Post-Election Audit of Senate Runoff confirms System Accuracy

This week, 138 counties participated in a post-election audit of ballots cast in the December 6, 2022, Senate Runoff. As part of the audit, every participating county was required to count randomly selected ballots totaling a minimum of 2% of their ballots cast.  In total, county election officials audited 409 batches of ballots, which represented about 4.6% of all ballots cast in the state. Of the 409 batches, 386 (94.4%) had no deviation from the original candidate vote totals. Also, of the 409 batches, 398 (97.3%) showed no deviation from the number of total votes originally reported. None of the discrepancies were outside of the normal amount for a hand count audit of this size.  Georgia law mandates that audits must be conducted following even-year General Elections. All counties participated in the required Risk-Limiting Audit following the November 8, 2022, General Election, which confirmed the outcome of the Secretary of State’s contest. This non-mandated post-election audit following the Senate runoff was requested by Secretary Raffensperger and the Chair of the State Election Board.  “I am pleased that we had such strong participation from our counties at a time when everyone is tired and ready to spend time with their families,” said Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. “This audit showed once again that our system works and that Georgia’s voting system is accurate.”  As in November, Georgia’s audit was supported by VotingWorks and their Arlo auditing software.  “Georgia election officials continue to show their dedication to secure, accurate, and transparent elections by verifying the tabulation of ballots via post-election audits,” said Virginia Vander Roest, Election Implementation Manager for VotingWorks. “VotingWorks is proud to support these efforts.”