Election Commission Regular Worksession

Okay, it's recording. Do I need to call us into session? You can just start the work. Yeah, just not—. Okay, hi everyone, my name is Katie Nolan.

I'm the chair of the Election Commission, and in front of us today are— Mike.

Commissioner Lauren Lehman.

And we're going to start this work session with some information from our staff. Yeah, so we are just, um, going to look at all of the preliminarily rejected ballots. Um, so Liz will show you the ballots, um, and explain the rejection and the code that pertains to it, and you'll have an opportunity to look at the ballots. And, um, we don't typically allow recording, but there will definitely be a certain portion of the meeting that we'll be looking at ballots that have confidential information on them, and so we will be asking to ensure that, uh, recording is shut off at that point. So I will make that announcement when we get there.

And our goal is— our responsibility today is going to be to look at each of these ballots that you have in front, uh, to show us and verify whether or not we agree with staff's recommendation and whether we want to continue the numbers, or if we find any discrepancies that we feel—. Yeah, so the work session, you're just looking at them and making your determinations, and then we will have the meeting start at 5 PM, and that's when you will do the actual accepting or rejecting.

Thank you.

All right, so the first category is duplicate ballot voted. So this is used when it has been determined that the voter has cast more than one ballot. Uh, if they are— they shall not be counted if the voter already voted in the election. And there are 5, and each one has its own little story attached to them. This just said maybe we didn't have an A, correct?

Thank you. So 0 A's. Yes, 0 A's.

No, I think—. Hi, we are joined by Commissioner Ann Courtney, um, and we are looking at ballots that have been pulled by staff and verifying that we agree with their assessment. I apologize for my late arrival. I can't drive, so I have to rely on somebody else. To pick me up.

I apologize. So this was a duplicate of—. So they already voted and this is the second ballot that was snagged. Okay.

The paper on the outside that's folded over it has a little story at the top that explains the day we received the first ballot. It has a photocopy of the first ballot, and then the ballot itself, the second ballot, is in her hands.

Yeah, so the voter voted in person. You're gonna have to go get your nameplate from Amy. They returned to vote again in person on election day at the same vote center. So the vote center were to remember the voter. Sorry, I can't leave the ballot.

Um, do you have an agenda for a list of the ballots that you're reviewing? Um, no, this is just a work session, so they're just looking at the ballots right now. We don't have a list of what they're reviewing. It's on the challenge ballot report, and so we don't have a list. We just have the various stats.

Liz? Yes. Um, the voter we were just talking about, did he or she get to vote one time? Yes. Okay.

And then they came in again on Election Day. This is the one on Election Day. There was nothing on here to tell me that one, one of them got counted.

Can you turn the mic on? Like when earlier— I'm sorry, how do you, how do you know, how do you pick this out of the bunch knowing that they voted previously? So when the second one got ran through the sorter, it kicked it out. Yeah.

And so when it ran through, the second one ran through the sorter, it outsorted saying that the voter already voted. And so that's when we went and looked at the original. So it's picked up by the computer? Yes.

This is the easiest step, at least for me. Yeah, pretty good, you're right. Good. I have a picture. I don't think I was holding 2 gallons, but my wife and I went to the— by the bus stop right there.

Box. I, I said, can you take a picture of me? And I took a picture. The phone's on my phone. You must be on hers.

Are you looking for future? Uh, well, I, I have done probably 2. She's there. It's raining or something. Yeah.

5. Okay, are we in agreement that there are 5 duplicate ballots? The second ballot was both— apparently that's a yes.

Thank you.

So then the next category is E, ballot return envelope empty or contained other materials, and we have 4.

So there's two—. I think there's two. Yeah, 1, 2, 3, 4. There you go. Okay, so empty ballot, official ballot.

What's the issue?

So then this gets notified and they came in and voted? Uh, yes.

Um, that one he actually called us, so he notified us that he realized it was empty.

So we can agree that for E, ballot return envelope empty or contain other materials, number 4. Thank you. The next category is E1, ballot returned without return envelope. We are unable to identify voter, and we do check to see if they've signed or have put their name. There is one that has a signature, but it's just a bunch of squiggles.

It looks like a heartbeat, and we can't determine what name that is. So there are 19. [FOREIGN LANGUAGE] Yeah, and so if the signature is legible and we can read the name, or if they write their name, we'll make a new envelope for them. But none of those, um, fall into that.

That better go with it. And these are just the, the Dropbox? Yes.

This—. What are these scratches on the outside of the envelope? What are the scratches on the outside of the envelope? That's where they came from. So Those would be the West drop box.

That's Diamond. Okay. They write where they came from so that if we were able to figure out the voter's name, then we would run it through and they would get credit for voting at that drop box.

No cure letters were there because we don't know. No. And if we were able to figure out who they were, we would just make up a new envelope for them.

All right, that was Item E1, ballot return to without return envelope.

To identify voters. We agree that there was 19.

Yeah, go ahead. The next is G, voter failed to provide identifying information. This code is used when it has been determined that the voter failed to provide ID when required, including out of ABC, or if the voter has the condition code of Active/ID. And there are 3, and we do send them cure letters. So these are voters who have not responded to cure letters or our calls or emails.

And so I would just also say that there's instructions or special instructions that informed them that they needed to provide us with a copy of their ID in the envelope. And then they were also sent a picture letter to provide us ID.

Those were cases, probably somebody registering to vote online, and then the first time they vote, they've got to go and show ID. Yeah, correct. Yep.

Okay, we agree that there were 3 G's— good, failed to provide identifying information. Thank you. Okay, for the next few ballots we— or the next few sections of ballots, we need to ensure that phones are down and off. There's confidential information on these ballots and we don't want for pictures to be taken and zoomed in, so.

