SPOKANE, Wash. — With the General Election just days away, The Spokane County Elections Office is working hard to ensure election integrity.
Election integrity is a concern across the nation, especially in states that exclusively use mail-in voting, like Washington.
Although claims of widespread fraudulent voting in the 2020 election have already been found to be false, the rumors continue to circulate.
Safeguards are in place to make sure the election’s integrity is maintained.
In Spokane, ballots are scanned on a digital system that alerts workers if someone tries to cast more than one ballot.
Someone might be issued two ballots if they lost one and then request a replacement ballot. Even so, it doesn’t mean someone can trick the system.
“We know how many different ballots have been issued, we know how many we receive back in and only one of those will be counted,” said Spokane County Auditor Vicky Dalton.
Elections offices also remove people from the system once they have died.
Dalton said Spokane County works all year long to make sure deceased individuals and people who move are removed from the voter roll.
They get updated information from several different places, like Driver’s Licensing.
“We get information from the Department of Health on death certificates. So, when someone dies in the state of Washington and a death certificate is issued we will get that information. We have to be able to match the name and birth date and preferably the address in order to remove the person from voter registration records,” said Dalton.
Dalton said election officials also stay up to date on obituaries in the newspaper.
It is possible that the Spokane County Elections office could send a dead person a ballot if they were not informed of the person’s death. Though an attempt to illegally vote on behalf of a dead person is rare, there are safeguards in place.
“if that ballot is sent back to us, we’re going to be comparing the signatures and the signatures are not going to match,” Dalton said.
Dalton encourages families to contact the elections office if someone in their family dies.
She said Spokane County Election Officials are doing everything they possibly can to make sure the voter rolls are as clean as possible.
“I am confident that across the entire state of Washington, our voter rolls are accurate and as up to date as possible,” Dalton said.
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