Investigation finds vote discrepancies in 2024 Kauai election
The panel is recommending that the county and state conduct audits of the vote-counting process in order to figure out why the number of ballots cast differs substantially between the two elections offices.
The July 13 report from the Elections Commission investigative group found that Kauaʻi County collected 26,414 mailed-in ballot envelopes for the Nov. 4 election but the state Office of Elections says it counted 27,075 mail ballots from Kauaʻi, a difference of 661 votes.
Critics of the election process — including some commission members themselves — have been raising concerns about Hawaiʻi's election process and voter fraud for years.
The Hawaiʻi Elections Commission is set to discuss the group's reports and its recommendations to ensure that local election results are conducted fairly and accurately at its next meeting July 30.
It's unclear whether the discrepancies, if validated, could lead to altering the outcome of individual Kauaʻi races. The official deadline to challenge results has passed, and the results have been certified.
While most of the races on the Kauaʻi ballot were not close, the winning margin for at least one Kauaʻi County Council race was just 106 votes.
But the committee's report along with recommendations to ensure greater accountability when it comes to voting could significantly alter how the counties and the state conduct elections to ensure voting integrity. Those suggestions include keeping more accurate official daily counts of ballot collections and the presence of official observers for ballot collection and signature verification.
Michael Curtis, the Elections Commission chair, declined to comment on the report. Scott Nago, the state's chief elections officer, also declined to comment.
Peter Young, the elections commissioner who chaired the group, could not be reached for comment. But during the commission's meeting last week he said, 'I think that what you're going to see is something that can be debated, but should shed light on a situation that we've heard lots of commentary from both our citizens and commission members.'
Young described the report as 'not one-sided' and 'actually quite neutral in many cases.'
Ralph Cushnie, one of nine elections commissioners and one of the most outspoken critics of Hawaiʻi elections, called the report 'damning.'
Cushnie, who like Curtis lives on Kauaʻi, has been speaking out for many months over his concerns about the voting process, especially regarding what's known as 'chain of custody' — that is, the way ballots make it from voters to the county and to state government for tabulating.
Cushnie has done his own independent analysis of election results using material obtained through public records requests, and his numbers differ from the official reports for Kauaʻi and Hawaiʻi County.
Cushnie and his supporters, including dozens of members of the public who turn out in large numbers to testify at Elections Commission meetings, regularly raise their concerns at the meetings. But they have gotten little traction with the commission other than to form the permitted interaction group to look more closely at some of the issues they've raised.
Cushnie also lost a case before the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court in December that challenged the Kauaʻi election. In that case Kushnie's group alleged there were 3,772 more ballots cast on Kauaʻi than the state's total. But the high court found no evidence of that.
Election Complaints 'Valid'
A permitted interaction group — or PIG under the Sunshine Law — allows a board to form a small group to work on specific issues and then report back in open session. The Elections Commission group was specifically charged with collecting information on complaints 'regarding chain of custody and election results discrepancies' on Kauai.
The complaints, the group concluded, 'are valid.'
Its report said there were no logs or records retained by Kauaʻi County that complied with Hawaiʻi Administrative Rules on the security of ballots — specifically, rules requiring the clerk to maintain a complete and current count of ballots issued, spoiled and received by the county.
As well, a count of ballots based on scans of ballot envelopes into the state's voter registration system 'is not reconciled with any manual counts and is not verifiable.'
Neither Nago nor the Kauaʻi county clerk, the report said, had a 'plausible explanation' for the discrepancy of 661 ballots between the county and the state.
The group said it had several written exchanges with Nago, Kauaʻi County Clerk Jade Fountain-Tanigawa and Kauaʻi Deputy Clerk Lyndon Yoshioka. But their responses did not satisfy the group's concerns.
'Both offices have responded to our requests, furnished documents, and offered explanations,' it said. 'They have not, however, provided a clear understanding of how the checks and balances work, nor have they removed doubt about the integrity of the election procedures. The PIG did not receive documents that comply with the law cited above.'
The report also suggests there is a different understanding between the Elections Commission group and election officials as to what exactly constitutes an official count.
Yoshioka, in response to questions from the group, said that 'any perceived inconsistency or correction' within manual hand-counts or envelopes 'is irrelevant' to the official results, 'as they do not represent the official count.'
The group's response: 'While this quote is true to fact, it does leave the PIG members trying to understand why there is a manual hand-count if it is 'irrelevant' and why this manual hand-count discrepancy is not noted throughout the County's documentation to address this confusion. The word 'irrelevant' is off-putting to the members of the PIG.'
Ultimately, the group concluded, there appears to be 'no inventory control' of ballot envelopes, and the Statewide Voter Registration System logs are 'electronic and unverifiable' by the group.
'Although the law clearly makes the Counties responsible for this task and the State assures the people that there is a chain of custody in which every ballot envelope is accounted for, there remain questions,' the group wrote.
The report also said there exists no reconciliation process to address differences between what the county and state respectively report.
'One would expect the number of signature-verified ballot envelopes in SVRS to equal the number delivered to the Counting Center, but neither of those numbers are provided in real time, nor are they official,' the report stated. 'Mr. Nago states that the official count begins when the ballot envelopes are scanned by the Counties and recorded in the SVRS. This, then, is where the chain of custody begins, but there are opportunities to remove or add ballot envelopes prior to scanning.'
The group's report does not identify by district or precinct where the extra votes were cast. But only 3,491 people on Kauaʻi voted in person in 2024, compared with the 27,075 who voted by mail or dropped ballots off at a dropbox location. The state says total turnout on Kauaʻi was 30,566.
The PIG's recommendations include requesting an audit of ballot envelopes collected by the county and transferred to a counting center. The group wants the state to do another audit to confirm the 27,075 mail-in paper ballots in the state's possession.
The group also wants the Elections Commission to hold a hearing to find out more about what state and county elections officials know about the vote discrepancies.
The commission has also formed a permitted interaction group to examine the results of the Hawaiʻi County general election, something that Cushnie has also raised concerns about. That PIG hasn't started work yet.
___
This story was originally published by Honolulu Civil Beat and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.
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