So the next category is I, Voter Is Inactive. This code is used when it has been determined that the voter status and condition code are inactive because they are registered in another jurisdiction, requested cancellation of registration, is convicted of a felony involving moral turpitude, or attempted to register in the past on a questioned or absentee ballot but did not provide required registration information. There are 3.

And then it's in the upper right-hand corner, right? From the shelter? Yeah. And so, um, this is what—. This is what you determined?

Yeah.

This— how do you decide if it's inactive?

When we look them up in the voter registration database, it tells us and keep the condition code in the voter registration database. Which is a county database or a state? State. Yeah. And then this actually re-registers them to vote.

They could be moved to inactive.

Because they've requested it on their own, they could be moved to inactive because they're in list maintenance. There's a couple of them that are actually count codes, which is PU, meaning they are on purge notice, but they're about— their information is— their letters are undeliverable. And so we do count those ballots that come through, and we have 2 of them, but these ones are Inactive and—. Do we know why each one of these are inactive? There should be— the reason is in those sticky notes.

That and then this one. So this state status code was RE, which is registered, and another jurisdiction.

Can you turn the mic on?

Not technically registered, and this will re-register her. Yes, she did, um, she had requested to be removed, and then she voted, and then now this will re-register her.

So she did get to vote? Uh, she— because she requested to be removed, the state put her as inactive, and we don't, we don't count that. Okay, that's what we're rejecting now. But the state the block views of things, and so they will update that voter registration to be active after the election.

Even though she asked to be removed. Yeah, she changed her mind, I think.

And the map must be—. It's my transcription. So the tax code is RE, which is registered in another jurisdiction. That one's easy.

Then we agree that there are 3 voter inactives, reject code I. Thank you. We're going to skip M and go to the MOA because we're working on all the yellows right now.

Yeah, so this will be MOA voters registered outside of the MOA. And there are 26.

And we wrote down where they were registered, so that will show here.

And that information came from, again, the state database? Yes.

Is this more than normal, or is that about the same for this category?

Um, last year we had 8. Yeah.

However, in '24 we had 43. Liz, is this an automatic disqualification or do we talk to them? Or it's automatic because they weren't registered They weren't a registered voter of the ministry within the ministry.

All right, that's code MOA number 26, voter registered outside of New municipality. Thank you.

Next is O, voter does not meet certification requirements. This code is used if the voter marked through any of the certification requirements on the voter oath or checked no On the citizenship, birth date, or residency box, there are two, and you can see up here, these are the boxes that it's referring to. I think both of these check no to them being 18 years old, and I think you can look on the birth date to verify that they are not 18.

They were under 18. That's why these two were rejected. Yes, they are. I think both of them had birth dates in May, and so on April 7th they were not 18. Is that kicked out of this order as well?

No, they were question ballots. They were not in the voter registration database that the vote centers had. And so the vote center said, "Well, you're not in our database, and so you need to vote a question valid." And so they filled out these yellow.

I'll note that under state law you can register to vote before 18.

But you can't vote until you are 18, so. Right.

All right, then we agree on reject code O, does not meet vote certification requirements number 2. Thank you. Maybe you don't need to do any gymnastics. Just getting my exercise on. I'm young, right?

Next one is C. Yeah, so there's none for R. The next is T, voter returned the ballot envelope and asked— oh no, that's the one that we don't have. T is registered too late. Code is used if voter registered or updated his or her registration after the 30-day cutoff before this election. There are 10.

I think we wrote in the information on the— in the corner what date they did update their voter registration.

And this year the deadline was March 8th, and so they were not previously registered in the state at all, and this is the date that they initially registered.

Where's that at? Oh, it's on the next page.

All right, that was voter registered too late, reject code T, and there were 10 of them. The good news is they are registered to go to the next election.

And then we're going to skip down to X, which is voter not registered. And so yes, they will now be registered after the election. Oh yeah, except for the— yes, and there are 14.

Yes. And so the reason why we put it in this code is that this, um, they're not trying to impersonate this. They just signed it as their own, but they are not registered. Okay. All right.

So somebody took this ballot that was meant for somebody else. And they voted in, signed their name? Yes. Not as if they were voting for somebody else? Yeah, they weren't— they signed theirs, so they weren't trying to do that.

That was a little confusing. Thank you.

So what it is, these, these 14 simply did not appear in the database? Correct. They're not even in the state's database. They're, they're just not registered to vote. And they're different than the previous reject code of people who appeared but are registered too late?

Yes. So the previous code were people who they They are registered, but they didn't register the 30 days prior to the election. These, um, voters haven't registered at all.

They didn't work the reason. Yeah, they didn't mark it, but when we looked them up in the state registration, they weren't— so the vote center just forgot to check the not unregistered.

So this person is the one who signed Lewis's envelope. So they witnessed this person, and that signature matches that. But yes, they are not Lewis. And so when we look up this name in the database, they are not registered.

Who's this? Uh, that's the— so this, um, was their envelope that this person witnessed, and this witness signed this envelope because Louis used to live there, but now they live there, so they're— they were just using his envelope, but they're not registered to vote.

Okay. We spent all of yesterday sorting all of this out, trying to tell you guys the stories, and we scratched our heads. I'd still be there, Jamie.

We go back to M? Yeah, we will. All right, on, on Blue Jacks Code X14, voter not registered, we agree. Thank you. Great.

So.

We're done with the yellow envelopes now, and so we're moving back to page 2, reject code M, which is multiple ballots in one envelope. Page what? 2. We're going to page 2, category M, multiple ballots in one envelope. Thank you.

So this was discovered in envelope opening on April 9th, so it was after Election Day. There were 2 ballots in one envelope, and so we don't know whose is which. And so there's one envelope with 2 ballots for rejection.

