Fact Check: Addressing Yet More Claims About Dominion Voting Systems

Sean Hannity raised questions about a machine that is not being used in Michigan and Georgia.

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During Sean Hannity’s Fox News show on Thursday night, he alleged that Dominion Voting Systems, a widely used vote-tabulating software company, was possibly responsible for errors in the vote count that cost President Trump votes. The segment was shared by Trump’s campaign:

https://twitter.com/TeamTrump/status/1327099511798378496

And the president encouraged people to watch Hannity’s show:

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1327095398712946695

Hannity gave examples from Michigan and Georgia, bringing up the miscount in Antrim County, Michigan, that led to counting Trump votes for Biden. As explained in past fact checks, the miscount was caused by “user human error” according to Michigan’s secretary of state, and it was corrected. Hannity also mentioned problems with Dominion machines experienced by poll workers in Georgia, who, during the primary elections, saw the machines blow fuses and freeze. No allegations of tabulation errors or software problems were made.

Hannity went on to cite the work of Princeton computer security expert, Dr. Andrew Appel, who expressed concerns about the security of Dominion’s ImageCast Evolution machine in congressional testimony in 2017 and in an article for website Freedom to Tinker in 2018. Hannity claimed that Appel’s work showed that Dominion could be used to “print more votes” on ballots.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Victor Clairmont

    You know, how funny would it be if the dominion stuff was true?

    ....

    .........


    .............omg that’s actually terrifying but what a way to end the year!

    Thanks for more fact checks Alec!

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  2. Midge

    "Hannity claimed he was just asking questions by sharing this information, saying at one point: 'Now, am I saying tonight this happened with Dominion in this cycle? No. How would I possibly know?'"

    Um, by doing a fact check. Hannity must have an entourage big enough to include fact-checkers if he wanted them.

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  3. Eric B

    A few points of confusion:
    1) Were any digital machines used in this election in a contested state?
    2) How do they work, do they mark ballots or do they offer a recorded, verifiable record of all votes cast on the machine?
    3) In the recent dispatch podcast Ben Ginsberg said machines are checked before and after voting but to a layperson and without further explanation that sounds like checking your front door lock before and after work and concluding nobody broke into your house while you were gone for the day. Though he did refer to "a stack" so I'm supposing the systems he referred to took paper ballots and if so, then auditing the paper is the check and that sounds fine.

    So while the current allegations against software appear to be just a distraction to claim theft, the more I read doesn't get me closer to understanding how fully-digital machines are secure but it's looking more and more like that's not in significant use now and a topic for wikipedia.

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  4. Joe1776

    Can you fact check whether the emails published by the New York post were Russian disinformation? Many people were saying they may have been “salted” but the evidence from independent witnesses and our fbi seems to suggest those claims were themselves disinformation.

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  5. Mary

    Hannity=Lying mouthpiece. FULL STOP

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  6. Paul A Sand

    True fact: Andrew Appel's dad. Kenneth, proved the Four-Color Theorem.

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    1. Avatar photo
      dmklever

      The old man was one of my actuarial science professors at U of IL in the late 1970's. I still remember the guy losing his train of thought occasionally and remarking that he must have "fallen asleep at the switch".

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  7. rob

    No matter how many "innovations" they make in voting there are always more flaws. To me the simplest seems to always work the best. A person shows up to their precinct on Election Day, fills out a ballot, puts into a locked box, and then the poll workers count the ballots at the end of the day. You don't need fancy computers or elaborate voting schemes.

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    1. Avatar photo
      JDW

      I'm fine with a machine "assisting" in the counting and even printing of ballots so long as the individual can see the result of the printing and a paper ballot exists that can be counted later. So I'd have a recording machine, and I'd have stations to fill in the ballots. That is what KY has now and it's why we know one hour after the election is over who won. The only thing I'd add is a machine that can print out a ballot for someone if they are handicapped etc...

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    2. Eric B

      I very much like the idea though that you could use a machine to process the ballot to get the counts automatically, and to show the voter what marks were acknowledged before they complete their vote. The paper would be dropped in the box and stored in case a hand recount was needed. In that way human error would be eliminated from the first count and machine error from the second, although machine error would be unlikely since the voter gets to see.

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  8. CatoTheElder

    Alec, you don’t get paid enough. This is the kind of work we need right now. Kudos.

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  9. eoncarlyle

    Motte: The election was stolen by voter fraud

    Bailey: “I’m just asking questions!!”

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