In a blow to election integrity, HB968 will ban hand counting ballots in almost all cases.

by Jacob Grandstaff

With Democrats controlling the legislature and the Governor’s mansion under Abigail Spanberger, Virginia is on the verge of enacting an election bill that requires machine-counting and restricts hand-counting to cases when a machine scanner is broken and would take too long to fix or replace.

The bill, HB968, passed along party lines, 65–33 in the House of Delegates, and 21–19 in the Senate where Democrats hold a two-seat majority. Virginia already uses ballot-scanning machines to count votes in most cases, however, this bill would remove the possibility of switching to hand counting if the machines are ever found untrustworthy or if local jurisdictions prefer ballots be counted manually. The real danger with this bill, lies in the limitations it puts on hand counting during recounts and election audits.

Spanberger is almost certain to sign this bill. The unlikelihood of a veto doesn’t make it a good development for the state’s elections.

This bill marks a troubling step backward for transparency and integrity.

Democrat proponents frame the proposal as standardizing election procedures. Election integrity proponents, however, see it for what it is—an unnecessary restriction that removes a vital human safeguard from the process. Hand counting provides voters with human verification by members of their own political party. Relying on machines to count ballots creates unnecessary distrust among voters, which drives down election turnout.

The Virginia Republican Party rightly noted, “[Democrats] want to make our elections as un-secure and un-transparent as possible.”

With hand counting, no one has to worry about internet access, software glitches, or digital manipulation. Both parties’ voters can be confident that local citizens with a personal stake in seeing their party win oversee the process. By contrast, when results are machine-tabulated, citizens are asked to simply trust technology.

Virginia Democrats like to tout the security of their state’s voting machines. But if they are so confident in their security, one must wonder why they feel the need to remove the possibility of double-checking them by hand.

Throwing technology at the electoral process is not progress. There is a reason states don’t just let people vote online. The authors of this bill made a deliberate choice to prioritize machines over human reassurance, creating more doubt about Virginia’s electoral process. With Gov. Spanberger likely to sign the bill into law, it will enter into effect in September—in time to pollute the November elections. Although it is not immediately catastrophic, it can be if Virginians do not vigilantly oversee the machine counting process Democrats plan to force on them.

True election security comes from maximizing transparency and maintaining every reasonable tool for verification. The time-tested practice of hand-counting ballots accomplishes this more than any other. This bill may pass, but the fight for transparent elections must continue. Virginians deserve better than being told to “trust the machines” with fewer opportunities for independent confirmation.

Jacob Grandstaff is an Investigative Researcher for Restoration News specializing in election integrity and labor policy. This column has been republished here with permission from Restoration News.