The following twitter thread is from an election and voting technology professional. It will curl your hair:
The post-election sham underway in AZ should concern every American.
Whether you’re an avid or casual observer, here’s a deep-dive🧵to explain why it’s not just about AZ — it’s a harbinger of grave threats to democracy that could spread farther.
To start: The charade in AZ is not an “audit.” And my pointing that out is not rhetoric. It’s a critical fact to name the danger.
The AZ Senate has hijacked a term for an important, proven, post-election verification process and cynically exploited it for partisan purposes.
As far as “every American should care,” here’s the “big picture” reveal, up front:
What’s happening in AZ is a potentially mortal attack on the firewall that protects impartial election administration from political influence & disinformation.
And it could spread elsewhere.
When weaponized doubt undermines faith in elections forever, it’s game-over for democracy.
And when it’s game-over for democracy, there’s no peaceful transfer of power. That’s what’s at stake. It’s the diff btw civil society & fighting in the streets.
This is not hyperbole.
In this thread, I will not call the AZ process an “audit,” as that would be a misnomer. It is no more an audit than cutting into someone’s chest with a dull stone is “heart surgery.”
Instead, I will simply refer to “the Arizona post-election sham.”
In this thread, I’ll unpack and illustrate why…
a) the premises of the sham are faulty; and
b) the sham cannot accomplish what a true audit is supposed to do, which is to increase public confidence in the correctness of election results
First off, on the faulty premises:
Post-election audits are supposed to be consequential.
But Senate Pres @FannKfann has said this exercise is not to change the already-certified election results. So, what’s it for?
(More on this in a moment.)
It’s reasonable to question the purpose of the sham, because it cannot do what an audit is supposed to do (i.e. increase public confidence in elections). Why not?
– It’s not transparent
– It’s not impartial; and
– It relies on unprofessional procedures lacking in rigorThe biggest tell about why the sham is *not* designed to increase public confidence in elections is because:
– it’s used to provide daily fuel for an escalating disinfo campaign
– to push the Big Lie; and
– to raise political funds.
None of this is normal for audits.
To learn about what looks “normal” for audits, or if you need an easy, plain language introduction to the topic, take a look here from @OSET’s CTO, @ejsebes.
It’s critical to recognize that in the elections world, if they are done right, post-election audits are not taken lightly; they are a big deal, & they must be done with great precision and public transparency – not “flying by the seat of your pants.”
An analogy: election officials think about ballots in a way similar to how like bankers take care of money.
Every single ballot is akin to a piece of currency – each and every piece of paper must be securely protected, preserved, and accounted for.
Every. Single. One.
13/ So, now that you’ve seen the Q&A to get caught up in AZ (above), and now that you have an intro to normal audits, let’s take a deeper dive into the faulty premises and poor execution of this post-election sham in AZ…
And why this model must not be repeated in other states.
ISSUE #1: There’s No “There” There
Professional election administrators in Maricopa County already performed a post-election audit of the 2020 pres election, and confirmed the correctness of reported results.
In addition to Maricopa’s own post-election audit, the County also commissioned an audit of its voting equipment, performed by two third-party voting system test laboratories, accredited by @EACgov. No irregularities were found.
ISSUE #2: Not Transparent
Nothing is more impt to the integrity of post-election audits than public transparency. Yet the AZ sham repeatedly fails to meet this standard.
Likely because the contractor (Cyber Ninjas) has no experience with elections. They just don’t get it.
An especially egregious example of how Cyber Ninjas doesn’t get elections-related civic values is their requirement that observers of the sham sign a non-disclosure agreement.
Or, as @maddow put it: “You can observe…but you just can’t tell anyone what you observed.”
ISSUE #3: Not Impartial
For a post-election audit to be credible, it’s essential that the parties administering it not be tainted by bias. Yet Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan was a vocal advocate of Trump’s “Stop the Steal” message.
ISSUE #4: Poor Procedures, Voter Marks
Voters make mistakes when they mark their ballots, & they have diff styles of marks too. In an audit, there must be standards to determine the interpretation of marks, i.e. “what choice did the voter intend?” The sham has none.
