Evnen Among Five Officials Who Testified About Election Security

WASHINGTON, DC–(KFOR Mar. 28)–Nebraska Secretary of State Bob Evnen was among five state election officials from across the country to testify before the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Rules and Administration on Tuesday about election operations and security.

Evnen reviewed the audit the Nebraska Secretary of State’s Office conducted following the November general election. The audit included ten percent of Nebraska’s precincts statewide. Election officials checked at least one precinct in each of the state’s 93 counties. In all, county election boards hand-counted 48,292 ballots. In total, there were eleven discrepancies discovered. That’s a discrepancy rate of twenty-three thousandths of one percent. Of the eleven ballots where there were discrepancies, five ballots were marked too lightly for the machine to read the ballot. The other six discrepancies were ballots that were misfiled or misplaced.

As for election security, Secretary Evnen highlighted the achievements of Nebraska’s election workers who strive for secure and fair elections.  He also talked about the recently approved voter ID measure in Nebraska.

“I have supported voter ID for many years. Our state legislature is now working on legislation to implement this new voter ID requirement,” Evnen said. “I am confident that effective legislation will be passed that will carry out Nebraska’s new voter ID constitutional requirement without disenfranchising a legitimate voter.”

Evnen concluded by voicing his support for keeping local control over elections. “Under the U.S. Constitution, elections have been left to the sound discretion of state legislatures. Speaking from my perspective as the Secretary of State of Nebraska, the states ought to remain responsible for the conduct of elections. Issues affecting the conduct of elections can be, and ought to be, resolved by the state legislatures,” Evnen said.