Thomas Nowak is a Fall 2024 AllSides content intern. He has a Left bias.
Reviewed by Evan Wagner, News Editor and Product Manager (Lean Left bias), CEO John Gable (Lean Right), and Editor-in-chief Henry A. Brechter (Center).
Why should you, as a voter, care about election certification? Most of the election certification process consists of simple menial tasks — essentially, signing papers to make it official that things have happened. On its face, it’s the final step to record your vote after rigorous processes have been taken to ensure there was no voter fraud to get someone into office.
But you should care about it because the system has been repeatedly pressured during our most recent national elections, which each came down to close margins in several states. For example, if only 44,000 people voted for Trump in key swing states, there would have been an electoral tie.
In 2000, the Bush vs Gore election hung in the balance as Florida recounted votes. All recounts showed Bush the winner, but there were numerous issues like “hanging chads.” The Supreme Court of Florida (six of the seven justices were appointed by Democrats) ruled to continue and add additional recounts, a decision that was later appealed to the US Supreme Court (seven of the nine justices were appointed by Republicans) which stopped recounts, concluding the election.
Many continued to argue that the election was illegitimate either because it was contrary to the national popular vote or because they saw the Supreme Court as biased. This also led to the Brooks Brothers Riot, one of the first modern instances of harassment towards election officials.
In 2016, Donald Trump won a narrow election over Hillary Clinton, and there was a move to have “faithless electors” vote for Clinton rather than for Trump as the results of their states required. There were some faithless electoral votes cast, but not a sufficient number to change the national outcome. Charges of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign and the investigation by the Senate furtherly helped some to see the election as illegitimate.
In 2020’s presidential election, Joe Biden narrowly defeated Donald Trump. Trump claimed that the numerous changes to election procedures across the country during the pandemic made fraudulent voting easier, and Biden’s victory was the result of election fraud. Trump lost multiple court cases, worked to find the votes he needed, and pressured Vice President Pence to reject the election results. Trump spoke to a crowd of protesters, some of whom went on to incite violence in the January 6 riots before Congress certified the election results in favor of Joe Biden. Trump continues to make claims of election fraud in the 2020 election, alleging fraudulent mail-in voting, widespread efforts of fraud, and issues with voting machines.
RELATED: Facts vs Myths: Was the 2020 Election ‘Stolen’?
Election Fraud is Rare
According to the Campaign Legal Center, a non-partisan non-profit, much research on tracking claims of voter fraud has failed to turn up any credible evidence that widespread voter fraud occurred in the 2020 election.
But regardless of whether voters believe in these claims, the real shift occurred when Trump pleaded with election administrators not to certify votes in their states.
Over the years, Trump’s efforts and claims led to local-level election jurisdictions being taken over by Trump supporters, which, if one refuses to certify, can put a state’s entire inventory of votes in jeopardy. So far, there have been efforts to refuse to certify votes, which have later been overturned.
Yet, the ultimate concern is voter fraud itself and understanding how claims of election fraud come from the right.
For example, the “proof” from the Heritage Foundation (Lean Right bias) that immigrants are registering to vote in elections by interviewing 50 people in an apartment complex is questionable. Private investigators looking into the people interviewed in the video were not found on any voter rolls. Or take the Heritage foundation’s database of proven instances of voter fraud in the U.S. totals to over 1,500 documented cases. One review of the database found “just 68 documented cases of noncitizens’ voting going back to the 1980s.”
While over 1,500 votes can look like a jarring number, it is unlikely enough to flip a presidential election—especially since this is the total number of cases found since 1982. External examinations of the database have ultimately concluded that voter fraud is rare. For Texas, there are 103 cases of alleged fraud ranging from 2005 to 2022 (just 0.000096% of all ballots cast in this time period). Is that really enough to prove there is systemic fraud?
The last real guardrail in this issue is that election officials have to certify every election. Personally, I understand this concern. Everyone has the right to insist on election integrity and push for transparency in how votes are counted. There is a constant tension between the need to certify by a specific date, and the desire to provide full transparency over the process and respond adequately to any claim of fraud
According to Protect Democracy, a self-described “cross-ideological nonprofit group dedicated to defeating the authoritarian threat” founded by three lawyers who served under President Obama, “The purpose of certification is not to ensure that votes have been accurately counted, identify irregularities or errors, or to resolve issues with an election — there are other processes built to address these. Election certification doesn’t occur until the results have been repeatedly verified during the canvassing process.”