Liz, neither gets counted, correct? Because we don't know which one is the voter who signed the envelope. Who the second ballot belongs to.

Is this curable? If it's before Election Day, we will send them a cure letter and ask them to go vote again. If both ballots are voted in the same way, Previous election worker suggested we could just stick it through, stick one through, and so if they're both voted in the same way, we'll send it through. But they're voted, the ballots are voted in two different ways.

Thank you, Jamie.

All right, we will agree that reject code M, there was one multiple ballots in one envelope. Thank you.

Now we're on the ballot received too late. The next section is B, ballot received too late. Forgot to ask for a baggie for that. I'll go get— I'll ask for a baggie. There are two that are disgusting, so just heads up.

This code is used if a ballot is received after 8 PM on Election Day via email or fax at one of the Anchorage Vote Centers or at one of the secure drop boxes. There are 14.

Oh, we're gonna get a Ziploc for the—. We just forgot, sorry.

Are they all like this? No, they're all in different places. Krista's bringing us one.

I'll keep those together because they were all the same date.

Well, try to keep—. Try to keep those together. They were all the same date. Yeah, there, there, there's her bandage. I think.

You can tell it when she can open it. You can open it and look in there to prevent getting dirt all over their workspace. Yeah, you can open it if you want, but if you just don't want to get your hands gross—. I'm like, "Yeah." So the day after Election Day, we go back to the drop boxes and take the flags off the top and take the fire stops out. And that is when we found some of them the next morning next to the drop box, having been run over or on top of the drop box or whatever.

So they bring them back and put them in this category.

Are all of these drop boxes? Yes. Can you tell me how the workers ensure when they take out all of the ballots that there's nothing left in your bottom? So they're in teams of 2, and one person is typically in the box taking them out, and then the second person is looking around. So that's why they're in teams of 2.

Um, some of them, um, you'll see that got handed to them while they were there was after 8 AM or 8 PM. Um, but the ones that are the next day, they were— they just left them there overnight.

Thank you.

But what's the question? How do we know that when they empty the box, if they complete all of it? Yes.

So part of the training is that they actually get in the box and they twist and they look around. Sometimes they use a flashlight to make sure because if it's dark out, and then the second person is also monitoring and looking around. And are they given either a watch or clock that is— has exact time?

Yes, they do. And they also do it like at the polls where they'll say you have 15 minutes The polls closed. It's now 8 PM. Polls are now closed. The drop—.

The box is now closed. So they do announce it to anybody who's in the vicinity, and they also, if cars are in line prior to 8 PM, we have a sign that we give them saying this is the last car at 8 PM.

All right, that was.

Code V, did sheriff ballot receive too late? We agree that there were 14. Thank you. Next is, uh, is the postmark—. Late postmark.

So the next section is W, ballot postmarked voted after Election Day. Uh, there are 201 and we have stamped when they were received. And we've left them in their groupings to make it a little easier on you. Okay. For these, I'm going to ask that we group together and look at them together.

If you would, please. This is W. Everyone. I think she wants to do it together. Let's do it together as a group, guys. Well, I mean— And I'm coming to stay.

We have got 4/22. That's when it was received, right? Yes. But it doesn't matter when it was received. So the postmarks are here at the back, and so we just stamp it when we receive it.

And so here are the postmarks up here. And so, so this one says 21 April. But we received it on the 22nd, so that's what that means. So this one's also a 21 April.

Here's 20 April. So this might be—. I don't see So there's 4 that had no postmarks, so that'll need to go in the next. 8 April, and 17 April, 16 April, 16 April, 16 April, 16 April, 18 April, and 17 April. Did you figure out what that one was?

That's—. Came from Norway, I think. Missed by a day.

So these are postcards right here. Oh, I missed this one. Yeah, so that's the— that's April 9th. Okay, what is this one? That one is April 9th.

April 9th. Okay.

Okay, this is 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, 15, 16. That's equal. This gives us 16, 16, 16, 12.

14.

Yeah, that was 15. Okay, so this was 14, 14, 14, 14. Missing by 4 weeks. Yeah. 11, 13, 13.

You see those M tricky? 13, 13.

Okay, I'm just— 8, 8. 8, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 8, 8, 8, 9, 11, 9, 10, 9, 11.

8, 11, 11, 11, 8, 9, 8, 10, 10, 10, 8, 8, 8, 8. Oops, I'm stupid. Sorry.

And 8. Good job, buddy. All right. Okay, I'll enjoy this mush now. 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 10, 10.

10! 10! 8—. 8? 8— 8— 8—.

8— 7 More legs.

8— 8—. Oops, 8— 8—. 8— 8— And 8.

And 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10. 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, And 8. Thank you. All right. All right, are you ready?

There we go. 9, 9, 9, 8, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9, 9.

9. Oops. 9.

9.

That's 9. That's 9.

8.

8.

8! 8—. I can't spell my text if I don't respond.

So who's next? Great watchin'. Uh... Wait. It was Bruce.

8-8-8-8-8. That wasn't the second one.

I noticed that several envelopes came through mailed but without a stamp, and this post office just let them go through, or do you have to pay on the receiving end? Uh, it's our understanding that we can pay on the receiving end. You pay on the receipt? Yeah, it's our understanding that post— that election mail is required to be delivered by the post office regardless of whether there's a stamp or not, and our understanding that our permit gets charged on the receiving end. Okay, and the other thing I noticed is that one stamp, one forever stamp, was sufficient.

Okay.

8! 8! 8! Sorry— 8? No, 8...

8! Yeah, push down. 8! 8! 8!

Come on, 8! One more, 8! 8! 8!

8! 8!

It— no! 8! Mm-hmm? 8! 8!

Stretch it out! 8! Oh yeah, you're doing something here! That's good! 8!

