People crowded the York County Administrative Center on Wednesday to urge the county commissioners to support state Sen. Doug Mastriano’s request for a forensic election audit.
“Even if York County was not the problem and it will not change the election overall, there were numerous irregularities, and I think the county has to put their voice behind supporting a forensic audit of the vote in Pennsylvania,” Mark Swomley, chair of the Springettsbury Township Board of Supervisors, told the board to applause during public comment.
Yet, as The Associated Press reports, no county election board, prosecutor or state official has raised a concern over any sort of widespread election fraud in November’s election in Pennsylvania. Critics say an election audit is duplicative, given the legal requirements for each county and the state to review election results for accuracy and investigate any discrepancies.
More:Pennsylvania decertifies county’s voting system after audit
More:York County raises objection to Mastriano’s election audit
More:Push for ‘forensic investigation’ has some GOP candidates squirming
In all, 24 people spoke during Wednesday’s public comment period, and 22 of them urged the York County Commissioners to support an Arizona-style forensic investigation of the 2020 election, which has been championed by Mastriano, a Republican from Franklin County who also represents part.
Mastriano, who has helped spread Trump’s baseless falsehoods that the election was rigged, has characterized his initiative as a way to bring transparency to elections and ease the concerns of Republican voters who do not trust the outcome of the 2020 election.
With about 80 people attending the meeting, an overflow room was established with a live video feed across the hall from the designated meeting room. Normally there are only a handful of residents at the meeting.
In a letter sent to Mastriano last week, the commissioners raised concerns about the legality of the investigation the senator is proposing and who would incur its costs. They also asked if the Senate or state would supply the staff, oversight and money needed to conduct the audit.
“If not, the York County commissioners cannot in good conscience agree that the York County taxpayers should foot the bill for this forensic investigation,” they wrote in their letter.
Before public comment period Wednesday, President Commissioner Julie Wheeler sought to inform the public of what the county had done to secure the safety of the ballots. She said activities were open to the media, political candidates, political parties, representatives of candidates and elected officials. Mail-in ballots were transported by members of the sheriff’s department and were secured throughout the process, she said.
In addition, Wheeler said she had been asked if mail-in ballots had substantially affected the 2020 election. She told the crowd that while mail-in ballots increased total voter turnout in 2020 as compared to 2016, the results were still similar. In 2016, Donald Trump won York County by 62.39% over Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton; in 2020, Trump won York County by 61.52% over Joe Biden.
“In a county the size of York County, results were not dramatically different between 2020 and 2016,” Wheeler said.
Another aspect of a potential audit is the backlash that the county may incur from state government. Governor Tom Wolf and Acting Secretary of State Veronica W. Degraffenreid have said they will decertify the voting system of any county that allows a post-election review from a third party.
On Wednesday, the Department of State announced they had decertified Fulton County’s voting system for allowing a review from Wake TSI.
“These actions were taken in a manner that was not transparent,” the Secretary said in a July 20 letter to Fulton County according to a press release. “As a result of the access granted to Wake TSI, Fulton County’s certified system has been compromised and neither Fulton County, the vendor, Dominion Voting Systems, nor the Department of State can verify that the impacted components of Fulton County’s leased voting system are safe to use in future elections.”
Before the meeting ended, Wheeler shared a statement from the Board of Commissioners saying it was premature to make a decision on a forensic audit. While speakers had attempted to answer the questions that the commissioners had, Wheeler said they would try to collaborate with Mastriano to get answers to their questions.
“We want to assure you that we’ve heard your concerns and we will take them very seriously, but at this point we are going to continue to attempt to collaborate with Senator Mastriano and get the answers to the questions that we have,” she said.
In the letter to Mastriano, the commissioners also pointed to the likelihood that its voting machines would be decertified and rendered useless if they allow third-party access to the machines that is not authorized by the state or the company that supplied them, Dominion Voting Systems.
In any case, the county’s commissioners said they had run the election legally, securely and transparently, and completed the required county and state audits confirming the accuracy of the results.
This is a developing story. More to come.
— The Associated Press contributed to this report.
