OKLAHOMA CITY – Selective audits of results from the statewide primary election June 28 were conducted across the state one month later, on July 28 – and the audits confirmed the accuracy of the primary elections.
County election board secretaries in 33 counties conducteda manual audit of ballots in accordance with a state law enacted in 2019 and procedures established by the Secretary of the State Election Board, Paul Ziriax.
Thirty-six (36) different races for federal, state, county and judicial offices, Republican and Democrat alike, were included in the audit. “We have software that randomly generates the list” of counties, political races, and precincts or absentee/early voting ballots that were audited, said Misha Mohr, public information officer for the State Election Board.
None of the certifications in the three dozen races were changed by the audits.
Manual audits confirmed the machine counts in Comanche County (Republican Governor’s race, one precinct), Jackson County (one precinct, State Treasurer’s race; Stephens County (one precinct, District Judge District 5, Office 3); and Jefferson County (one precinct in the GOP contest to replace Joy Hofmeister as State Superintendent of Public Instruction).
State statute defines a post-election audit as a “manual or electronic examination of a limited number of ballots by a secretary of a county election board or other authorized election officials … for the purpose of maintaining the security of the election system by ensuring that voting devices and software used in a particular election correctly tabulated votes.”
Depending on the particular race to be examined in a county, ballots from a specific precinct, mailed absentee ballots or in-person absentee ballots were scrutinized.
Audit results cannot be used to change or alter certified election results, Ms. Mohr said.
Audits were conducted in Cimarron and Beaver counties in the Panhandle; Ottawa County in far northeastern Oklahoma; Adair and Sequoyah counties in far eastern Oklahoma; Roger Mills County in far western Oklahoma; Lincoln, Cleveland and Canadian counties in central Oklahoma; as well as Comanche, Jackson, Stephens, Jefferson and Caddo counties in southwest Oklahoma.
Race results that were audited included:
- Ÿ Republican primary races for Attorney General, State Auditor, State Treasurer, State Labor Commissioner, State School Superintendent, and Corporation Commissioner;
- Ÿ Republican and Democratic primary races for Governor;
- Ÿ the Republican contest to complete the four years remaining on U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe’s unexpired term and the Democratic race for James Lankford’s six-year U.S. Senate seat;
- Ÿ GOP primary contests for congressional districts 2, 3, 4 and 5;
- Ÿ Republican primaries in state Senate District 22 and state House District 11;
- Ÿ the Democratic primary in state Senate District 28;
- Ÿ Tulsa County and Stephens County district judges;
- Ÿ Republican primary for Rogers County Assessor, Democratic primary for Cherokee County Treasurer, and Republican primary for Osage County Commissioner District 1. 2 Minor Irregularities. Only a couple of minor irregularities were discovered.
- Ÿ The manual post-election audit completed in Caddo County for Precinct 080511 confirmed the certified count for the State Treasurer Republican Primary. However, the Secretary found that the precinct officials had improperly secured a spoiled ballot in the transfer case rather than in the spoiled ballot bag, as required by procedures. The spoiled ballot was not counted, nor was it included in the certified or post-election audit totals. Refresher training will be conducted in Caddo County to ensure all poll workers follow the correct procedures for spoiled ballots.
- Ÿ The manual post-election audit completed in Osage County of mail absentee and in-person absentee ballots confirmed the certified count for the County Commissioner District No. 1, Republican Primary. However, the audit revealed that one provisional ballot was incorrectly categorized as an Election Day vote, rather than being included in the tally for in-person absentee votes, in Precinct 570107. Provisional ballots were counted on July 01.
Process explained
Each designated county election board prepared a tally sheet and first determined whether there were any provisional ballots and/or ATI ballots that needed to be included in the audit.
[Oklahoma’s Hart InterCivic eScan A/T voting device is equipped with an audio tactile interface (ATI) that enables a voter with a visual or physical disability to listen to instructions for using the ATI controllers and an audio version of the ballot, to make selections for each race or question on the ballot, to review all selections and make changes if necessary, and finally to cast the ballot privately and independently.
The voter’s ballot selections are recorded electronically in the device’s memory and included in the results for the precinct.No record exists to link an individual voter to a specific ATI ballot, Ms. Mohr said.]
The ballots were sorted for counting, then bipartisan audit officials followed the procedure established by Secretary Ziriaxfor counting all of the ballots for the appropriate races and precincts. Although state law allows for ballots to be counted manually, electronically, or a combination of the two, all ballots in this post-election audit were counted by hand, Ms. Mohr said.
After the counties finish auditing the ballots, the totals from the audit will be compared against totals from the certified election results and the results will be reported to the State Election Board.
The results are to be posted on the State Election Board website at https://oklahoma.gov/elections/security-integrity/post-election-audits/upcoming-and-past-post-election-audits.html.
The July 28 audits were open to the public.