8! The stretch! 8! Over there too, so come here first. 8!

8! Eight. Eight.

What's on the grapes? So, yeah, the two route for the eight.

Uh, yeah, let's set this one aside. Um, there's this bunch. Um, eight. Okay, eight. Eight.

Eight.

Eight. Eight. Oops.

Eight.

Eight. Eight.

Eight. Uh, maybe 89. Yeah, for just that much.

No.

They're all circles.

Oh yeah, yeah, I'll give you one. It's in the kitchen in the fridge.

Yeah, back in a better week. Yeah, Amy can run and grab it for you. Amy's running around.

Can you get her a bottle of water? Does it show up as 8 and then APR? Yes, APR is April. Yeah, the 8 comes before the 9 months.

Here, there's another each side.

Okay, we agreed we can see the top circle on the green. Okay, all right.

Oh yeah, and so with removing the 4 that, um, didn't have the postmark, this is now 196.

So we're going to agree that there's 197 ballots that were postmarked after Election Day. That's code W198. Thank you. Did you get a count on how many of those were April 8th? About half?

More than half. Yeah, we didn't count that. Just another reminder to anybody listening how important it is to have the post office hand stamp with the correct date. Probably just about everybody mailed that on April 7th, but the post office in Prosser— I mean, there's a possibility. Um, I am going to mention that last year we had 301 that were postmarked too late, and in '24 we had 269 that were postmarked too late.

So this is a nice trend.

So the next section is W1, which is no postmark but received after Election Day, and with those 4 being added, it's now 7.

Liz, it is 3:50. What's the standard procedure for as ballots come in?

Where are they stamped? Are they— is everything stamped as it comes in? No, so we stamp it with the red received after Election Day is when we start stamping with our stamp.

I think it's important to understand that anything that's in red comes from this office. Yes, how's that? And I believe, if I remember correctly, if it's received, in this case April 8th, then the assumption is that it was mailed at least by April 7th. But none of these are Close to that.

Yeah.

Uh, it's on the other side of the column. It's 3— 3/5— 3/3.

All right, we're going to agree that Coach Debbie won. No postmark, but received after election date. There were 7. And I'm going to call it 5-minute recess so that I can wash my hands because those envelopes were yuck. Anyways, thank you.

Just out of curiosity, like for that last one, and I think there's another one also, um, it says received after the date of the election, no postponement, and the deliverer cannot verify Sometimes there's like a yellow barcode on there, and so when they do, we have to—. We ask the post office and give that.

Give them any information. And like last year, I think there was information related to it, but not for this year. Thank you. How's it working? Excuse me?

Well, until I went to PT, it was just fine. After PT, I became murderous. I understand the murderous aspect. I'm sure it'll be good. Alright.

And then I couldn't take it. I kept grabbing two of them instead of one. Yeah, that's what all of our desks have, like big bottles of lotion. Yeah, there should be some graphic representation of how many board members sit. Like, are you guys going to do like a farewell slide after?

How many board members sit? Uh, no, because I don't think we want to encourage anybody to like go for the record.

So was it, uh, busy? Busy, busy. It's usual. Yeah, it was pretty steady. It's a normal ramp up and then all of a sudden everybody's gone and you're looking around like it's just 3 of us or 4 of us.

Yeah, it goes from just 4 of us to there's everybody, it's chaos, and then it's back down to you can hear a pin drop. Because it is kind of large. Yeah, just a little bit. Get an echo in here with our bodies. I mean, we talk loud, so I guess it's just our voices, actually, but Oh, sorry.

I just— are we allowed now to turn our phones back on? Yes.

Um, all right, we're back together again. Thank you. Next.

Okay, uh, the next section is W-2, which is unclear postmark, but the post office can provide additional information. There are 3.

And I'm just going to note for us that the received office date is 17th 20th, so they were quite late.

All right, that was Reject Coach W too. After postmark and very late received, there were 3. Thank you. The next is XX, voter is deceased. There is 1.

How are these discovered? How are these discovered? This— in this case, in this case, they— whoever received the envelope wrote deceased on it, and when it went through the sorter, our signature verification team saw that it was is deceased, they made another challenge so that we can look at it, and then we will provide that information to the state, and then they look into it.

Does the state verify that the person is deceased? Absolutely. But they don't tell you? Uh, sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

This was the giveaway. Yes, that was the giveaway.

But the person voted in anyway, right? Uh, I don't, I don't think so. I don't, I don't think we opened it because it didn't get that far, so I, I don't know.

Are there different names? Who is—.

I don't think that was just erroneous. They had two different issues on the same one. Oh, okay, so it doesn't even go with this. Okay, well, that certainly makes sense to me now. Thank you.

All right, that was reject code double X, voter is deceased. There was one.

The next section is Z, voter failed to sign the ballot return envelope. There are 32, and like they—. 32, Yes. So they get cure letters, and if there were phone numbers or emails, we also reach out to them that way.

This one has a little story, so that's why it's still wrapped. Okay. You want to get to the story first?

Liz, do you have a— of those who came without a signature that you contacted, how many of them cured? Oh, I don't know about confidence.

So this one just, just couldn't make it. The recommendation is reject. Yes. So we sent them a care letter. We sent them the same notes and a care letter, and then we also Contact.

If he had contact information. Yeah, there's a phone on this.

Unable to write signature. I'm sorry, you may be repeating this, but you did contact this person? Yes, and they got And they got cured. Did they—. Do we know why they were—.

Did they cure? No. And we don't know why. That's—. If they had cured, they wouldn't be in here presently.

Um, no, I'm sorry. Liz, there's a notation that this voter was unable to sign, right? But he or she didn't put an X. If he or she had put an X, there was a witness, we would have been in good shape. But they indicated that the voter even make a mark.

