Audits have shown that Utah’s elections are clean. No counting system is perfect, and an audit of the ‘22 election found some counties with a few more votes than ballots, but no systemic errors or significant fraud were uncovered.
Many people may not realize it, but Utah’s counting system is not connected to the internet. Only the voter database and a website that, among other things, posts election results, are web based. And each election is administered separately by local jurisdictions, mainly counties.
Which is why it’s hard to understand why Lockhart and Josh Daniels, the former Utah County clerk, have found it necessary to start a website — trustutahelections.org — with the stated aim of reassuring voters and building trust in Utah elections.
Many people may not realize it, but Utah’s counting system is not connected to the internet. Only the voter database and a website that, among other things, posts election results, are web based. And each election is administered separately by local jurisdictions, mainly counties.
Which is why it’s hard to understand why Lockhart and Josh Daniels, the former Utah County clerk, have found it necessary to start a website — trustutahelections.org — with the stated aim of reassuring voters and building trust in Utah elections.
It’s hard, that is, in light of facts. And yet I’m guessing many people reading this understand perfectly why such a thing is needed.
Facts just aren’t what they used to be, apparently. After all, former president Trump and his supporters filed 62 lawsuits in nine states after the 2020 election, contesting the results. Only one was initially ruled in Trump’s favor, but then it was overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
And yet polls consistently show about a third of Americans believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen. A January poll by USA TODAY/Suffolk University showed 52% of Trump supporters had zero confidence that the 2024 count would be accurate.
Lockhart and Daniels met with the Deseret News/KSL editorial board last week to talk about these things. The discussion is important for two reasons. First, Tuesday’s GOP primary election in Utah features hotly contested races with multiple candidates for U.S. Senate and House, and second, because election workers, and elected officials, themselves, are experiencing a surge in physical threats.
At a legislative hearing last month, Director of Elections Ryan Cowley said 20 of the state’s 29 county clerks have left office since 2020, many due to “the tense political environment.”
“We haven’t had any necessarily actionable threats; we’ve come really close,” KSL reported him saying.
Daniels sees a problem with the unruly few possibly influencing the uninformed many.
“There are people out there tearing down election administration without very much knowledge,” he said. “And then there’s a whole lot of other people kind of in the middle who maybe don’t care that much but don’t understand if there’s a problem or not. And what they’re hearing are really loud voices who are angry, who are asserting there’s a problem, oftentimes with very little evidence, and they’re not really sure what to think.
“And we thought, we need to speak to that audience.”
The website establishes four general principles of good elections. They must be fair, accountable, secure and transparent. Each of those can be divided into several subheadings. The idea is to set a standard by which an election may be judged.
“And then you can sort of ignore all these specious red-herring type arguments trying to drag you into rabbit holes of conspiracy theories with very little evidence and just lots of fear and uncertainty and doubt,” Daniels said.
Lockhart suggests voters with doubts should become personally involved. Call your county clerk and ask to come by on election night and watch the counting. Transparency, he said, is the best antidote to suspicions.
Sometimes, he said, the truth is boring. Conspiracies are much more fun to consider — except that when democracy is at stake, there is nothing fun or interesting about entertaining rumors.
A website isn’t going to sway those who are disposed to mischief. It might convince people in the vast and largely politically unaware middle.
But the fact that Utahns, without any evidence, would need convincing that their state’s elections are handled competently, is a tragic sign of a nutty time in history.
Facts just aren’t what they used to be, apparently. After all, former president Trump and his supporters filed 62 lawsuits in nine states after the 2020 election, contesting the results. Only one was initially ruled in Trump’s favor, but then it was overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
And yet polls consistently show about a third of Americans believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen. A January poll by USA TODAY/Suffolk University showed 52% of Trump supporters had zero confidence that the 2024 count would be accurate.
Lockhart and Daniels met with the Deseret News/KSL editorial board last week to talk about these things. The discussion is important for two reasons. First, Tuesday’s GOP primary election in Utah features hotly contested races with multiple candidates for U.S. Senate and House, and second, because election workers, and elected officials, themselves, are experiencing a surge in physical threats.
At a legislative hearing last month, Director of Elections Ryan Cowley said 20 of the state’s 29 county clerks have left office since 2020, many due to “the tense political environment.”
“We haven’t had any necessarily actionable threats; we’ve come really close,” KSL reported him saying.
Daniels sees a problem with the unruly few possibly influencing the uninformed many.
“There are people out there tearing down election administration without very much knowledge,” he said. “And then there’s a whole lot of other people kind of in the middle who maybe don’t care that much but don’t understand if there’s a problem or not. And what they’re hearing are really loud voices who are angry, who are asserting there’s a problem, oftentimes with very little evidence, and they’re not really sure what to think.
“And we thought, we need to speak to that audience.”
The website establishes four general principles of good elections. They must be fair, accountable, secure and transparent. Each of those can be divided into several subheadings. The idea is to set a standard by which an election may be judged.
“And then you can sort of ignore all these specious red-herring type arguments trying to drag you into rabbit holes of conspiracy theories with very little evidence and just lots of fear and uncertainty and doubt,” Daniels said.
Lockhart suggests voters with doubts should become personally involved. Call your county clerk and ask to come by on election night and watch the counting. Transparency, he said, is the best antidote to suspicions.
Sometimes, he said, the truth is boring. Conspiracies are much more fun to consider — except that when democracy is at stake, there is nothing fun or interesting about entertaining rumors.
A website isn’t going to sway those who are disposed to mischief. It might convince people in the vast and largely politically unaware middle.
But the fact that Utahns, without any evidence, would need convincing that their state’s elections are handled competently, is a tragic sign of a nutty time in history.
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