4 ms·

> Were that to have happened, analysis of the voting results would show a divergence in results in those “well placed” areas. Why didn't that sort of analysis

> Were that to have happened, analysis of the voting results would show a divergence in results in those “well placed” areas. Why didn't that sort of analysis find fraud in Philadelphia in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018? How are you so certain of its infallibility given it's apparent inability to find fraud like this?

the_snooze 4y ago
The analysis never found fraud? Or there was no analysis at all? According to the DOJ, the fraud centered on Democratic primary elections [1], which don't receive anywhere near as much scrunity or participation as Presidential general elections. [1] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-philadelphia-judge-elections-convicted-conspiring-violate-civil-rights-and-bribery https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-philadelphia-judge-ele...
- willcipriano 4y ago
  Let me put this in different terms. What algorithm should they have ran to detect this? If we have such a infallible algorithm why isn't it always used? If it's not a algorithm but instead more of a handy wavy "analysis" by "experts" how do you know for an empirical certainty they didn't just actually fill a room full of monkeys, waited a week and said the results are good?
  - the_snooze 4y ago
    You asked "Why didn't that sort of analysis find fraud in Philadelphia in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018?" And I answered it. Is that a sufficient answer or not? To your new questions, yes, there are well-established ways to detect monkey business from machine-maniputation or ballot-stuffing. Basically, you make sure that the results line up between the paper ballots and the machine counts, and that the number of paper ballots you have matches the number of voters who checked in at the precinct. https://www.vote.pa.gov/About-Elections/Pages/Post-Election-Audits.aspx https://www.vote.pa.gov/About-Elections/Pages/Post-Election-... By law, elections generate a lot of data across independent sources. Rigging an election undetected is hard because you need to make sure those data sources remain consistent. If you're skeptical of elections, I encourage you to volunteer to be a poll worker. Learn your state's procedures and carry them out more faithfully than how you think they're otherwise done today.
    - willcipriano 4y ago
      That doesn't really solve for all the ways you can rig an election. For example in '2000 Mules' they propose that democratically aligned charities like homeless shelters and elder care homes would gather ballots from their vulnerable populations, fill them out for their preferred candidates, and then have mules distribute those ballots to publicly accessible ballot boxes 3 to 5 at a time. They have some interesting footage of those boxes, and a lot of the footage is apparently conspicuously missing. However nothing concrete, so take this as a thought experiment. How do you prove they didn't do that from the raw ballot counts and voter roles in a way that I don't have to take someone else's word for it?
      - the_snooze 4y ago
        >For example in '2000 Mules' they propose that democratically aligned charities like homeless shelters and elder care homes would gather ballots from their vulnerable populations, fill them out for their preferred candidates, and then have mules distribute those ballots to publicly accessible ballot boxes 3 to 5 at a time. In order for this to actually work, the nefarious operatives would need to forge people's signatures on those mail ballots. Otherwise, they'll fail the signature match at the elections returns center and the ballot will get tossed. Here's a good rundown of how that works, at least in California [1]. Do you have reason to believe that the signature check doesn't work? Stepping back, rigging elections by stuffing mail ballots makes zero sense from a cost/benefit perspective. It requires massive amounts of effort to coordinate all those people so the plan proceeds undetected. A rational attacker would be better off taking an opposite approach: throwing away opponents' mail ballots. That requires far less effort. I'm skeptical of these mail ballot stuffing claims because it's an overly complex Rube-Goldberg-machine of a plot. Other than throwing away opponents' mail ballots, is there a viable attack that could actually work? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YJyQbckMDw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YJyQbckMDw
        deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
        jacobriis 4y ago
  - HideousKojima 4y ago
    Comparing ballot totals to exit polling is a fairly accurate way to detect fraud (within a certain margin pf error). But increased mail-in/absentee voting, increasing the number of days on which voting occurs, etc. make it more difficult to outright impossible to perform quality exit polling any more.
camgunz 4y ago
It looks like this was pretty small-time voter fraud in local and low-level elections, where there weren't teams of data operatives scouring returns for any inconsistency. When people talk about "there is no voter fraud", mostly what they mean are federal elections. The US has great gobs of elections, there's no reasonable way to analyze them all, and we simply don't have the data in most of the cases.
javagram 4y ago
> Why didn't that sort of analysis find fraud in Philadelphia in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018? You can’t look at votes a local candidate for city office received in Massachusetts or Iowa because those candidates are only on the ballot in Philadelphia. The type of national vote trend analysis I’m describing only exists for national elections.