We did send them a cure letter, um, and we also—. Is there anywhere in our instructions that says individuals who cannot or unable to sign may—. It's on the envelope. Okay, so, um, if, if you are unable to write your signature, make a mark in the voter signature area above And have your mark, witness. Gotcha.

Thank you.

They may not have made an X, but they did say unable to sign. The witness, fine, put that.

So the voter has to make a vote. So if the voter had written that and witnessed it, we've been okay.

Sorry, thought it was your phone. Oh, no, no, no, it could be. My son just got home. Oh, okay. It's not easy.

I think we're almost done.

6 More codes.

Kind of way.

All right, we agree that that was 32 voter-filled slide ballot return envelopes, item numbers— reject code Z, and the one that just hurts to do.

So the next is Z1, which is no signature match on the ballot return envelope. There are 455.

We had one more come in. Yes, we had one more come in. Sorry. That's okay. Let's do these in pairs.

We'll work on one and you do the bottom. And you guys work on this one.

Go through and you're looking for, uh—. So could you, could you explain this, Ewan? So Z1 is when the signature on the envelope does not match the reference images that we received from the state or from the previous election that we— it's been looked at by these two people. Some of them have been looked at, just one of them. At least two people trained to look.

Yes, yes, they've been trained by a document exam specialist. Were they sent cure letters? They were sent cure letters. They were also, if there's phone numbers or emails, they were also contacted that way. And if they have ballot tracks, we also sent out several other notifications saying you still need to carry your ballot.

And what are we as a commission doing now? Just because it— how do we know that that signature is not locked in? Yeah, I think they just get them. Yeah, I mean, if they want to, or you can just—. Because we trust the experts, two experts who made the determination.

We had sometimes the support team had availability. We also did a second review, or third review rather, review and resolution. We do it on a microphone. Sorry.

Sorry, uh, so these were looked at at least by 2 on the signature verification team. The core team, as available, as we were available, we did a third look at them, and the review and resolution team also looked at them. So sometimes you even had, what is that, 6, 8 people look at them. And then we, they, these all got cure letters, and then if there's contact information, we contact them again. And same with if they have ballot checks, They would have gotten several ballot box notifications saying, "You still need a cure." How many were in the Z1 category last year, or the past couple years?

I've got that here. Last year—. Oh, sorry, 386 last year, 602 the year before. So 455 is not our high and not our low.

I can see some of these signatures are difficult.

Except this one's still in the— is it the interior? Yeah, this is the one that we have the most issues with. The key is how do we find a better way?

This individual appears to have made some sort of mark and to have had it witnessed. That would count as a—. So I think, so I think you're correct. I think, um, we left them a message and they just didn't respond, but If Chair Nolan isn't agreeing, we can count that.

They said that it was them. Uh, no, but if you want to accept that as a mark—. That's a mark. So if it's marked as witness, technically we could. Oh, okay.

Thank you, Ms. A lot of these are witnessed.

They might be witnessed, but for our code, just because it's witnessed doesn't meaning that we count it. Per code, the only way that the witness comes into play is if they do an X or a mark. So, in the code, for signature lines marked but not signed by a voter, the same attributes applicable to a voter's signature may also be applied to a witness's signature. If challenged, the witness does not have a signature in the state voter registration database, the municipality may rely on other signatures reasonably known to the municipality to be witnesses. For purposes of this section, a mark may be an X or other letter, line, or symbol verified by the witness signature.

Jamie, a number of these are, I presume, signed and witnessed.

Um, in this fact alone, there was—. So, um, I would say that 8 people have looked at those signatures and said that it's not a match to what we have in the voter registration database. No, but maybe just simply a quotes mark, which is witness. I'm sorry, I'm confused.

Um, a valid signature— the signature on the ballot declaration must be compared with the signatures in the voter's voter registration file using the standards in this subsection. The municipal clerk may designate in writing election officials to perform this function. All personnel assigned to the duty of signature verification shall subscribe to an oath administered by the municipal clerk regarding the discharge of his or her duties The signature on the ballot declaration may not be rejected solely because the signature is not dated unless the date is necessary to validate the timeliness. The signature on a ballot declaration may not be rejected solely because the name in the signature is a variation of the name on the voter registration record. The following characteristics shall be used to evaluate signatures to determine whether they are the same writer.

Agreement in style and general appearance, including basic construction, skill, alignment, fluency, and general uniformity and consistency between signatures. Agreement in the proportions of individual letters, height to width, and heights of the uppercase to lowercase letters. Irregular spacing, slants, or sizes of letters that are duplicated in both signatures. And then after considering the general traits agreement of the most distinctive unusual traits of the signatures. A single distinctive trait is insufficient to conclude that the signatures are by the same writer.

There must be a combination or cluster of shared signatures.

Likewise, there must be a cluster of differences to conclude that the signatures are by different writers. And so for signature lines marked but not signed by a voter, the same attributes are applicable. And then text, letter, line, or symbol verified by a witness signature. And so my team, uh, has been trained by forensic document examiners, and their determination was that these signatures did not match. And so our reading of the code is that it's not a valid signature, and so we're asking the commission to reject them.

If the signatures aren't even close to matching, um, but all of these have received your letters or contacts. All of them have received your letters and none of them responded.

How many did respond?

I don't have that part. We don't have that number off the top of our heads. We have a master cure list that we've been working off. I would say, I think there's been, for the various reasons, there's thousands on the, or at least 1,000 on the cure letter list.

Jamie, what is the definition of a mark.

Um, and the question is, can we consider these signatures as marks which are.

Goodness. How'd you guys do on this?

Um, so mark is not defined in the definitions section, and so what I have to rely on is, for purposes of this section, a mark may be an X or other letter, line, or symbol verified by witness signature.

