By Patrick Colbeck
The 2020 election results have been certified certified by local, state and federal authorities. Certification of election results is only supposed to occur after the election results have been canvassed for each jurisdiction. The “canvassing” process is our first line of defense against election fraud. This “canvassing” is completed by what is referred to as a Board of Canvassers for each jurisdiction.
So, what exactly does the process of “canvassing” entail?
Canvassing is a process which ensures that the proper execution of election processes has been completed via examination of election records. In practical terms, the process of canvassing is simply the election version of what accountants would call an audit except that it is conducted by the Board of Canvassers.
There is significant variation as to the degree of discipline applied to these canvassing examinations. In practice, the canvas examination is focused primarily on the act of verifying that the number of votes cast in a precinct per the poll book equals the number of ballots. In order to truly ensure that a proper execution of election processes has been completed, however, a canvass would need to ensure that the integrity of each link in the election record chain of custody specific to that jurisdiction has been verified.
The lack of definition around what is specifically meant by “canvassing” invites the application of significant political pressure to canvassers to certify the vote. After all, voters and candidates alike are always anxious to learn the results of the election. They want the results as soon as possible. This translates to “rubber stamp” certification votes which do not have election integrity as their number one priority.
To make matters worse, once an election has been “certified” there is significant political pressure applied to accept the results and “just move on”. If the election processes were indeed conducted in a manner which maintained the chain of custody, accepting the results makes perfect sense. If, however, there is significant evidence of breakage in the links involved with the election chain of custody, such political pressures leave little room for courts to pursue allegations of fraud prior to a candidate taking office. In other words, canvassing which lacks a rigorous examination of the election chain of custody can be used to facilitate the theft of an election from voters.
See our primer on the 2020 Election Chain of Custody if you would like to learn more about this important topic.
Our second line of defense against election fraud is to conduct an audit. In Michigan, our Constitution guarantees our citizens the right to an election audit.
(h) The right to have the results of statewide elections audited, in such a manner as prescribed by law, to ensure the accuracy and integrity of elections.
Michigan Constitution, Article II Section 4
The only statutory requirements pertinent to the conduct of an audit are found in MCL 168.31a.
(1) In order to ensure compliance with the provisions of this act, after each election the secretary of state may audit election precincts.
(2) The secretary of state shall prescribe the procedures for election audits that include reviewing the documents, ballots, and procedures used during an election as required in section 4 of article II of the state constitution of 1963. The secretary of state and county clerks shall conduct election audits, including statewide election audits, as set forth in the prescribed procedures. The secretary of state shall train and certify county clerks and their staffs for the purpose of conducting election audits of precincts randomly selected by the secretary of state in their counties. An election audit must include an audit of the results of at least 1 race in each precinct selected for an audit. A statewide election audit must include an audit of the results of at least 1 statewide race or statewide ballot question in a precinct selected for an audit. An audit conducted under this section is not a recount and does not change any certified election results. The secretary of state shall supervise each county clerk in the performance of election audits conducted under this section.
(3) Each county clerk who conducts an election audit under this section shall provide the results of the election audit to the secretary of state within 20 days after the election audit.
Michigan Compiled Law 168.31a
In addition to a lack of any specificity as to chain of custody examination, Michigan statute stipulates that audits are conducted “Post-Election”. In other words, under Michigan law, audits, unless ordered by a court, are not a tool for evaluating election integrity prior to certifying election results beyond the poorly defined and politically influenced canvassing process. In most cases, we are limited to post-election audits to get to the bottom of any election fraud which may have occurred in a previous election.
An audit of election chain of custody is an important tool, but it needs to be of sufficient quality to be able to discern whether or not election fraud has occurred.
The following files provide the guidelines for the conduct of an election audit in the State of Michigan:
The findings and corrective actions generated from a real audit not only highlight any improprieties in previous elections which may involve criminal wrongdoing, they serve as the basis for true reforms for future elections.
So, pre or post-election, would Michigan audit guidelines be sufficient to identify election fraud? Let’s look at specific examples of election fraud in Michigan for which there are signed affidavits from certified Poll Challengers.
Does the state Audit Checklist encourage sufficient rigor for an auditor to be able to identify any of the fraud which was observed in the 2020 election?
