SDSOS Orders Ballot Image Capture OFF!

Endangers election officials of committing crimes.

May 19, 2024

It’s been a very busy week attempting to educate and inform the Secretary of State, along with all the County Auditors, Commissioners and State’s Attorneys that deleting Federal Election records is actually a crime.

Let’s remember where we started. From the article Incoming Secretary of State looks to hand-count ballots, audit each election

Johnson said her concerns about voting tabulator machines and online voter updates are shared by “highly qualified professionals.”
“I had people reaching out to me saying ‘no’ because anything can be hacked,” Johnson said. “That was the biggest thing. The people reaching out to me were IT people, military people.” But the campaign is over, and Johnson is thinking about the changes she hopes to make when she takes office next year.
Changes like an audit of every precinct in South Dakota and a state-level push to convince county auditors to hand-count all ballots. She’s also suggesting that lawmakers consider barring the use of tabulator machines altogether.
Secretary-Elect Johnson would like to see auditors in each county take a sample of the ballots from each precinct.

From another article quoting Monae Johnson; “I want to move forward and bring that trust forward. The way to do that is more transparency.”

Well, we all know how that turned out. Fast forward to last week. Email confirmation shows that Johnson ordered ES&S to turn off the ballot image capture function for the 2024 elections.

MORE TRANSPARENCY??????????

As most of you know by now, every county in South Dakota uses electronic ballot tabulating machines. These machines are computerized scanners that take an image of the front and the back of a ballot and converts the ballot marks into a cast vote record. The CVR is the evidence of how the computer/tabulator interpreted the ballot. (If you need more information on CVR’s refer to prior articles in our Substack.)

Somewhere along the line, some genius decided to stop saving the created ballot images. Notice we said created…..because the machines create the images whether your corrupt election officials want to save them, look at them, or use them to audit. (which none in our state do, other than the Minnehaha County Auditor, because she is actually an auditor.

From the ES&S transcript the South Dakota delegation were discussing keeping/saving the ballot images:

Rachel Soulek (election director - NOT the SOS or an elected official) says “we’ll look into it” while Monae Johnson says “I would like to, if I can.” In case she forgot, she IS the SOS and could have decided then and there.

ES&S officials discuss why the ballot image capture function has been shut off in past years.

Again, Johnson says “I would like it” while Rep. Sue Peterson says “there isn’t anything preventing it” and Auditor Leah Anderson agrees there isn’t.

Diedrick goes on to say he doesn’t know what the reason is. He was probably having a hard time finding one because there is NO reason to not save the created ballot images. NONE. It is however, a really good way to cover up fraud. Yes, fraud.

Why would Georgia election officials have deleted ballot images? In comparison to every day life, this is like deleting all the images of the cashed checks in your bank account and the deposit slips. Just transactions going through your account with no evidence to match them up. Have you ever had a transaction that wasn’t yours hit your account that needed to be corrected? How did you do that? Well, you pulled up the images of course and found the discrepancy. ONLY in our ELECTIONS is it OK to DELETE THE AUDIT TRAIL and no one goes to jail or gets fired.

To watch a video on missing ballot images in Maricopa County, watch Jeff O’Donnell’s Fingerprints of Fraud bonus video HERE.

Sheriff Dar Leaf of Michigan, who has been conducting a three year investigation into Dominion, released internal emails revealing Serbian nationals contracted as employees for Dominion, had access to the voting machines and deleted the audit trail.

The statutes Sheriff Dar Leaf is quoting above is exactly what our election officials will be violating when deleting election records created by the machines. So is our SOS then not as guilty as the Serbian foreign nationals who hacked and altered the election results in Michigan and the Dominion execs who allowed it to happen?

Monae Johnson’s concerning order for ES&S to not SAVE Federal Election Records violates Federal and State Law, the Civil Rights Act, and puts every auditor in the state in jeopardy of committing crimes. The list is extensive and it’s all been put in writing for you to review HERE. Read this document. Bring it to your local officials, and your Sheriff.

If you are a candidate for office, we suggest you email the auditor responsible for counting the votes in your election a copy of the document and request they come into compliance with the law by preserving and maintaining ALL election records, digital or paper, for your election. Any violations of the law put the validity of the election in question.

The Attorney General has received an email from SD Canvassing and Midwest Swamp Watch requesting the AG to advise the SOS of possibly felony violations and to immediately remedy the situation BEFORE the election. Every County Auditor, State’s Attorney, County Commissioner, and State Legislator that we could find email addresses for have been notified.

The point is this:

Ballot images ARE created.

Not saving them is a crime.

62 of the 66 counties in South Dakota can’t even VIEW the ballot images or CVR’s. That is gross negligence at the LEAST.

Ballot images and CVR’s are essential for auditing an election.

Ballot images and CVR’s are essential for TRANSPARENCY.

The Secretary of State has ordered any possible aspect of TRANSPARENCY in election records to not be saved.

The Secretary of State is derelict in her duty to the citizens of South Dakota.

The Secretary of State has broken every campaign promise she made to the people.

The Secretary of State has endangered our election officials of committing felonies.

The Secretary of State is attempting to defraud the citizens of South Dakota.

This is just more proof that the machines have to go. It’s well past time to return the power to the people. Hand count, in the precinct, on election day, no machines, no electronics. Fully auditable, fully transparent, and counted in full view of the public.