Day

e. Security of the audit
i. Sealing early ballots selected for audit and recording seal numbers
ii. Checking all seals after Election Day
iii. Precinct-level report of votes BEFORE selection of precincts for audit
iv. Selecting the precincts and races to be audited
v. Selecting the early ballots to be audited
vi. Checking precinct-cast ballot bag tamper-revealing seals
vii. Checking seals on touch-screen voting machine cartridges

7. Ensuring election integrity-data collection and analysis

a. Collecting data
i. Recording ballots at every step of the process
ii. Recording seal numbers on boxes of ballots
iii. Recording times
iv. Recording names of people performing different tasks
v. Recording seal numbers used on computers, storage containers, rooms

b. Analyzing the data
i. Comparing numbers of ballots at different stages of the election
ii. Comparing seal numbers from different stages of the election
iii. Looking for odd events (e.g., extra early reports, unneeded database actions)
iv. Comparing early ballot numbers with precinct-cast ballot numbers
v. Checking the database after the election is over

Appendices

A. Arizona Election Day Manual
B. Consolidated Arizona Election Calendar
C. Count Chair Election Integrity Checklist
D. Observer Guidelines
E. Sample log forms for observers