Scott County Iowa 2024 General Election Sample Ballot Screenshot
Candidates on the Ballot: November 5, 2024
Kerri Tompkins, Republican – Incumbent
Matt Trimble, Democrat – Challenger
Publisher's Notes: Auditor Tompkins did not respond to our requests to participate in this printed forum. The invitation remains open for Tompkins to provide her responses by October 10, 2024, and we will supplement this article at our Web site with her responses. Tompkins has responded to none of the questions published in the September 2024 print edition and published online here Who Has Access and/or Control of County Election Data Before, During, and After an Election?, nor any of the questions provided below.
Please visit the Reader's podcast collection to hear Tompkins and Trimble respond to questions from the People's Forum and attendees on Saturday September 21, 2024 at the Eastern Iowa Community College campus in downtown Davenport, Iowa, at this link: RCReader.blubrry.net/2024/09/23/scott-county-iowa-auditor-candidate-forum-september-21-2024/
Introduction and Request for Collaborative Engagement:
These questions are presented after decades of studying, researching, and reporting on the election equipment and election governance practices, policies, and processes both locally and in dozens of other counties across numerous states including Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Georgia.
Please note these questions are apolitical and nonpartisan, and not directed or relative to any specific candidate race in the past or in the future.
These questions are presented in the spirit of collaboration, providing an opportunity for the elected incumbent Scott County Auditor Kerri Tompkins and her challenger Matt Trimble to demonstrate proficiency, expertise, and further the public's understanding of how a heretofore opaque system is more transparent and more capable of successfully responding to citizen vigilance and scrutiny.
When asked questions about elections and equipment and practices in May of 2024, Tompkins' repeated responses were: “As the current Scott County Auditor, I follow the law and will continue to do so if I am elected for another term,” with no specifics. Challenger Matt Trimble elected to not respond or participate in that questionnaire.
Subsequently, we've generated more than half of the 39 questions below for this 2024 General Election Scott County Auditor Questionnaire to be binary with “Yes” or “No” possible responses that voters will respect and subsequently more fully understand this county's election management processes. Such engagement will go a long way to help dispel any misgivings or misunderstandings, real or perceived, that generate distrust in election integrity.
In the spirit of informing the Scott County electorate, if Auditor Tompkins or challenger Trimble prefer to answer with a blanket, non-specific response such as, “I will follow the law,” for any of these questions below, we respectfully request that each candidate also include which specific law he or she will follow relative to the question's topic.
Topic 1: Eligible Scott County Voter Registration Roll (Database) Maintenance
1.1: Are updates (additions, deletions, modifications) to Scott County's Voter Registration Roll managed and controlled by Scott County Auditor and its staff? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: Yes, the Auditor’s Office maintains Scott County voter records in statewide I-Voters system for the Iowa Secretary of State.
1.2: If not, then who manages the Voter Registration Roll (updating via removing, adding, et al, voters to keep Voter Rolls current and clean)?
1.3: How often are changes forwarded to the Secretary of State for updating the aggregate Iowa Voter Registration Roll (database) for the entire state?
Matt Trimble: Since I’m not in the position, I don’t have knowledge of the current process. I would assume updates would be in real-time or daily updates.
1.4: Does the Scott County Auditor office verify by reconciling its most recently updated Voter Registration database with the most recent data maintained by the Secretary of State? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: Since I’m not in the position, I don’t have knowledge of the current process. I assume that the staff would have a process for review & change analysis in the I-Voters system.
If yes, what are the primary metrics compared between each database to ensure parity, and how often is this “trust but verify” measure taken in a given 12 month cycle leading up to a General Election?
Matt Trimble: Since I’m not in the position, I don’t have knowledge of the current process.
Topic 2: Cast Vote Records, Election History, and Public Access to Impersonal Data
The U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) defines the “Cast Vote Record (CVR)” as one ballot image generated by a tabulator when a a single ballot is cast (fed into the tabulator) by an individual voter. It is this definition that is providing the justification for Iowa auditors to deny public access, claiming it would violate individual voters' privacy.
But many election jurisdictions refer to the Cast Vote Record as the election history of all ballots cast during an election. In other words, the CVR is a real-time accumulating digital record generated by the tabulators from all the ballot images of all the ballots cast in a precinct, in the order that voters cast them (fed their paper ballots into tabulators) to provide an election history of votes cast.
Each of Scott County's 66 precincts' ballot totals are added to the total absentee mail-in ballots (which are also fed into tabulators by volunteers at a central counting location on behalf of voters who could not vote in-person), to provide the final county-wide results of the county's election and preserve that election's history for 22 months as the law requires.
2.1: Does the Absentee & Special Voters Precinct Board (a.k.a. the ASVP Board) or election personnel and/or volunteers, who feed Absentee Ballots into the tabulators at the central counting location, check signatures on the Affidavit Envelopes containing the ballots against the voter's original Voter Registration Card or Driver's License to verify the voter is eligible to receive a ballot? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: Signature verification is proven to not be a reliable & valid method of authenticating a voter. Signature matching is frequently used to disenfranchise eligible voters.