Summary of Michigan election fraud related to chain of custody.
| Fraud Identified | Link Broken (i.e. Record) | Method of Discovery | Covered by Official Audit Guidelines? |
| 616,648 ineligible voters eligible to vote | QVF | Review QVF transaction log (who, when, how, where). Review steps taken by the Secretary of State to reconcile QVF with data in other states. Review procedures used by Secretary of State to verify address of voter in QVF. Review procedures used by clerk to verify birthdate of voter. | No |
| At least 210 dead voters | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Poll Book entries (who approved ballots for dead voters, what ID was shown). | No* |
| At least 317 voters cast votes in multiple states | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Poll Book entries (who approved ballots for voters casting votes in multiple states, what ID was shown). | No* |
| At least 13,248 absentee or early voters were not residents of Michigan when they voted | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Poll Book entries (who approved ballots for non-residents, what ID was shown). Review steps taken by the Secretary of State to reconcile QVF with data in other states. | No* |
| 2,474 voters had invalid addresses | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Poll Book entries (who approved ballots for dead voters, what ID was shown). Review procedures used by Secretary of State to verify address of voter in QVF. | No* |
| Fake birthdays entered | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Poll Book entries (who approved ballots of voters with fake birthdays, what ID was shown). Review procedures used by clerk to verify birthdate of voter. | No* |
| Multiple versions per precinct | Poll Book | Review Electronic Poll Book transaction log (QVF updates). Review Paper Poll Books sealed with precinct records. Reconcile various versions of Poll Books with each other and highlight discrepancies. | No |
| Double voting occurred | Poll Book | Compare voter entries in Poll Books used at “in person” polling locations with those used in Absentee Voter Counting Boards. | No |
| Unsupervised ballot duplication | Ballot | Review surveillance video. Review affidavits of party affiliation for poll workers. Reconcile poll worker affidavits with assigned precincts. Reconcile number of poll challengers for each party with number of precincts. | No |
| Suspicious drops of tens of thousands of ballots | Ballot | Review surveillance videos and ballot delivery vehicle logs to determine if ballots arrived in official election bureau vehicles, scan each paper ballot to identify fraudulent ballots, review poll book entries by clerks. Correlate poll book entries with ballot transfers to counting boards, correlate counting board transfers to surveillance video observations. Verify that ballots were sealed in approved containers. | No |
| At least 289,866 illegal votes cast | Vote Tally | Review electronic transaction logs (who, when, where) associated with vote tally transmittals for tabulators, adjudicators and EMS workstations as well as any peripherals such as USB Flash Drives or Compact Flash Drives. Attempt to correlate vote tally data transmittals with observed vote tally updates. Review audit trail and trace poll book entries regarding ballot batch handoffs to tabulators to tabulator vote tallies. Reconcile tabulator scanning capacity with the number of ballots reported to have been counted between updates. | No** |
| Evidence of internet connectivity | Vote Tally | Review election equipment specifications to determine if equipment is able to connect to the internet. Review Election System configuration reviewed by board of elections for each precinct prior to the election. Review pre-election Poll Inspector equipment certifications. Review event logs for all electronic devices used in support of election for indication of internet traffic. | No** |
| Evidence of fractional vote tallies | Vote Tally | Review electronic tabulating system equipment configuration and review pre-election Poll Inspector equipment certifications. Determine if any software modules which would enable fractional voting have been enabled. Review raw data stream (website formatting truncates fractions to whole numbers) for vote tally data transfers to/from tabulation equipment, adjudicator equipment, Election Management System equipment, and third party data aggregators (e.g. Edison Research). | No** |
| Dominion election system featured a 68% error rate resulting in suspicious adjudication rate | Vote Tally | Review pre-election Poll Inspector equipment certifications. Inspect the voting system equipment to see if it was defective. Review all ballots in precincts with high error rates which were rejected by voting system thereby requiring adjudication. Review audit trail to determine how many ballots were adjudicated. Conduct manual review of ballots in precincts. Reconcile manual vote tallies with adjudicated vote tallies. | No** |
| Data anomalies indicate fraud | Vote Tally | Apply same data anomaly analysis techniques (e.g. Benford’s law) used in detecting financial fraud to election fraud. | No |
So, out of the 15 examples of breakages in the election chain of custody, ZERO of them have a reasonable chance of being addressed, much less discovered, by adherence to the audit guidelines currently in place. ZERO. Fake audits are not the remedy for fake elections.
Our election system is broken.
A true audit with sufficient rigor to address the breaks in the links of the election chain of custody would go a long way towards repairing our election system. If our legislators and Governors were truly interested in repairing our election system, they could demonstrate their sincerity by requiring audits to have sufficient rigor to include the means of discovery cited above. Failure to do so indicates that they are simply “going through the motions”.
