Pitkin County voter Shelley Supplee likes to vote in person.
“I have the memories of standing outside the school in our neighborhood … in the suburbs of Philadelphia,” Supplee said. “I just remember standing in that line with my parents. They felt it was very important to introduce us to that.”
She cast her ballot in person on Saturday in Aspen. She had heard about some recent threats to Colorado's election security, such as a partial password leak at the secretary of state’s office and fraudulent ballots submitted in Mesa County.
However, she’s still confident in the state’s safeguards.
“When I read about what measures are being taken, and if I just think of my experience as a voter, no, I haven't been too worried,” Supple said.
For concerned voters, Pitkin County Clerk Ingrid Grueter was on site Saturday, offering voters refreshments and answering questions from the public.
Grueter said she’s been responding to some community concerns over election security, but hasn’t received physical threats, something other clerks around the country have endured.
She said compared to other parts of the Western Slope, Pitkin County has it “pretty easy.”
“Some of the other counties get a lot more threats,” Grueter said. “I wouldn't trade places with Mesa County, for instance, for anything.”
Grueter explained her office’s safety precautions to clear up the process for skeptical voters.
In Pitkin County, all ballots, once received, are sent down to a room called the “Mineshaft.”
It’s a basement room where election judges process ballots. Before they’re opened, each ballot goes through a verification process, comparing signatures on the envelope to ones that the state has on file.
If a signature doesn’t match, it’s set aside to be cured. This process led election officials in Grand Junction to flag around a dozen fraudulent ballots in October, but curing ballots is not always a cause of concern.
“Sometimes we just need more signatures on file to match up, but sometimes people think they can just sign for someone else in their household,” Grueter said. “Then they might get a call saying ‘No, you can't do that.’”
Next, the clerk’s office requires a nonpartisan team of two people to unlock a box of signature-verified ballots. One opens the envelope and passes the ballot in a secrecy sleeve to their partner.
“So that (election) judge that has the ballot with a name on it doesn't see the ballot,” Grueter said. “The person that collects the ballot doesn't see the name. So, it keeps the anonymity.”
Then, ballots are scanned and tabulated. If Pitkin County’s scanner has trouble assessing a ballot, a team of two election judges reviews it to determine the voter’s intention. This can happen when a voter uses a check mark instead of filling in the bubbles on their ballot.
Afterward, ballots are filed in a separate, locked room in sealed boxes.
“Any of our judges, when they come in now, have to sign in and sign out,” Grueter said. “There’s very little access to our system. We have it locked down, only a couple of us with passwords.”
None of the scanners or computers are connected to the internet — making it extremely unlikely, some argue impossible, for someone to remotely hack into Pitkin County’s voting system.
Once polls close on election night, Grueter’s team runs the current totals, puts those figures onto a programmable USB drive, walks it upstairs and verifies the data again before it’s uploaded to a state system.
Grueter’s team transfers data a few times over the course of the evening, until all ballots have been counted. These ballot processing protocols have been unchanged for years.
In 2022, however, Colorado’s legislature passed the Election Security Act, upping already stringent security measures.
“We're just really doubling down on everything,” Grueter said. “For anything to happen, (someone would) have to somehow mug one of us to get in there and try anything nefarious.”
Despite new regulations, Grueter still hears myths circulating about election security. Some people worry about voters submitting multiple ballots, but Grueter said the tabulation system is only designed to accept one ballot per registered voter, flagging and voiding duplicate ballots.
Many voters also saw news of people setting fire to ballot boxes across the country, but Pitkin County’s ballot boxes are videotaped 24 hours a day, and they are built to withstand fire.
“The ballot boxes we have are designed so there's not enough oxygen that can get in there, even if somebody threw something in there, that wouldn't sustain a fire.”
As of Nov. 4, the Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office had not reported any unlawful voter activity this election season, except Pitkin County commissioner candidate Toni Kronberg reported several stolen campaign signs. However, no suspect has been identified in that case.
Grueter said she’s seeing a lot of people eager to cast their ballot since polls opened.
“I think there's a lot of energy with this election,” Grueter said. “It's been quite busy.”
Grueter said she’s sad to see voters doubting election integrity, but she hopes people with questions or concerns will come to her office, so she can help to stop the spread of misinformation.
