Competitive races this year could thrust administrators in states such as Iowa, Alaska, New York, Kansas, and Texas into the national spotlight. Standard human errors, including delayed precinct openings or accidental duplicate files, frequently get twisted by influencers and political figures into claims of intentional tampering. To counter this, advocates like former Michigan clerk Tina Barton are actively training local officials nationwide to navigate worst-case scenarios and mitigate potential fallout.
Key points
Routine operational glitches like equipment failures and delayed precinct openings are in…: Routine operational glitches like equipment failures and delayed precinct openings are increasingly weaponized as evidence of election fraud.
Intense scrutiny over election administration is expanding well beyond traditional battle…: Intense scrutiny over election administration is expanding well beyond traditional battleground states like Georgia, Michigan, and Arizona.
Organizations such as the Committee for Safe and Secure Elections are preparing local cle…: Organizations such as the Committee for Safe and Secure Elections are preparing local clerks nationwide for close races and controversy.
Sources checked by our analysis pipeline: 1
There's one big difference, Tina Barton says, between running an election in a battleground state and a non-battleground.
It's what happens when there are mistakes.
"If a human error happens, it's easily explained in the press and it's not a story," Barton says. "You have a human error in a battleground state and all of a sudden it can become a massive conspiracy."
Barton would know.
In 2020, she oversaw elections as city clerk of Rochester Hills, Mich. On election night, her office mistakenly sent an unofficial absentee vote file twice because the first one didn't initially appear to send.
Such mistakes happen every election cycle in a national process run by tens of thousands of human beings. A machine isn't plugged in. A poll worker sleeps through their alarm clock and doesn't open a precinct on time. Someone gets handed the wrong ballot.
In Barton's case, the issue didn't impact actual votes, and it was corrected in the tally the following day.
But it changed her life regardless.
The chairwoman of the Republican National Committee accused her office of…
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