So in my mind, it's pretty wide open what a mark is, and if we consider this scribbling to be a mark which is witnessed, um, I think What's the objective of round 4, counting each? Okay, so we did this a couple of years ago. We had the commission ordered us to reverse, to count everything that was— had a signature on it that had a witness signature. And as we were going through the system with hundreds of very obviously not matched signatures, The observers at the time wrote a challenge on all of these ballots because the signatures were very clearly not a match. And so, so we updated the code to include this definition of a mark, because if it doesn't match, it doesn't match the signature that we have, it's not a valid signature.

According to the voter registration database, according to our code, which we're required to look at the voter registration database. And so I can see that it's not a valid signature, but I'm struggling with whether or not that, as you say, scribbling constitutes an MM mark, which if witnessed would be countable. Can I jump in here? I'm looking at the code version. So the way that I read that subsection 5 is if you have signature lines that are marked, right, somebody makes the X instead of a signature, that's a mark.

I don't think it automatically disqualifies the ballot even if there is a signature on file for that voter. Let's say there's a voter who you've got a hand injury and cannot sign this time, so their, their mark doesn't match the signature, but it doesn't necessarily need to because that's that they're using the mark instead of a signature, then what you do is you look at the witness signatures and you take the witness signature and compare that witness signature to the whatever reliable witness signature you have, and you apply that same analysis to the witness signatures that you otherwise would to— like you on a normal ballot would to the voter signature. Is that the process you're describing? Yes. Okay, so then what you'd be looking at is whether the witness signatures match, and if the witness signatures don't match, you know, they're the same criteria you would apply to ordinarily to a voter signature, then that would not be acceptable.

These signatures of the witnesses—. Verify?

No, because those we determined are more than a mark. They were attempting to do an actual signature, and that signature didn't match, and so we didn't look at the witnesses. That seems to me to be the key here. If there's a signature, it's not a mark. Correct.

And a mark is only valid if the person is unable to write a signature. So if you've got a signature on there, it's not a mark within the meaning of the code.

Oh, Katie was wanting to know if those would constitute a mark. That's the only way I can make sense of it.

Okay, thank you very much.

I mean, I think this one could— X or other letter, line, or symbol.

Liz, I think we may have been over this. Whoops.

If someone prints their signature today or April 6th but their signature in the state roll is cursive. Is there any way to compare those two? Do we compare those two?

So I'm going to generally say no as a hypothetical, um, per the training that we received because they are so different between printing and cursive. There's nothing in common, like the characteristics, the slants, everything that you look at, there's nothing in common.

Is it fair to say that a witness's signature is irrelevant unless It's being used to verify a mark. For our purposes, yes.

—And remind me of the technique for curing. You can come to the election central in person, you can text, and can you telephone call? And cue her over the phone? Not verbally over the phone, but we always ask if we can get an email address for them, and then we'll email them their letter. Or they can email us a picture of their driver's license or voter ID.

Okay, so email is—. So text or email, or you can mail back your letter. So it's It's a fairly easy process, fairly easy. We try to make it as easy as possible. And why can't we use voter IDs— uh, I'm sorry, voter ID numbers instead of signatures?

Because in our code it requires a written signature. Okay. Ignoring code for a moment because code could be changed, would that be an effective way to solve this issue?

Are you like saying that they sign the ballot declaration and then provide an identifier to— as the state does? Um, that if that's what the code says, then that's how we would But is that—. Verify— would that be an effective solution to this issue so we're not throwing out ballots? Um, so certain information is required to be confidential according to the state law, so.

Voter ID, what else? Voter ID, date of birth, Social Security numbers, and driver's licenses are all on that list. And so in order to do that, we would have to have a flap that covered those numbers, and it would require an additional step in our process where we were removing the flap prior to it going through our process. So if that's what the code says, That's what we would do, and that's the steps that— some of the steps that we would have to take to change the system. Okay, thank you.

Is there such thing as a sample ballot then and envelopes and everything that we could play with? Uh, we could. Give you a blank envelope. Yeah. Could you please sign this?

Yes, please.

You think that's a mark or an attempt at a signature? Um, I think per how the code was read, I would think that that's an attempt because that's more than an X or a line.

What does— I think that's the same thing.

What would verbal by Jane Doe mean?

She told me to sign it. Yes, it's so the— it's one that got sent into your letter because that's not an actual signature.

Well, did you get your questions answered? I've got my questions answered. Um, have you seen— do we have— okay, all right, so we're through. We pulled a couple. How many did we 2, so it will now be 453.

All right, then we are in agreement that 453 ballots qualify under reject code C1, no signature match on ballot return envelope, mentioning that all of these received your letters and did not cure their ballots.

Thank you. And this—. Can I take a look at those too?

Yes.

Liz, in our pre-election communications where we go on KTUU and give people tips, Did we emphasize this year the need to sign?

Yes, so that's part of our normal talking points, and then we also, as we get further into the election, also emphasize the different ways that they can cure so that they don't have to wait for their letter, so that it gets cured faster.

These are—. Yep, so this is Z2, no reference signature. This code is used as there is no digital reference signature in the state of Alaska voter registration database. So we do contact the state and ask if they have anything that they can pull. And they couldn't find anything for these 3.

And they get a care letter? And they also get a care letter and they're contacted and processed. 3? Yes.

Yeah, I'm just going to check if the break—. Okay, so we've got 3 no preference signatures to reject both of these C, 2. Thank you.

The next is— so there's nothing for 2, so the next one will be 3, ballot voted by someone other than the voter. There are 14.

So there's, um, information related to each one of these, and, um, As we have started calling voters and over the past few years using their emails and phone numbers to call them, we are finding that more and more are explaining to us over the phone that their wife or mother signed for them and either asking us to remove them from the voter database or just explaining to us that they did not in fact sign. And so you'll see the stories on each of them.

