Dakota County election official says CVR data from 2020 has not yet been destroyed; Property and Finance Director in Carver County says ES&S told them they don't have CVRs; Kanebec Auditor also balks
One would not be wrong in wondering why such sophisticated equipment, made by no doubt even more sophisticated and intelligent designers, would not have a better way of summarizing the aggregation of the people’s voice through their intent than through these cumbersome tape printouts. (Hint: There is a way—it’s called the Cast Vote Record.) Photo by Erik van Mechelen, Aug 1, 2022, Wright County Logic & Accuracy testing.
This post is too long for email so please go to https://erikvanmechelen.substack.com to read the full post.
Estimates suggest hundreds of public data requests for Cast Vote Record data from the 2020 and 2022 election have been sent in from all around Minnesota, for close to all if not all counties. No America First clerks have yet been found willing to share this critical data with the public, resorting to advice from county attorneys to deny public data requests.
Part 1 of this series covered Todd, Chisago, and Washington County were highlighted. Todd and Chisago were chosen because this writer was directly involved—that work was previously published in this book.
Part 3 will focus on several more responses from Carver, Kanabec, and Dakota in the context of the law and transparency.
A surprise! in this episode is that one well respected county elections official from Dakota County admits that they do have a 2020 CVR… well then, why hasn’t it been released to the public? And if one county has it, shouldn’t they all?
Law vs Transparency
Minnesota counties continue to walk a very fine line with respect to data governance laws:
Recall from Part 1 of this series that the former Todd County Attorney said “does not create this data nor does it have such data stored anywhere.” This is tantamount to saying the tabulators weren’t used, by the way, since the tabulators are being used to tally the votes, are they not?
(Why are these requests handed off to attorneys? Who do attorney’s really work for?)
Here is my followup to the new Todd County Attorney.
Dear John E. Lindemann,
I am writing to ask whether you share the opinion of the former Todd County Attorney regarding the 2020 Cast Vote Records, important for transparency of all voters in the county especially given the proven concerns regarding electronic election manipulation that is possible in any county using electronic voting equipment, but also which could be shown not to have occurred by producing such a report.
Meanwhile the line has been crossed with regard to transparency: there simply is no transparency in Minnesota elections at present, a disservice to every voter in this state.
No county in Minnesota is capable of producing a report that confirms the tallies from the machines match the physical paper ballots and the final SOS reporting. About 435 of these reports have been produced around the country including 14 in neighboring Wisconsin.
No wonder then that people who voted in all directions are starting to unify in asking the same questions.
Especially when they realize many races on the ballot in Minnesota never get audited.
Especially when another election may be right around the corner.
Carver
There was a long meeting (2-hour video not captured by county but recorded by this writer) in Carver on July 19 where many spoke, including one who asked for all cast vote records for the 2022 primary to be produced.
David Frischmon opens the late-morning session on July 19, 2022 with the County Auditor seated nearby. Later, Mr. Frischmon would claim that ES&S said the Carver County tabulators and Electionware software are incapable of producing CVRs.
Not sure if Mr. Frischmon believed that or thought maybe I would buy it.
The fact is the ES&S tabulators and the Electionware software that Carver County uses certainly does have that capability.
Meanwhile, a few months later, here was a response to a 2020 CVR request:
Good afternoon,
Thank you for your interest in Carver County elections. In response to the multiple requests for Cast Vote Records which are identical or similar to the one below, Carver County is providing the same response:
Carver County is required by State Statute to use paper ballots for elections including statutorily-defined post-election review processes. Thus, Cast Vote Records data is not created for Carver County elections and therefore Carver County does not have Cast Vote Records data responsive to your freedom of information request.
Please let me know if you have any questions/concerns,
David Frischmon
Property and Finance Director
Carver County
This response dodges the focus and the ask of the public data request entirely by bringing up paper ballots, which on a separate but related note so far no county has managed to unseal for a proper forensic audit.
Meanwhile, Carver County residents may submit requests to see communication from the vendor to Carver County regarding the inability of their machines and software to produce Cast Vote Records (CVR) reports when their own manuals indicate they can.
