11 Fundamentals of Auditing Elections

Are election outcomes publicly-verifiable? 11 Fundamentals of Auditing Elections

All of the following procedures are necessary to avoid certifying incorrect election outcomes:

1. Use independently-auditable voting systems — voter-marked paper ballots.

2. Publicly report all vote tallies (audit units) used to tally overall election results prior to randomly selecting a sample for auditing.

3. Allow meaningful public observation and participation in manual audits and in security and transportation procedures for electoral records, including ballots. Prohibit ballot and electoral record access between the time of public posting and manual audits.

4. Use sampling methods designed to allow the public to verify that the risk of certifying any incorrect initial election outcome is less than 1%, based on within audit unit upper margin error bounds and the overall reported contest margin. Assume that outcome-altering vote fraud could be well-hidden in the smallest number of audit units possible. If maximum within audit unit margin error is assumed to be less than the upper margin error bound, then allow candidates to select discretionary units for manual auditing in addition to the random sample.

5. Use publicly-verifiable random selection methods, preferably weighted by upper margin error bounds of audit units rather than using a uniform sampling distribution.

6. Conduct polling place and jurisdiction-wide reconciliation of printed, used, unused, and spoiled ballots with absentee ballot and polling place records.

7. Provide timely public access to electoral records necessary to evaluate the accuracy and integrity of reconciliation and manual auditing processes.

8. Use voter intent as the standard for manual counts during audits.

9. Publicly report any discrepancies found during the audit and use the manual counts to correct the initial reported results.

10. Expand the sample size, perhaps to a full recount, or certify the election using an algorithm based on the premises of the sampling method. Treat any missing paper ballots as discrepancies when deciding whether to expand or certify.

11. Complete the audit prior to certifying election results.

Does the state you live in follow all these procedures?

Kathy Dopp
Ph.D. Student
Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy
State University of New York at Albany
kathy dot dopp at gmail.com
August 28, 2010