2.2: Does the Scott County Auditor's office refer to what is identified as CVR's above with another label for the similar work product? Yes or No? If yes, what label?
Matt Trimble: Since I’m not in the leadership of the office, I do not have knowledge of the current use of CVR.
Election histories (or CVRs) are accessed in other jurisdictions (counties and/or states), and because they are not individual ballot images as defined by EAC, no personal information is disclosed, therefore does not violate anyone's privacy. CVRs by most vernacular usage are election histories that provide impersonal data for myriad purposes of analysis and are used by all manner of organizations, agencies, and political interests.
2.3: Does the public have equal access? Yes or No? If no, why not?
Matt Trimble: From what I understand about CVR, since the data is abstracted there would be no reason to keep the data private.
In addition, the Cast Vote Record can also refer to the State's more comprehensive election history of aggregated ballot images from ballots cast (fed into tabulators) in all the precincts of Iowa's 99 counties. In each scenario (precinct, county, or state), every election is memorialized via both aggregate and individual election histories of all votes cast in states' precincts per counties, in the order each was cast (fed into the individual tabulators), providing each State with an election history of recorded results of every election deciding the people's choices for their elected representation.
2.4: Does Scott County's election equipment produce an historical record of ballots cast, along with corresponding ballot images, during an election, especially in case an audit or recount is necessary? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I'm not in a position to know the specifics of how the current election management system handles historical records but it would be a required function of that system.
2.5: As Auditor, once an election is closed, do you have access to the recorded election history or CVR of ballots cast per precinct tabulators, and to the aggregate election history that combines those totals for election results? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the current practices. It would be best practice for the data set to be immutable & read-only after the election is closed.
2.6: Are the reports that are created internally by the tabulators and recorded to the thumb drives available to you without ES&S' permission and/or oversight? Yes or No? If no, why not?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know but I assume yes as part of election management.
Topic 3: Thumb Drives and Chain of Custody
Once the election closes, thumb drives are removed from each tabulator and sealed, along with the tally sheets from the same tabulators. All the precincts report their results to the County Auditor via secure sealed envelopes containing thumb drives and corresponding tally sheets that are taken from each precinct's tabulators containing all the ballot images and vote totals for that precinct. These sealed envelopes are then delivered according to security protocol that should include chain of custody measures.
3.1: Is the Scott County Auditor still contracting with a private entity to transport these election assets from the various precinct polling locations to the Auditor's office as the 2014 Election Security Policy authorizes? Link to the 2014 document here. Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the current practices. I assume Scott County staff would be the sole handlers of election materials.
3.2: Once the election is closed and certified, does the Scott County Auditor retain each thumb drive with their respective election histories recorded and stored on each one for 22-24 months as required by Iowa law? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I would expect this equipment would be preserved as part of the election records.
3.3: Does the Scott County Auditor retain physical possession of the original thumb drives from each precinct and absentee tabulators once their contents are uploaded to the dedicated airgapped central laptop and transmitted? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I would expect this equipment would be preserved as part of the election records.
3.4: Which supplier or vendor provides the Auditor's office with the thumb drives used in the tabulators, and how soon before an election?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics but the equipment would need to be on hand in order to do quality checks in preparation for an election.
3.5: Does the supplier of these thumb drives program the drives with the county races, any referendums, etc, for that election? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. I assume the vendor has nothing to do with the preparation of the data cards used in the election equipment. The election management system or precinct voting machines would have a process to prepare the cards.
3.6: Do these thumb drives install specific programs resident on these thumb drives when inserted into the tabulators? Yes or No? If yes, what are the functions of these programs?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. The data cards should just be used for data storage for the local device and not execute a program.
3.7: Are authorized Auditor personnel physically able to open and review the programs that come resident on the thumb drives before or after inserting them into the tabulators and/or installing them? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics.The data card should be for data storage for the local device and not execute a program.
3.8: Are any specific software programs executed or put into a run mode on these thumb drives after voting is over, but before the election is closed and the thumb drive is removed from each tabulator? Yes or No? If yes, which programs from which vendor?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics.
3.9: Do the tabulators themselves have resident programming that runs apart from the inserted thumb drive? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I assume yes since it is a computer with an operating system.
3.10: Are the official ballots for each election printed by the tabulator vendor, in this case ES&S? Yes or No? If no, who does print Scott County's ballots?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. I assume this is an open document format not vendor specific.
3.11: Does the County Auditor's office actually own the the thumb drives, and the data that is collected and recorded to the thumb drives throughout the election? Yes or No? If no, who does own these assets?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. I assume yes Scott County owns the equipment.
3.12: What services does Tenex provide relative to the ballots and ES&S tabulators?
Matt Trimble: I'm not in a position to know the specifics. Tenex is the poll book vendor which would only be used to update a voter's participation in an election in the Iowa SOS I-Voter system.
Topic 4: Scytl and Iowa Secretary of State
4.1: At the conclusion of the 2020 or the 2022 elections, did the Scott County Auditor office upload via the Internet or any other secure network connection, the county's election results (each precinct's election totals) to a third party private vendor Scytl (or its subsequent acquirer) originally headquartered in Barcelona, Spain, instead of sending the results directly to Iowa's Secretary of State? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. Scott County Auditor would have no control over how the Iowa Secretary of State handles voter data once it has been entered into the system.
