MINNEAPOLIS — Across Minnesota election judges are back to work taking part in post-election equipment reviews, double checking the vote tabulating machines.
These reviews happen every two years in all 87 counties no matter how smoothly the election goes, whether or not someone is questioning the accuracy of the count.
"This is a normal part of the elections process we do after every federal election, and the point of it is to make sure that election officials can satisfy themselves that the voting equipment counted all of the ballots accurately," Ginny Gelms, Hennepin County Elections Director, told KARE. "It's a good process for us to do. It's in state law, and it's also a transparent process, so people from the public and come in and observe that the voting equipment counted the ballots accurately."
Hennepin County election judges gathered in a county office building in downtown Minneapolis Monday morning to begin an operation that would likely take at least a day and a half. They retrieved ballot transfer boxes from 12 randomly selected precincts encompassing 24,000 ballots.
Each precinct got its own table where judges sorted ballots first by presidential preference. After sorting them into candidate piles, they counted them, first by forming bundles of 25 ballots. It's a process they must repeat for the US Senate race, and the Congressional race.
It all goes to verifying something election oversight veterans have found to be true; the machines get it right.
"The machines are quite accurate. As it turns out the machines are a lot better at counting pieces of paper than human beings are," Gelms remarked.
Secretary of State Steve Simon came to observe and called the media's attention to the event. He said it's about building confidence in Minnesota's election system.
"The reviews are always open to the public, just like the public accuracy tests that occur before the election to ensure the performance of election tabulation equipment," Simon told reporters.
He noted that the results of the post-election review process are subject to being contested by a candidate or a party, and it's just one of several opportunities for Minnesotans to challenge the result of election.
"We will certify results of the election Thursday, but even the certification could always be the subject of a court challenge. In our system there are many avenues of self-review, even outside challenges, all with the goal of making sure we got it right."
Simon and the media weren't the only ones invited to see the show. Average citizens and monitors from election integrity groups always come to watch the post-election review.
State law dictates if there are discrepancies in these spot checks, the election judges must pull in more sample precincts to review. That will help determine whether there's a systemic problem or something isolated to the precinct where the hand count doesn't match the machine count.
Gelms said it has never happened during her years working in elections administration, but it's good to know there's a process in place.
"I really appreciate being an election official working in Minnesota, because in Minnesota we have really great state-level laws that help us be transparent and satisfy ourselves after every single election, regardless of what happened in that particular election, that the system ran the way it was supposed to," Gelms said.
"And if it didn’t, I appreciate that we have an opportunity to catch any errors here or there that might have occurred."
After the review ends, all the ballots will go back into sealed ballot transfer boxes and go into secured storage until September of 2026.