Isn’t that interesting? Election observers assist the election staff. Assist, but not by noting if the observers see something of concern. Assist. Meaning, cover for us. Assist.

In this day and age where “misinformation” is used to denote anything that goes against the narrative, this is egregious at best. What is the benign, innocent explanation?

Since the purpose of the election observer is to cover for the officials, then part of the requirement to be an election observer should include ensuring that they align politically with the officials.

That would be more honest, since the purpose of the observer is not going to be to ensure that there is no cheating.

The election observer they want with this description of the job could do the job just as effectively from home.

As an Elections Observer in August, I experienced the frustration of the inability to make note of my observations and questions with solid details on paper.

On one occasion I was observing signature verification and I thought I observed an issue, but I wasn’t allowed to write down what I observed. I took the issue to Kathy Garber who researched my question. Her feedback was that she didn’t see any issues. Further, she told me that my “job is to observe and not to audit”.

Note to self: The Auditor and his staff will do whatever they want. They have their system. You can watch as a handicapped election observer, but don’t ask questions because that’s not your job.

Chuck Miller, President of Washington Citizens For Responsible Government. I served our Community as an Election Observer a few years ago. Mark Engleman is Right On with his comments, as Observers we do not have control to insure the integrity of the voting process and not able to ask questions and encourage integrity and transparency!!! Those that have made the 10 comments below are also absolutly correct, Thank You!!!

My experience as an observer was of a recount back in days of hanging chads on computer cards used to count votes. A hanging chad was possible if the device used to mark the ballot wasn’t pressed firmly enough, and a tiny chad of paper remained hanging to the voter card. Election observers were instructed to stand behind a line and watch the recount from a distance that made it nearly impossible to see anything. Nevertheless, I did notice one apparent error, and at that time observers were allowed to bring it to the attention of staff. It was an error, and was noted so on the recount. Auditor Kimsey came over and chastised me for leaning a bit to see the problem, and informed me that I had crossed the line, although I hadn’t, my feet were firmly on the observer side of the line far away from the table people were examining the votes at. The auditor explained for the first time something that was not included in the instructions that I was supposed to consider that taped line a barrier extending to the ceiling, so in the bit of leaning done inadvertently in order to see what was going on I was at fault according to him. Over the years, keeping observers far enough away to avoid actually seeing what is being done has gotten worse according to the reports of current observers. It seems like a charade to give the appearance of oversight, when the reality is that the distances required for observers to stand from the election activities prevents meaningful observation of the process.. Not allowing recording devices or even writing down observations further impedes identifying concerns. Irregularities never identified seems to be the goal, since identification of concerns is the first step to correcting or improving a process.