4.2: If the Scott County Auditor's election results are sent to Scytl, for what purpose(s)?
In other words, what does Scytl do with the County's election data before Scytl passes that data on to the Secretary of State and Edison (the contractor that supplies media distribution for all the states' election results broadcast on television), that you as Auditor or the SoS cannot do?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. Scott County Auditor would have no control over how the Iowa Secretary of State handles voter data once it has been entered into the system.
4.3: As Scott County Auditor, do/will you verify/reconcile that the Scott County totals Scytl receives electronically, then passes on to the SoS and to Edison, matches precisely what was sent on Scott County's thumb drives? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: This should be a common and required practice.
4.4: What vendor or supplier provides the dedicated secure airgapped laptop used for transmitting results to Scytl?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics. This should be a secure channel or point-to-point VPN for data transmission and treated with even more protection than a financial transaction.
4.5: Do you have any concerns sending county election results to a foreign third party vendor before the elections are state certified, or even generally?
Matt Trimble: I don’t know the current process but election results would be already published and should be treated as immutable.
Topic 5: CIS, DHS, CISA, and Albert Censors
The Center for Internet Security (CIS), a private non-governmental organization (NGO) that is contracted by the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in a private-public partnership to monitor U.S. elections for illicit activity by bad actors both foreign and domestic. And to establish a management model for election-related “misinformation,” broadly defined by DHS as a potential domestic threat. CIS oversees election cyber protection using Albert Sensors that monitor county election system networks' bidirectional traffic to detect and report breaches (unwanted activity) of election system components that are connected to the Internet. According to CIS, individual county governments do not have access to the data that Albert Sensors are collecting.
5.1: Is the Scott County Auditor's office, or the Scott County IT Department it works closely with, contracting or coordinating with any of the entities named above to facilitate Albert Sensors being utilized on any Scott County election equipment or equipment operating networks connected to election equipment? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I don’t know what the Scott County IT and CIS relationship is. The CIS Albert sensor is an Intrusion Detection System that is provided to SLTTs (State, Local,Tribal & Territorial government agencies) as a low cost network security device. This network security device saves these organizations & municipalities hundreds of thousands of dollars per year and provides increased cyber security defenses. This type of system is common as part of defending enterprise networks from attack. The system sends regular activity reports to the organizations.
5.2: When the public is told the election systems are safe and secure and not connected to the Internet, does this mean not connected during voting, but can otherwise be connected at other times? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: The election related equipment would need to be connected to the elections management system which would be on a local, private network.
5.3: Which components of the Scott County election equipment or systems are not physically able to connect to the Internet?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics.
5.4: Which election equipment or systems is CIS and its Albert Sensors monitoring and protecting?
Matt Trimble: If the Albert IDS is in use by Scott County IT, it would be used to detect malicious activity for incident response. Election equipment or related staff equipment would be protected behind the enterprise firewall.
5.5: How can the Albert Sensors monitor/access the election systems—voter registration rolls (databases), poll books, tabulators, or any other part of the election system network before, during, or after elections if none have Internet connectivity capabilities?
Matt Trimble: I don’t know if the Albert IDS is in use. IDS type of network security equipment is used to monitor inbound/outbound & lateral internal network traffic. I would expect all election equipment would be on a secured, isolated network segment. If an election related device was operating in a suspicious way the IDS would detect that and escalate it for incident response.
Topic 6: 2024's New Poll Book Hardware & Software, Signature Verification
Until this year, during an election, a county’s Voter Registration Roll (database of all registered voters in that county) was installed on each precinct’s master poll book (laptop). This master poll book was hardwired to subordinate processing poll books (laptops), using a local LAN network, to check-in voters, verify and confirm eligibility to vote in that precinct and provide an 8-1/2x11 paper Declaration of Eligibility (DOE) for voters' signatures, then issue them their individual ballots. After which each voter fills out his/her individual ballot, then feeds it into a tabulator to be counted as the means of casting his/her vote.
Matt Trimble: Issue not raised here: Was the proper hardware acquisition process followed to allow for a full, public review of the voting technology? It was not in violation of the law and has cost the taxpayers over $100,000 and delayed the implementation of the new equipment pushing it into a Presidential year which goes against best practice and increases the risk of errors.
6.1: Do the new Tenex poll books use a LAN network during elections? Yes or No?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics of this equipment. It would make sense that a local private or peer-to-peer network would be established that would only allow for the known election devices to interact to update voter participation during the elections at the specific polling site.
6.2: Tenex claims its poll books do have WiFi connectivity. Are Scott County poll books and printers connected to the Internet at anytime during an election? Yes or No? If yes, for what purpose are the poll books and printers connected to the Internet?
Matt Trimble: I’m not in a position to know the specifics of this equipment. There should only be a local private or peer-to-peer network for the election equipment for the sole purpose of updating voter participation during the elections at the specific polling site.
