Delaware County tests voting machines ahead of fall election

According to The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll from 2023, only 44% of Americans have a “great deal” of confidence that the vote count will be accurate this November, but here in Delaware County, The State of Indiana is taking steps to ensure there is no room for inaccuracy.

In the basement of the Delaware County Courthouse, a fundamental aspect in the security of this November’s election is taking place, the testing of the voting machine.

“We randomly select 5% of our machines to check and make sure that they are programmed properly and that they vote properly so we can feel assured when we put them into the field that the public is getting the machines that are properly prepared.” Says Rick Spangler, The Delaware County Clerk.

Spangler, along with other members of the Delaware County Election Board and many other volunteers gathered at the courthouse to carry out the test. The test consists of several different phases: Making sure that all machines have no previous votes on them, putting in votes for every location and every candidate, and finally checking to see if all machines can properly send those votes to the tabulation computer. Spangler speaks on the importance of this test.

“Well, this gives us actual visual proof, you know. We can say that the machines are good, you know, the past history proves that the machines are good, but we physically check them prior to every election.”

This test is not limited to just the in-person voting that most think of, they also put emphasis on testing mail-in ballots from absentee voters.

Steve Shamo, General Manager of Microvote, explains this process.

“The second stage of the test was, we have to test the mail ballot system, and so we have a test deck that also verifies that every candidate in the election voting location is active, and can receive votes from paper ballots and mail ballots that are sent in from the voters.”

Using tests like this, the State hopes that the people of Delaware County and the State of Indiana as a whole can rest assured knowing that their vote is protected this November.

Contact Eli Grasham with comments at eli.grasham@bsu.edu.