Cast Ballot Lists
An essential tool for election transparency. Plus updates from multiple states.
Among the items that Idaho does better than other states is providing its registration list for the entire state for a mere $20. Other states may charge thousands of dollars and some states (ME, NM, PA) have court cases that would prevent some groups from obtaining such lists.
As researchers in Idaho began digging into registration lists in search of phantom voters, we learned about some limitations with the registration list. If we wanted to put together a list of all the people that voted using the voting history in the list, we could never get the number of voters to match what was stated on the official canvass.
This is because registration lists are dynamic. They change over time as people move around, die, or otherwise become inactive. If you request a list too far away from a given election, you will find significant disparity between the count of people that voted in a given election and the official canvass. If you request a list that is too close to a given election, ‘same day registrations’ may not have been updated into the registration system which will again result in significant disparity.
In other words, creating a list of all the people that voted in a given election is virtually impossible to do accurately with a registration list. What we need instead is a ‘cast ballot list’ that should be permanently stored after each election and that will never change. Such a list not only provides supporting detail for every ballot cast, but it is much more useful for citizen door knocking activity to verify that it matches reality.
A cast ballot list is not readily available, although it can be created. Candidates in Ada County can access such a list via a “candidate’s portal”. An updated cast ballot list is provided every couple of hours and is meant to enable candidates to do ‘get out the vote’ efforts by focusing on people that have not already voted.
The ‘cast ballot list’ is just one of a number of transparency tools that should be publicly provided in order to bolster confidence in our elections.
AZ: Constitutional Amendment could Echo Idaho Effort - Arizona will have a constitutional amendment on their 2024 ballot that addresses the same issue we are facing here in Idaho - preventing open primaries and ranked choice voting. An article in the Federalist touched upon that effort and also pointed out deceitful tactics from pro-RCV groups in trying to get open primaries and ranked choice voting implemented.
MI: Audio Suggests AG Concocted Charges Against Political Opponents - Attorney Stephanie Lambert was criminally charged in August for illegally accessing voting machines while investigating the 2020 election. Audio shared on this podcast (starting around the 1hr 30min mark) seems to show that Nessel engaged in forum shopping for the lawsuit as well as conspiring with colleagues to define a crime.
MI, MN, CO: Efforts Fail to Remove Trump from Ballot - Several state court efforts have attempted to remove Trump from their 2024 ballots for inciting an insurrection on J6. Using a certain interpretation of the third clause of the 14th Amendment, cases were brought in Michigan, Minnesota and Colorado. Each has now failed. A Supreme Court challenge (perhaps after state Supreme Court appeals) is likely on the horizon.
AZ: AG Warns Mohave County About Hand Counting - Mohave County had entertained eliminating machines and hand counting the 2024 election. It was earlier decided to not do so but the matter was resurrected and once again defeated this past week. The Arizona AG had issued a letter stating they would be violating Arizona law if they opted to hand count.
GA: Voting Machine Vulnerability Trial Set for January - A 135 page ruling from US District Judge Amy Totenberg moves forward a case brought several years before the 2020 election which challenged the security of voting machines. Of note is that the Judge specifically referred to voting systems being ‘critical infrastructure’ which places higher demands on cyber security vetting.
PA: Judge Race Vote Manipulation? - I’ve seen similar videos as the linked video but not when using official Secretary of State website data. The video shows votes across several counties where totals went down at different times during the night. Hopefully, an explanation is forthcoming.
CA, GA, NV, OR, WA, TX - Suspicious Letters Sent to Election Offices - Some reports indicated that they may have contained fentanyl but as yet, there has not been any confirmation. Threats to election workers has been a concern of election officials and election integrity groups have been leery that they are being accused of such actions.
FL: Observation Changing Behavior? - The People’s Audit has begun pulling voter rolls each month and speaking out about anomalies they have found in their monthly comparisons. Interestingly enough, they have seen voter rolls shrinking in a state whose population is growing. Why?
MA: Were People Paid for their Ballots? - Video shows people apparently being paid for their votes in a Springfield, MA mayoral race and affidavits from poll workers allege others were being paid for their votes.