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Posted on 08/04/2025 5:12:19 AM PDT by lightman
An analysis of three recent statewide elections found that problems with voting machines were rare and easily fixed.
This article is made possible through Spotlight PA’s collaboration with Votebeat, a nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting. Sign up for Votebeat’s free newsletters here.
Pennsylvania voters encountered only scattered voting-machine malfunctions that rarely affected their ability to cast ballots in recent elections, according to a Votebeat and Spotlight PA analysis of problems reported to the state.
Counties reported a smattering of common problems with machines at polling places, such as paper jams and error messages. Such issues were typically fixed quickly by counties having technicians on call or simply replacing the machine.
For election officials, sending out a technician or staffer to a polling place is usually easier and more efficient than trying to walk a poll worker through a fix over the phone, said Forrest Lehman, election director in Lycoming County. Officials refer to these traveling helpers as rovers or roamers.
“Often you don’t know for sure what’s going on without sending someone out there,” Lehman said. His rovers are prepared with a “Swiss Army knife” of supplies to address any issue they may encounter, he said, and often the biggest delay is just the time it takes a rover to drive to the polling place.
Pennsylvania appears to be the only state to require counties to report voting system malfunctions after each election. The requirement is the result of an August 2023 legal settlement between the Department of State and a coalition of election security groups. Votebeat and Spotlight PA analyzed the reports for three elections since the requirement took effect: the November 2023 municipal election, the 2024 primary and the 2024 general election. The 2025 primary election reports haven’t yet been published.
The reports reviewed by Votebeat and Spotlight PA showed:
The most common problems were ballots getting jammed in a machine, issues with scanning ballots, or the machine displaying some kind of error message. Many of the problems didn’t affect voters’ ability to cast ballots, because workers were often able to direct them to other available machines. Of those that did interfere with voting, the most common types of problems were scanning issues and jams.
Across the three elections, a total of 1,673 voters were delayed or prevented from casting a ballot due to equipment malfunctions, which represents 0.014% of the votes cast in those elections. See a compilation of the reports.
The most common resolution involved replacing equipment, but election officials also solved problems by resetting a machine or switching to a second machine for the rest of the day.
The quickest resolutions, those that took 30 minutes or less, typically involved having a trained county worker go to the polling place and fix the issue.
The state doesn’t require counties to have roving technicians, but Amy Gulli, a spokesperson for the Department of State, said most at least have extra staff at the election office who can be dispatched as needed.
Karen Barsoum, Chester County’s election director, said her county uses two separate teams of workers — one of traveling technicians and another of roaming staffers to solve issues that can’t be resolved by poll workers.
Barsoum said the roamers serve as liaisons between her office and the precincts, providing the poll workers with extra supplies or just an extra set of hands if needed.
The technicians are available for more serious issues. They have the county divided into 10 zones, with one traveling technician stationed in each zone on Election Day with tools to repair, clean, or replace malfunctioning equipment.
Barsoum said the new requirement to fill out the malfunction reports helped Chester County more clearly see how poll workers should handle issues when they arise. The county developed its own form for poll workers at each precinct to fill out when machines malfunction, which includes step-by-step instructions and an explicit reminder not to let the issue prevent or delay voting. She then uses those precinct-level sheets to fill out the state reports.
“Poll workers cannot say, ‘Oh the machine is down. Please come back later,’” she said. “Now that’s not an option. Now it’s in writing — this is what you do.”
The reports show that the most consequential issues are typically due to human error — often one that should have been discovered through pre-election machine testing.
Northampton County’s 2023 ballot tabulation issue, which made it appear as if votes were being changed to candidates not chosen by the voter, and Cambria County’s issue with ballot printing during the 2024 presidential election were both problems that could have been discovered and fixed through proper logic and accuracy testing. But the counties failed to catch those issues in time.
Carter Walker is a reporter for Votebeat in partnership with Spotlight PA. Contact Carter at cwalker@votebeat.org.
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Agreed, yes the voting machines are very easily "fixed".
That seems possible.However,if a machine is programmed to act in a certain way or if it receives instructions to act in a certain way that can’t be called a ‘malfunction”.
“Votebeat is an online media platform under the Civic News Company that reports on local elections across the United States from a left-of-center perspective. The platform publishes content by corporate sponsors and prominent donors in addition to its routine reporting. Votebeat also states that it times its reporting to match what it calls “moments of greatest consequence” to mobilize its reader base. The platform lists left-of-center racial ideology as one of its core values, and claims that an “ongoing legacy of racism” exists in American elections and in the media. 1”
https://www.influencewatch.org/organization/votebeat/
By “malfunction”, they mean let the Republican win.
ROTFL! Yeah. Okay. Whose data? The DNC voting machines “data” crew?
Pennsylvania Ping!
Please ping me with articles of interest.
FReepmail me to be added to the list.
Good to know.
On Carter Walker and VoteBeat...
https://www.votebeat.org/authors/carter-walker/
Note the bit about political extremism and misinformation.
Correction: The machines only malfunction in favor of Democrats.
There is an old saying in the computer science arena that applies to voting machines: GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT!
What ever happened to the truck driver who said that he was hired to haul a truckload of completed ballots in from New York?
They found his empty truck parked at the Farm Show Building in Harrisburg after the election.
Look at the stats... Shapiro is the biggest crook since Ed Rendell.
Ahh yes Voicebeat, listed as left of center, around the same credited bias as CNN receives.
So basically, rabid left which means they are lying out their A$$e$$
Voting machines rarely malfunction during Pa. elections, new data show
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Voting machines rarely malfunction during Pa. elections, new data show
Becomes
Voting machines rarely malfunction during Pa. elections, new data show, but if they do it’s not enough to sway elections
Becomes
Voting machines sometimes malfunction, but if they do it’s not enough to sway elections
Becomes
Voting machines malfunction, but when they do it’s not enough to sway elections
Becomes
Voting machines sometimes malfunction, but only rarely
Becomes
Voting machines rarely malfunction during Pa. elections, new data show
Becomes
SHUT UP YOU CRAZY RACIST ELECTION DENIER CONSPIRACY THEORISTS
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Problems might be rare, and they might be easily fixed. Only, the definition of what constitutes a “problem’ just may not be the same for everybody. One example of a “problem” may be “How do we assure a majority vote for the Democrat (Socialist) in respect a race against a Republican?” Well, now, that is very easily fixed, just rig the machine to switch or invalidate, say, every tenth Republican vote cast.
Nothing to be said about a free and fair election.
Let’s have an independent audit of those machines at any time, day or night, and see just how accurate they are!
It’s not the machines. It’s people people.
Voter Fraud in PA is now due to the mail in ballot request and reply structure. IT cannot be audited and right now there are about 10,000 write in ballots that have no corresponding voter id or name match in the SHURE system.
“Voting machines rarely malfunction during Pa. elections, new data show”
But, oh baby, when they malfunction, they malfunction big and only in one direction.
Yes it’s why no cell phones are allowed in casinos in Vegas.
Yeah—the explanation that the machines only malfunction once in a while—is a pile of baloney. Just need the bread and the mustard—supplied by the dimmocraps.
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