How are Elections Certified?
Before election certification, election results are reported, an initial announcement of the election winner without thorough verification. Canvassing is the subsequent process of examining all data generated from an election cycle. A canvassing board reviews the chain of custody, ballot and voter reconciliation, and document review, which is formalized in the Canvass report. After all of these steps, there is a final review in which all votes are counted one last time, leading to votes being certified.
The best explanation for why election certification should be mandatory is that it is a ministerial duty that occurs after canvassing ensures that there were no significant issues with vote tabulation.
The argument for questioning voter certification processes is legitimate. Everyone wants to have fair and secure elections. But what cost is this questioning worth, especially if it is based on unfounded conspiracies that lead to a never-ending witch hunt – one that is not only expensive but actively makes elections less secure? Furthermore, one that actively leads people to threaten the lives of election officials?
Why Should You Care?
The issue of election certification is only becoming more and more prominent, especially for swing states like Georgia that will decide the election. For instance, last month in Fulton County, a member of the Board of Elections and Registration sued to make election certification discretionary.
In a different lawsuit, the Georgia State Election Board ruled that elections must be certified — despite having recently passed a vague rule that requires county officials to make a “reasonable inquiry” before certifying election results. Critics of the rule change argued that it opened up legal paths to delay or deny election results. Then the Georgia State Election Board passed another rule requiring all ballots to be hand-counted on the state's election day. Though these rules are unlikely to hold up as a Fulton County judge ruled that “no election superintendent (or member of a board of elections and registration) may refuse to certify or abstain from certifying election results under any circumstance.”
Not only are these decisions legally questionable, already leading to multiple lawsuits — including one to prevent another effort from the board which CNN (Lean Left bias) says aims to allow the board to appoint pro-Trump election monitors in Fulton County and require the county to pay for it — but they’re also impractical. Making last-minute changes to how an election should be run shortly before it occurs opens a Pandora’s box of issues that will likely occur on election day and makes room for legal arguments that elections shouldn’t be certified.
It’s not just Georgia. According to a Reuters examination, “in the five largest counties in each of the seven battleground states that are likely to determine the election’s outcome,” findings showed “that nearly half – or 16 of the 35 county election boards – had at least one member who has expressed pro-Trump skepticism about the electoral process, including theories that Trump won the 2020 election, doubts about the integrity of voting machines or beliefs about widespread fraud in mail ballots.”
To ease concerns, there are legal guardrails in place to make sure election officials certify elections, as officials from numerous swing states have announced they will sue and “compel them to certify” the election.
While this post has included heavy criticism of the right, Democrats could potentially become a problem in this issue. In an Axios (Lean Left bias) interview, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D) claimed he would certify a Trump victory if he "won a free, fair and honest election,” though he doesn't believe Trump would win by fair means. It can be argued that this remark was blown out of proportion because it’s a singular instance, though it does set a concerning precedent that can create a trend similar to what’s been seen on the right.
What Can You Do About It?
However, this doesn’t necessarily solve the problem of how you, as a voter, should act if you believe that there is active election fraud in the country. So, what can you do within your reasonable civic duty?
To take from the AllSides Editorial Philosophy, expose yourself to different perspectives from a variety of media sources. Exposure to the same old echo chambers will only further your view on whether you do or don’t believe there is election fraud. And as always read fact checks from multiple sources.
This is the same process we follow as AllSides contributors to keep us open to a range of ideas. While elections are increasingly becoming more transparent, there is room for improvement and advocacy to ease public concerns. Only by constructively engaging with claims of election fraud, rather than immediately dismissing them, can we hope to advance mutual understanding and make our election processes even more secure.
Furthermore, as John Oliver put it best covering the same issue, make a plan to vote and encourage others to do so too. Increasing the number of fair, legal votes for your preferred candidate is the only way to strengthen the margins in your preference. Staying informed, advocating, and exercising your rights, is the best way to combat the misinformation and confusion around election certification.
Thomas Nowak is a Fall 2024 AllSides content intern. He has a Left bias.
Reviewed by Evan Wagner, News Editor and Product Manager (Lean Left bias), CEO John Gable (Lean Right), and Editor-in-chief Henry A. Brechter (Center).