the_snooze 4y ago

The analysis never found fraud? Or there was no analysis at all? According to the DOJ, the fraud centered on Democratic primary elections [1], which don't receive anywhere near as much scrunity or participation as Presidential general elections. [1] https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-philadelphia-judge-elections-convicted-conspiring-violate-civil-rights-and-bribery https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/former-philadelphia-judge-ele...

willcipriano 4y ago
Let me put this in different terms. What algorithm should they have ran to detect this? If we have such a infallible algorithm why isn't it always used? If it's not a algorithm but instead more of a handy wavy "analysis" by "experts" how do you know for an empirical certainty they didn't just actually fill a room full of monkeys, waited a week and said the results are good?
- the_snooze 4y ago
  You asked "Why didn't that sort of analysis find fraud in Philadelphia in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018?" And I answered it. Is that a sufficient answer or not? To your new questions, yes, there are well-established ways to detect monkey business from machine-maniputation or ballot-stuffing. Basically, you make sure that the results line up between the paper ballots and the machine counts, and that the number of paper ballots you have matches the number of voters who checked in at the precinct. https://www.vote.pa.gov/About-Elections/Pages/Post-Election-Audits.aspx https://www.vote.pa.gov/About-Elections/Pages/Post-Election-... By law, elections generate a lot of data across independent sources. Rigging an election undetected is hard because you need to make sure those data sources remain consistent. If you're skeptical of elections, I encourage you to volunteer to be a poll worker. Learn your state's procedures and carry them out more faithfully than how you think they're otherwise done today.
  - willcipriano 4y ago
    That doesn't really solve for all the ways you can rig an election. For example in '2000 Mules' they propose that democratically aligned charities like homeless shelters and elder care homes would gather ballots from their vulnerable populations, fill them out for their preferred candidates, and then have mules distribute those ballots to publicly accessible ballot boxes 3 to 5 at a time. They have some interesting footage of those boxes, and a lot of the footage is apparently conspicuously missing. However nothing concrete, so take this as a thought experiment. How do you prove they didn't do that from the raw ballot counts and voter roles in a way that I don't have to take someone else's word for it?
    - the_snooze 4y ago
      >For example in '2000 Mules' they propose that democratically aligned charities like homeless shelters and elder care homes would gather ballots from their vulnerable populations, fill them out for their preferred candidates, and then have mules distribute those ballots to publicly accessible ballot boxes 3 to 5 at a time. In order for this to actually work, the nefarious operatives would need to forge people's signatures on those mail ballots. Otherwise, they'll fail the signature match at the elections returns center and the ballot will get tossed. Here's a good rundown of how that works, at least in California [1]. Do you have reason to believe that the signature check doesn't work? Stepping back, rigging elections by stuffing mail ballots makes zero sense from a cost/benefit perspective. It requires massive amounts of effort to coordinate all those people so the plan proceeds undetected. A rational attacker would be better off taking an opposite approach: throwing away opponents' mail ballots. That requires far less effort. I'm skeptical of these mail ballot stuffing claims because it's an overly complex Rube-Goldberg-machine of a plot. Other than throwing away opponents' mail ballots, is there a viable attack that could actually work? [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YJyQbckMDw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YJyQbckMDw
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - jacobriis 4y ago
- HideousKojima 4y ago
  Comparing ballot totals to exit polling is a fairly accurate way to detect fraud (within a certain margin pf error). But increased mail-in/absentee voting, increasing the number of days on which voting occurs, etc. make it more difficult to outright impossible to perform quality exit polling any more.

camgunz 4y ago

It looks like this was pretty small-time voter fraud in local and low-level elections, where there weren't teams of data operatives scouring returns for any inconsistency. When people talk about "there is no voter fraud", mostly what they mean are federal elections. The US has great gobs of elections, there's no reasonable way to analyze them all, and we simply don't have the data in most of the cases.

javagram 4y ago

> Why didn't that sort of analysis find fraud in Philadelphia in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018? You can’t look at votes a local candidate for city office received in Massachusetts or Iowa because those candidates are only on the ballot in Philadelphia. The type of national vote trend analysis I’m describing only exists for national elections.