An Alabama congressman is proposing legislation that would require probate judges to conduct election audits in county and state elections.
HB 30, sponsored by Rep. Debbie Wood (R-Valley), would require probate judges to designate a county precinct for an audit of a county or statewide contest after each election. Ballots counted by machines at a polling place selected by the Board of Elections would be recounted and compared to the final election results to ensure the integrity of the election.
“This post-election audit bill is testing the machine to make sure it’s doing its job,” Wood said in a phone interview Tuesday. “I’ve worked with technology and machines all my life, I was a real estate agent and relied on computers and all those things. But I always knew they could fail, they could have a problem, a problem and they would need to be fixed.”
Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen said in a statement that the counting machines used in Alabama elections are all less than 10 years old and are used only on election days. They are publicly tested each election cycle.
“None of the ballot counters are connected to the internet and our elections use only paper ballots,” the statement said. “None of the election day counters used in this state, whether rented or owned, would be used if they were not functioning exactly as they should.”
Kathy Jones, president of the League of Women Voters of Alabama, said Madison County, where she lives, recently purchased new machines.
“I am fully convinced that our probate judge here in Madison County runs a very strict regime,” Jones said, “and I suspect most probate judges would agree with that, because I don’t know if any probate judge disagrees. If he thought the devices were not trustworthy, he certainly would have applied for more funds from his county to be able to replace those devices.”
Under Wood’s bill, on the second Friday after the election, members of each county’s board of elections would designate the precinct and round in which votes should be audited. The probate judge would then set the date, time and place of the audit and appoint an inspector and the necessary number of poll workers to conduct the audit.
The ballot papers for audit will be delivered to the venue unopened and sealed in their original packaging along with all other election materials required for auditing.
The audit shall not take place earlier than 31 days after the national parliamentary election or before the deadline within which a candidate must submit the documents necessary to contest the election result.
After the audit, the county probate judge will report the findings to the Alabama Secretary of State’s office. The report will include a description of any problems or discrepancies, the reasons for the problems, and recommendations to correct the problem.
Sonny Brasfield, executive director of the Association of County Commissions of Alabama, said he worked with Wood on the bill, even though it is not part of the group’s platform.
“Initially we were concerned about the costs and administrative difficulties at the local level, but these problems were solved through linguistic changes,” he said.
Under the bill, all costs associated with the county audit will be reimbursed by the state auditor.
Wood said she hopes the bill will serve as a catalyst for discussion about voting machines and force election officials to bring them up to date.
“Everyone talks about how old these machines are,” Wood said. “We as a state need to get to work on replacing them, and to do that we need to have a good conversation and get things moving.”
Jones said she has marked ballots in the past to test the machines and the results have been accurate.
“It was 100% accurate,” Jones said. “I’ve done this in several elections. I trust the machines to be programmed correctly, that the election officials know what they’re doing, and that the people who program these machines are using the voter lists that are given to them. They control and protect the integrity of this process.”
