Philly will scale back a process it had previously used to catch any double votes before they were counted.
City elections officials voted unanimously Wednesday morning to approve vote-counting procedures that specifically say they won’t pause the vote count to undertake the poll book reconciliation process. That process helps stop mail ballots from being counted if voters already voted in person but requires halting the vote count.
Philadelphia’s three-member elections board, the city commissioners, said Wednesday that the process is no longer needed and that it conflicts with a new state law. They noted that Philadelphia’s use of poll book reconciliation — doing it during the vote count, instead of afterward — had gone beyond what the rest of the state did.
“As we all know, Philadelphia was the target of complaints about not canvassing ballots as quickly as other counties because we were going the extra mile,” Seth Bluestein, the sole Republican commissioner, said at the meeting. No double votes had been cast in the three most recent elections, which he attributed to increased voter familiarity with mail voting, better poll worker training, and improved procedures: “The results of those efforts demonstrate that this additional work is neither necessary nor helpful any longer.”
Poll book reconciliation updates the state’s voter registry to log every voter who is listed as voting in person. Other counties undertake that process after counting votes; Philadelphia does it during the counting process, which allows workers to remove mail ballots if a voter already voted in person. The procedure flagged a few dozen accidental double votes in the 2020 elections and none in the three elections since. That requires a pause in the vote count that sometimes can take a day or two.
But the state legislature this summer created new state funding for elections — and it comes with the requirement that counties count votes “without interruption” until they’re done. Philly accepted their $5.4 million share of that grant money, which meant they’re now subject to that continuous vote count requirement.
And the commissioners see that requirement as conflicting with their use of poll book reconciliation to catch possible double votes.
“It is clear that the legislature intended that we pre-canvass and canvass as quickly and efficiently as possible,” Bluestein said. “The extra step of reconciliation prior to pre-canvassing and canvassing ballots, which as I’ve already explained is not necessary, is in tension with this.”
A Republican election law group sued the city last week to try to force them to keep the process in place. The group, Restoring Integrity and Trust in Elections, was created earlier this year by GOP strategist Karl Rove, former Attorney General Bill Barr, and others. They say the city must continue its reconciliation process as part of its vote count and its duty to catch any wrongly cast votes.
A lawyer for the group said Tuesday that he would file for an injunction if the commissioners approved the vote-counting procedures without the poll book reconciliation process.
Without fully addressing the lawsuit — “I will not comment on ongoing litigation, no matter how baseless,” Bluestein said — the commissioners said in their remarks that they were prepared to stand up to any attacks on Philadelphia’s electoral system, whether political or legal.
“We will not be intimidated by these external efforts to undermine confidence in Philadelphia’s elections,” said Lisa Deeley, the chair of the commissioners. “And we’ll go forward with the processes we believe are proper and appropriate under the Election Code and our authority as the county board.”
» READ MORE: Philly might scale back a process for catching double votes — because of GOP ‘election integrity’ rules
— Jonathan Lai