Yes, so there's different things that we look at. Typically it's because the signature on the envelope is nowhere near what their signature on file is, and then we look at the witness in these cases, and then we look at, are they in the same household, what are their ages, things like that.

So it's all triggered by a kicking out of the—. Or not the, uh, yes, so it's during signature verification. Yeah, so it's triggered by not matching.

I just have one more example. Just— you have a message for these students? No, I have a thing. Would you— would I just stay here and say, "Hi, my name is me, me." Okay.

Okay, you may have Please, you're welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Amazing.

It seems to me that these are ballots that are properly rejected if the signatures don't match. It doesn't matter if somebody else signed it, but if the signature doesn't match, it's not going to be counted.

Correct. Correct. These are just— we noticed that there may be a pattern because I think there's one that has— there was one person that did it for several, um, and so it's up to the commission if you would like us— if you would direct us to send it to the prosecutor's office.

Do you mind using red?

Are there any guidelines for determining whether something should be forwarded to the prosecutor?

I'm sorry, Ann, can you please repeat your question?

Excuse me, I asked if there were any guidelines for, uh, determining that a a balance should be sent to the prosecutor's office? No, it's at the discretion of the commission.

Sorry, we'll pull up the relevant provision of Title VIII and share it with the commission. What the— we'll pull up the relevant provision from the criminal.

Code and share it with you so that you can then have that to reference. And I think if you think that it is something that merits prosecutorial look, then you could—. Thank you very much.

Um, pull out one that has an R on the end. Um, it's 60,000, 67,000.

And then flip the— oh, I'm sorry. To your right, the lower box, I think is 1.2. Yeah, and then lift up the flap. There's more. We have more categories to go.

Um, no. Please, would you mind helping me with this one? Sure.

Yes, so this was one, um, where we called them and they said that they lived out of state and they did not vote. And so this was somebody trying to sign for them, like, as them, but we got confirmation from the voter that they were out of state and they didn't actually vote. Okay, thank you.

The statement was, I didn't vote, I don't live here anymore, I didn't vote. Did they give you any indication who might have? No. Okay.

Which one is this? I think these are just from the—. I think they're done. Yeah, I need to keep it close. I'm sorry.

Okay, this is the one.

Okay.

All right, have we both looked at all of these envelopes? There are several here that I think we'll all be comfortable with. Somebody agreed to somebody else signing their names, but these I'd like everybody to look at again. Um, these I think should bear further investigation. And if you just real quickly check out each of these and see if you agree.

Before we make that decision and take this review, could we wait for APHA to Well, we're waiting to hear the code on that.

So you're not really making any decisions now. We're going to have a break. We're going to continue to cure that we've received cure letters and stuff on since 4 o'clock, and then— or up to 4 o'clock, you're going to have a dinner break, and then we're going to come back for a meeting. So this is just a work session where you're looking at the majority of what we have. And then you're going to come back to a meeting where you're going to actually make the motions to accept or reject.

So that will be when you'll be ready for these particular ones to make those— that recommendation. So yes, you will have an opportunity to hear from the municipal attorney and, and know how you want to proceed on that. Right. I'm just trying to get a count that we're all on the same page with these to look at again, but I can't say until— well, we're waiting for that. Okay.

You said up to 4 o'clock. I think you meant up to 5 o'clock. We're already past 4. Yeah. Okay.

I pulled up the criminal law provisions, so we're happy to go over those now if now is a good time.

Okay, so there are a couple of different things that might apply if we're talking about a situation where somebody has signed somebody else's ballot. Is that the situation where you're interested in right now? Okay, uh, so Title 8.30-170 is unsworn falsification, and that's actually a part of code that's called out on the ballot envelope. And so for that one, a person commits the crime of unsworn falsification if With the intent to mislead a public servant in the performance of a duty, the person submits a false written or recorded statement that the person does not believe to be true in an application for benefit or on a form bearing notice authorized by law that false statements made in it are punishable. So in here on the ballot envelope, uh, the ones that you've been reviewing, it has an explicit warning: Making false statements on this envelope is punishable as a misdemeanor.

With a citation to this provision of code. I unders— warning, I understand that it is illegal to falsely sign, forge a signature, vote more than once in this election, or cast another person's ballot. So, and of course the ballot, you know, they've revised, they're attesting and declaring that this is their signature and they are the person voting.

So that is what the code says. This is an empty ballot envelope if you want to have it for reference and pass it around. So that's one provision, and then the next provision in Title 8 is 8.30.180 on election violations, and it says that a person who knowingly violates— so knowingly, they have to know what they're doing when they're making their action— knowingly violates any provision of Title 8 regarding the conduct of municipal elections. And then in Title 28, that's the elections title, there is a section on voter misconduct. Now one of those provisions, uh, it says— that's in 28-200-120— a person commits the crime of voter misconduct in the second degree if the person— and it has several sections— one here that would be relevant is votes or attempts to vote in the name of another person or in a name other than the person's own.

And then there's also, you know, intentionally makes a false affidavit, swears falsely, falsely affirms under an oath required by this title. So if you think somebody has falsely affirmed, falsely, you know, certified what's on the ballot envelope, or knowing voted or attempted to vote in the name of another person, or cast somebody else's ballot— if you think that somebody knowingly did that, then that would seem to fall within the within the parameters of what's criminalized by code. The code, the Title 28 code, is it, can you give it? Sure, 28.200.120. And in terms of process, what happens if things are referred to the prosecutor's office, and the prosecutors, they are not part of this process, but they independently, they screen, they look at, you know, what evidence there is, they look at the law, and they decide if in their prosecutor discretion if it's a case that should be pursued or not.

