Clerks reiterate Michigan elections are ‘safe, secure, fair’ as absentee voting begins

As absentee ballots for November’s general election begin to be mailed out to Michigan voters on Thursday, clerks and election advocates urged Michiganders to feel confident in the safety and security of the state’s election system and those who administer it.

“I can say with complete confidence that our elections are safe, secure, fair and have accurate results,” said Grand Rapids City Clerk Joel Hondorp in a press conference hosted by the ACLU of Michigan on Thursday morning. 

Ingham County Clerk Barb Byrum, whose jurisdiction includes two cities — Lansing and East Lansing — that were targets of Department of Justice election monitors in the state’s August primary, said that those election monitors were treated as poll watchers, and if they return to any Ingham County polling places in November, the same will be true.

“In Michigan, local clerks and county clerks, and the Secretary of State and the Attorney General are ready to welcome them in, so long as they follow the rules and serve as poll watchers,” Byrum said, acknowledging that her whole district falls in the highly-contested 7th Congressional District.

Byrum emphasized that the reasoning provided for monitors to be present in August was not accurate, specifically referencing allegations of long lines, the non-use of provisional ballots and non-use of the qualified voter file by clerks. 

“We have not received any information of what was concerning, if they saw anything concerning, but it is important that we note that Michigan elections are transparent, and we welcome poll watchers. The more people watching, the more eyes on our election, the more faith people will have in the integrity of our elections,” Byrum said. “I think the intent was to make voters worry and make voters question the integrity of our elections, but truth be told, we have poll watchers all the time, and so the local clerks in Ingham County welcomed those DOJ watchers.”

Byrum’s comments come as election administrators and elected officials in Michigan and nationwide are preparing to respond in the case of federal interference, including armed federal officials at polling places, in November. 

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, for example, said in a panel on Wednesday that she is preparing her staff to station attorney general office agents in case there is a criminal incident or voting threat at polling locations, and making sure its assistant attorneys are prepared to do the same.

“We have briefs that we’ve prepared for virtually every set of circumstances we could think of, except the zombie apocalypse,” Nessel said in the event hosted by the Center for American Progress. “I don’t have that down yet.”

Mackenzie Walz, the election protection director for Promote the Vote, explained that, as a part of Michigan’s Election Protection Program, her organization is working to educate voters on their rights and on the election administration process, as well as to recruit nonpartisan challengers to observe the elections process at polling places, early voting sites and voter counting boards across the state to ensure that votes are being cast and counted properly.

She also highlighted the election protection hotline, which allows voters to ask questions and get assistance with any part of the voting process, up through actually casting their ballot.  

“Call volume has been increasing for the Michigan call center, as we have expected, and we’ve been preparing for, by having more legal professionals prepared to staff,” Walz said. “We received several hundred calls for the August election, which is typically higher than what we’ve seen in the past, and we’ve already noticed call volume increasing now. We usually receive around a thousand calls on election day in November. We’re expecting at least that, if not more.”

Byrum also emphasized the importance of Michigan’s decentralized election system, saying, “This means that thousands and thousands and thousands of Michiganders across the state work together to carry out our elections. These dedicated folks are our neighbors. They work in bipartisan teams who are united for a single purpose: to deliver on the promise of democracy, and to do so with elections that are fair and free.”