A viral social media post features a video that it claims shows a “Dominion voting system representative” manipulating voting data in Gwinnett County, Georgia. While the individual in the video is a Dominion technician, the allegation about what he’s doing is untrue.
The post describes what happens in the video as follows:
“@CodeMonkeyZ: “Watch a Dominion Representative at Gwinnett County Election Central, responsible for tabulating ballots and certifying results, download data to a USB from the Election Management Server, plug it into a laptop, manipulate the data, then palm the USB.
The Election Management System (his first computer) should not be connected to anything and prepares tabulation reports for export to USB drive. You are supposed to deliver the USB drive, not plug it into an external laptop and manipulate it in the file explorer before palming it”
Gwinnett County spokesman Joe Sorenson said in an email to The Dispatch Fact Check that the video shows a “Dominion employee doing his job.” He explains: “This is a Dominion technician producing a data report on the server and saving the report to a Dominion USB thumb drive and then using a laptop to filter requested information. The Dominion servers are not equipped with Excel and counties are not authorized to install any hardware or software on these systems.”
In a press conference on Tuesday, Gabriel Sterling, a Georgia Republican and voting systems manager, also clarified that the video in question is not evidence of fraud.
“A 20 something tech in Gwinnett County today has death threats and a noose put out, saying he should be hung for treason because he was transferring a report on batches from an EMS to a county computer so we could read it,” Sterling said. “Mr. President, you have not condemned these actions or this language. Senators, you have not condemned this language or these actions. This has to stop. We need you to step up and if you’re going to take a position of leadership, show something.”
Dominion spokesman Michael Steel told Fox News, in response to a question about whether “thumb drives could upload material from foreign sources,” that “the tabulator has no unlocked thumb drive access, no unlocked USB ports.” Steel also added that “the machines are what we call air-gapped, They are not connected to the internet. It’s just not physically possible.”
More broadly, in response to widespread allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in conjunction with the National Association of State Election Directors, issued a joint statement, calling the 2020 election “the most secure in American history.”
The statement also addressed the many “unfounded claims” about the election: “While we know there are many unfounded claims and opportunities for misinformation about the process of our elections, we can assure you we have the utmost confidence in the security and integrity of our elections, and you should too. When you have questions, turn to elections officials as trusted voices as they administer elections.”
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