How and what was updated on the Audit Form as of 01-15-2020?
OMG – this is joke, right?
what you are talking about patrick is that our current election system in not transparent, or not sufficiently transparent, to assure voters that the will of the people, the legal votes, are correctly tabulated and counted. we’ve all just assumed in the past that “the system” was trustworthy enough to feel assured that our votes counted, that the declared winner was indeed the actual winner in an election. that trust has been shattered by the realization that our present system is not transparent. like you point out, there are countless vulnerable areas of the system where fraud can occur. then, to make matters worse, the system has no realistic way to appeal for redress of grievances. the court system breaks down in respect to elections because of separation of powers issues, not wanting to intervene by courts, etc. coupled with a powerful mainstream media and social media corporations censorship. it’s a perfect storm of corruption. this is the first time in my lifetime i can say elections in the u.s. are corrupt. unfortunately, it probably won’t be the last.
one ray of hope: arizona is supposed to be conducting a full forensic audit in a few days. if what we saw happen in michigan happened in arizona (as we suspect), then a lot of corruption should be exposed very soon. that might give other states, like michigan, to have enough courage to do a full forensic audit also. then the dominoes might start to fall. it wouldn’t change the presidential race, but it would prove our case.
It BETTER change the presidential race. I am telling you guys. WE WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS. YOU EITHER REMOVE BIDEN OR TBERE WILL BE A WAR ON AMERICAN SOIL. THIS WE THE PEOPLE PROMISE. DONT TELL US WE HAVE TO LET THIS RIDE OUT. IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN. WE ARE BEYOUND PISSED
You are so right! This election needs to be thrown out. We will not sit back and just let the traitors and thieves stomp on our right to a fair and legal election.
Allowing a fraudulent Presidential election slide by, just opens the door for the Dems to cheat more. Why Vote! Our Vote Matters!! Please advise on how We the People can correct this illegal election!!
How can this be possible in America? Of course it should change the race. It should change the race. Biden could resign or be removed.
How can I forward this to my representative
[email protected] the ballot jovan PULITZER
Watching Michigan Senate, oversight committee this week looks as if they are just going to sweep it under the rug. Our votes have not counted since 2000 when the machines were used more than the old time ballot stuffing was going on. Government seems to be (in my opinion) around 85% corrupt.
Well, Mr. Colbeck, call me reckless, but I nominate you and Ruth Johnson to lead a team to investigate, and to actuate a change in policy in Michigan to help bring back election integrity. We know we don’t have it, to be sure. Plenty of evidence there. And while, I have zero political intelligence, I am desperate. as are many others, to see justice installed. Two chilling moments in my history as a voting citizen stand out in my mind…when I first saw the computers at the polls 20 or so years ago, maybe more. My first thought at the time was, “That could lead to cheating.” And concern about cheating was sealed when in early 2018 I saw a flyer from michigan.gov/vote which advertised the “New Rights for Michigan Voters” without ANY mention of citizenship requirements.
I appreciate what you’re doing, keep up the good work and God bless you.
With the evidence of foreign interference in the 2020 election as shown in the newly released Mike Lindell documentary, should we the people call for the immediate decertification of the MI result? Or is this something that would have to be done by the Supreme Court? Is this a game changer for the entire country?
I am new to politics, what I don’t understand is if we voted fair and square and we are finding fraud like this (which we are) then who is in office right now its faulty up in our Whitehouse how come we can’t have a recall on our election in states and how come we don’t have the person that was voted in In as our President not the fraud to me the left knew about it if you stored a house you have to return it and you would go to jail why isn’t this happening right now
I believe it was MI where one of the Canvassers wanted to pull back their certification because they and their lives being threaten was the only reason they certified. After thinking about it they decide to withdraw the certification but then was finally pressured into re-certifying in the end. There was a lot of canvassers threaten with bodily harm along with judges, GOP committee members to get them to accept a fraudulent election. That alone should be ground for another election. We have stated all along we do not seek to overturn the election we seek the true and the dully elected POTUS by the majority of legal votes & legal electoral votes. We also seek to have in office all dully elected officials immediately. WE HAVE NO INTENTION OF LETTING A CRIMINAL ACT AS OUR POTUS FOR 4 YEARS. BIDEN WAS LEGALLY SUPPOSE TO PROVE NO TIES TO CHINA BEFORE ENTERING OFFICE. OUR GOVERNMENT IS A CORRUPT MOB WITH THE EXCEPTION OF A FEW. TREASON FOR ALL WHO COMMITTED TREASON!