So that's the process. Where is good intent, uh, fall in this analysis? Well, it does require knowing, so you have to have mental state of, I know that I'm making a false statement, I know that I'm casting somebody else's ballot. So if somebody does it accidentally, um, I know what I'm doing, but my mom is so sick and she's I can't do it. I know she would want to vote for me.

I would say that might still be a technical violation of the law, but that's where the prosecutorial discretion would come in of, hey, is this really culpable conduct that we should punish, or is this some— somebody where, you know, the vote wasn't counted, a lesson was learned, they don't know not to do it? Prosecutors make those decisions all the time when faced with charges. Prosecutors make those decisions, but not the Election Commission. I think it would be your decision to refer it to them for, for review. So you could refer to prosecution, then the prosecutors will decide, hey, the mental state is— but I mean, I think that you are— I don't think you have any mandatory obligation to refer if you think there's been a technical violation.

I think it's your choice to refer or not refer. So you can also make that decision right now. Thank you so much. Really appreciate that.

All right, clarification, you can make a decision once you're in official session. Yeah, any decisions right now in your work session, right at the meeting. And then just one piece to add to what Eva said, um, in our experience, the prosecutor's office asks us to send it to the police department first. So the police department does a little bit of investigation before I send over to the prosecutor's office to do a little bit more Intent. But the prosecutors do involve you guys so that they know.

Do you want us not to do this right here? Nope, you can do whatever you need to do to be ready for your meeting that starts at 5. How much more do we have to go through? 7 Ballots. 7 Ballots.

Not baskets, ballots. 7 Ballots. 3 Types.

Do you want to go further here so she can sit? Sure. Amy, I'll show them the rest and you can sit with me and be accepted. And then we can go further. Oh, you're a fish girl now.

Wow, you got a chair in it! Wow, is that coat rack unbalanced or is it just my imagination? Is it crooked at all?

I have no idea. I would say that the AED sign makes it—. No, the one of the wooden—. Oh, oh, the hooks are not in a straight line. The wood is a straight line.

The hooks are really bent. They probably got it secondhand.

Yeah. Anybody ever go up to the storage space up there? So some of that is when we had the 2018 earthquake, uh, the ASD stored the artwork from greening up there because it was so damaged. There's our pumpkin box— our spare pumpkin boxes that we use that when we get a new one, when ours gets old and decrepit, we get new ones. They only come out in October.

It's not convenient for the April timeline. No, got to keep them around here.

I don't know, this ladder just looks like an ocean. Yeah, I don't think I've ever been up there, but yeah, it's not, it's not fun. You've done it now. Mhm. Now, now those shoes, right?

Oh, I'm sure I have. Fun fact: the blue things do come off, so they're wobbly, so you can't use that as a stabilizer. Oh, that's a potential reason why I don't go out there.

That's not good. I think you think you should be there. No, you're there. I think you have to find yourself.

Oh yeah, it's food waiting for us. I'm so sorry. That's all right. This sandwich is very rich.

That's your side? That's my other side. Geez guys! It's really scary to me if you're called from 6 locations during the night— that scares the living daylights out of me. And that's it all.

Liz, can you help me? Sure.

We have two X's. Okay. What would these be? So these ones, they're the same household, same witness, and There's one is 23 and one is 20. So the—.

These voters are college age. The X's, the email, and the witness are all the same. No one's a rusher. It's the same. So our kids are understanding what we need to do is that the father signed for the college age kids.

Next.

Yes. Okay, thank you very much, Liz. You're welcome.

Do it now.

Um, we're on 3. Uh, 3.

Yes. Okay, perfect.

So these are the— that's the Japanese investment. I'm just, just checking. Just checking. All right, good to be sure. Okay.

I'm sorry. Yes. Okay. All right, we got through that. Uh, what we've got is the ballot voted by someone other than the voter, that was reject code 3.

That's a total of 14. 14. Yes. 11 What we're going to look at later. Okay, so next is Section 9, POA ballot voted by power of attorney.

We only have one.

And remind us why ballots cannot be voted by powers of attorney. It's an—. They can do a lot of things with the power of attorney, such as witness notice.

Yes, so in this case the POA is signing on behalf of the board, which is against code.

Yes, it says it right on the envelope.

All right, we've got one, uh, reject code 9. The power of attorney— the ballot was voted by the power of attorney, which clearly says we can't do. Thank you. Next is 10 previous election ballot envelope received. We have 4, and we do open them and make sure that it is indeed a previous election ballot.

There are two.

I know that I probably screwed us up because I thought that I was handing you two ballots. There's only one ballot in here. You can hold this material if you want. Okay. I think that's what we said.

I don't know, it's two envelopes, but I think there's only one. I think I thought that I All right, and these are, uh, for—. Sorry—. Code 10, previous election ballot envelope received. Sad.

And then lastly is Reject Code 11, which is other. Uh, there's multiple envelopes with one ballot and a statement of what happened. Um, so you can read that, but basically somebody came into the front, they handled whatever they needed to, and then they dumped in the trash these. And so these are to be rejected. They left them in the trash.

Yeah, so this is not theirs, and so they said they don't need it and they threw it in the trash.

Just the one ballot.

Yeah, yes, that's one reject for Reject Code 11.

I was checking up on her a couple of months ago.

I don't know if she died or just moved on. Yeah, that's why. I don't know. Yes.

Okay.

And that's it. That's all we have for the work session. What's our— what's our— what's our—. Please, nothing under K. Reject code K.

No, we do not have anything for K.

I don't have our total because we did have cures come in while we were meeting, and that's what we're working on. So we'll have updated numbers, um, and I guess a few minutes because it's quarter to 5. Okay, so we have 15 minutes to eat the supper that they've provided and wash our hands again. Thank you.

Yes.