ISSUE #5: Poor Procedures, Ballot Security
The conditions in the Coliseum, where the sham was being conducted, do not inspire confidence. For example, ballots were kept in a chain link “corral” — but it doesn’t even have a ceiling and access control appears sloppy.
ISSUE #6: Poor Procedures, Partisan Teams
In keeping with the value of impartiality, it is typical in post-election audits to ensure that auditors reviewing ballots are bipartisan teams, with equal representation.
Cyber Ninjas has said they cannot guarantee any of that.
ISSUE #7: Poor Procedures, IT Security
For a firm that claims to be “experts” in cybersecurity, the number of bad practices Cyber Ninjas has displayed is striking: Unattended laptop PCs, WiFi routers on servers w/ ballot images, etc.
Just horrible.
ISSUE #8 – Poor Procedures, Discrepancies
Former election official @lizlhoward of @BrennanCenter scratched her head over the lack of any procedures to reconcile different tallies for the same ballots among the human reviewers on a team. Duh.
24/ ISSUE #9 – The Snipe Hunt
Not only are the procedures silent on critical issues, but they are also constantly changing, apparently without end. So, this sham exercise is looking like an open-ended snipe hunt, bleeding into areas with no relevance.
SO FAR:
– Prior audits done
– No evidence of wrongdoing
– Biased “auditor,” no elections experience
– No standards for voter intent
– Poor procedures for ballot security
– Review teams not bipartisan
– Lousy IT security
– Silent on discrepancies
– Snipe huntThat’s a pause.
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE…
All of those problems should be enough on their own. Big, big problems. Not transparent. Not professional. Partisan. And now, to make it worse…
…they are moving all the ballots and equipment.
It’s a security nightmare.
ISSUE #10: Doing It Wrong
@SecretaryHobbs has been just one of a loud chorus pointing out the problems with this sham exercise. As an elections professional, she would know. In a lengthy letter to the AZ Senate, she provided details.
ISSUE #11: Intimidation & Harassment
For having the temerity to point out problems, supporters of the sham (no doubt committed to “freedom” and “transparency”) responded to @SecretaryHobbs with anonymous death threats.
ISSUE #12: Lies Beget More Lies – And Money
Undermining democracy like this would be bad enough. But the troubling part is that it likely doesn’t stop in AZ. This model could go elsewhere. It could become a model for other states. Why? Read on…
Like a cancer that produces more cancerous cells, the sham is itself fuel for an ongoing disinformation machine that spreads to other states – producing more donations, and more resources for the Big Lie, to keep our country divided in perpetuity.
I wouldn’t blame you if reading this far makes you feel like you need to take a shower. But I try to maintain hope. Because, as I said above, this is a binary choice.
When weaponized doubt undermines faith in elections forever, it’s game-over for democracy.
Forging ahead:
Develop more and better practices to provide transparency on election administration processes. It’s not easy, but if democracy is to survive, even the politicians sowing doubt must be reached, somehow.
Forging ahead:
The responsible press must keep telling the truth.
And that also means calling something “a lie” when it is a lie.
Forging ahead:
Voters should keep learning about the difference between a true audit, and a sham that hijacks the term. Audits are impartial, transparent, bipartisan, and based on rigorous procedures developed by election administration professionals. Forging ahead:
Listen to your local election officials, and support them. In a loud voice. They are heroes for democracy.
Contact your Congressional and state representatives, and tell them you support your local election officials too.
Forging ahead:
Support the free press. There are too many local reporters in AZ to thank them all for their coverage, but their noble work is a great reminder of how impoverished the public would be without the work of journalists committed to the public interest.
And finally:
Remember, when it’s game-over for democracy, there’s no peaceful transfer of power. (And that affects both parties. Undermining elections is like a snake eating its own tail.) This is a national security issue.
This is not hyperbole. /END
Originally tweeted by Eddie Perez (@eddieperezTX) on May 14, 2021.