Kanabec
Here the Kanabec County Auditor consults with yet another county attorney to produce the following email:
Sent: Friday, September 2, 2022 at 11:00:47 AM CDT
Subject: RE: Data request for 2022 Primary and 2020 General election
I consulted with our county attorney yesterday and this was the consensus of our meeting:
The information you requested for the 11/3/20 election cannot be produced. We used Unity software for ERM and it didn’t have the capability to collect the info needed to produce your request.
The information you requested for the 8/9/20 [sic, should read ‘22] primary cannot be produced either. The report you request is not a report we can run with our version of Electionware.
Note we do not use modems to transmit our election results or nor do we produce images of our ballots. This maybe something that larger counties do when their precincts do not physically bring their ballots into the county on election night. We have no need to run retain those stats in Kanabec County.
Please know that I am not refusing to run these reports, I simply cannot run these reports. We can provide you with information that we have, only if MN state statute allows. We cannot give you something we don’t have.
I’m sorry but if there is other information you need, please let me know.
Thank you,
Denise Snyder
Denise M. Snyder
Kanabec County Auditor-Treasurer 18 N Vine Street Suite 261A Mora, MN 55051 320-679-6430
Translation: We will continue following the minimum standard.
So, the search continues for an America First clerk in Minnesota willing to put their job on the line for election transparency.
Let’s see if we find one in Dakota…
Dakota
Part of an email from someone who stopped by their county’s elections office:
I met yesterday with Andy Lokken at Dakota County Election Office. It was our first meeting. He told me that he is not destroying CVR from the 2020 election because he has had so much interest in the process. He also told me the CVR from the 2022 primary is not available yet. We were also invited to observe ballot processes that happen in his office during an election.
Mr. Lokken has had to answer many election related questions for 2020 (where 154,000 absentee regards were missing only 5 days after the MN State Canvassing Board certified the election) as well as 2021 after data discrepancies were noticed in the 2021 ISD 196 school board race.
In 2020 an outstanding question is how this postelection review (PER) was labeled as acceptable. This data, sent digitally by Mr. Lokken soon after the PER to someone who attended (PERs are open to public) and asked to see the data, differs from the official report on the SOS website.
This writer sat in a closed door meeting in late Spring 2022 where the office was unable to answer simple questions months after the 2021 election.
Regarding electronic systems, Mr. Lokken has admitted (video) that Dakota is so unique that “they have to do a custom version of our software” in a June 7, 2022 GPP meeting which was mysteriously held in a small room instead of the county commissioner board room (where a meeting was held that same morning) which might have seated more of the scores of people who showed up.
The beautiful and spacious board room which the commissioners opted not to use for the GPP meeting, for which even more people showed up to hear discussion on resolutions related to ballot board balance and dropboxes.
This tactic relates to similar 1st Amendment-related issues as seen in Sherburne County (where someone was forcibly removed) and in Crow Wing County (through a subtle addition to an ostensibly election transparency-related resolution attempting to remove the ability of commissioners to take further election transparency actions prior to November).
Without the people showing up in strong numbers and documenting the discussion and conversation, would the general public even have access to these important developments?
Thank you for reading Midwest Seeds by Erik van Mechelen. This post is public so feel free to share it.
The trend toward accountability and transparency in local government will only grow. To see reporting on this topic prior to July 2022, read this free book on [S]elections in Minnesota: How Machines Controlled 2020 and Why We Must Return to Hand Counting Paper Ballots (also available on amz/bn and audiobook).
Watch Standing in the Gap (film review) to help create a future where a significantly reduced government actually works for the people.
Joe Oltmann of the Conservative Daily podcast (and much more) will be speaking on this topic on Monday, October 3rd, 2022 at 6:30pm at Studio Timeout in Minneapolis.
Kris Anne Hall is speaking at an event the same evening in Monticello relating to the role of Sheriffs going forward.
Erik van Mechelen will give an update at the Chanhassen library at 6pm on Wednesday, September 7, 2022.
The official report by the MNSOS of postelection review data from 2020—more detailed data can by FOIA’d.
A film review of Standing in the Gap, recommended for those who have already watched 2000 Mules and Selection Code but still want direction on how to get involved in holding local government accountable and removing the machines
1st Amendment-related issues as seen in Sherburne County (where someone was forcibly removed)
Crow Wing County (through a subtle addition to an ostensibly election transparency-related resolution attempting to remove the ability of commissioners to take further election transparency actions prior to November)—scratched from resolution after opposition from the people and Commissioner Franzen
