Mar. 2—Turnout in Tuesday’s primary election is expected to be low in Morgan County, Probate Judge Greg Cain said, but he and the Alabama secretary of state say those who vote can be confident the results won’t be affected by fraud or voting machine manipulation.

“The Alabama Legislature passed two laws in particular that are important,” Secretary of State Wes Allen said Thursday. “One is, we’ll always have paper ballots in Alabama, so we’ll always have those receipts. … And then the other law they passed was to make sure that the tabulators that we use in Alabama in every county are not connected to the internet.”

Cain said paper ballots are an important tool against voter fraud.

“If we have a question or if something looks irregular, we always have paper ballots that are reserved that we can always go back to,” Cain said.

Another issue that some jurisdictions have is copying absentee ballots.

“There were some news stories that circulated, I think, last year maybe in a couple jurisdictions that people had photocopied some absentee ballots and on test day were able to feed those into a public machine,” he said. “There is no ability at this point in time (to do that). An absentee ballot will not go into a machine that is regulated from a polling location.”

No polling system in the state, Cain said, can be hacked because none of the machines are connected to the internet.

“There are some jurisdictions that do allow these machines to be connected to the internet,” he said. “In Alabama, it’s illegal; they do not have a modem in them. They cannot be connected to the internet in any form or fashion.”

Allen said the lack of a modem helps the state’s voter security.

“There’s no way for Wi-Fi or Bluetooth technology,” he said. “The only plug on the tabulators is the one for electricity that we plug into the wall.”

Cain said it looks like voter turnout will be less than usual for presidential primaries.

“There’s been less than 200 absentee election ballots cast in this primary, which is pretty low for a primary,” he said. “We had a total of 282 absentee ballots cast in the presidential primary in 2020. In that particular primary, we ended up with about a 34% turnout on a countywide basis. I don’t know that we’ll quite reach that this time. I would probably say 25 to 30% maybe.”

There are a few reasons, Cain said, why it is a lower projected turnout.

“There’s not a whole lot of races on the ballot on either party,” he said. “You do have quite a few elected officials that are up for reelection, but they’re not on the primary ballot because they don’t have any primary opposition. There’s not a whole lot on the ballot this time that draws much attention.”

Cain said, even though it is a presidential primary, a lot of people figure they are going to vote a certain way in November regardless of who is representing each party.

“I also think some of it has to do with people’s mindsets that a lot of the candidates have already been chosen in each party in the primary at this point in time,” he said.

Testing of all Morgan County voting machines was done within the last couple of weeks, Cain said. However, a public testing was performed Friday in Decatur.

“When we test the machines in general, the machines are zeroed out and then we have what we refer to as a test deck of ballots, which are actual ballots that are used on election day,” Cain said. “They’re marked and then they’re fed through the machine. Then we tally the ballots that have been fed through the machine and we compare the tabulation that the machine gives us compared to how we know that deck was actually marked.”

Cain said a couple of weeks before every election the voting machines are tested.

“It gives us the ability to verify the machines, that they’re working properly and that they’re accurate and they’re doing the job they’re supposed to do,” he said. “We want everyone to have confidence in our elections, so testing the machines is actually very important. We test the machines that are actually tested before they’re shipped to us. So, they actually go through multiple tests before election day.”

Allen said probate courts tell the public a date, time and place that they will publicly test a machine.

“They test the tabulators, make sure they’re certified, and then lock them up and of course deploy them on election day, March 5,” he said.

Lauri Boardman, Probate deputy chief clerk and elections director, said they have had some trouble getting poll workers in a few Decatur precincts.

“The main one is the Aquadome,” she said. “That has been one that we’ve struggled with trying to get workers from that area to sign up to be a poll worker.”

Boardman said they have had many poll workers drop out.

“A lot of our workers are older and retired,” she said. “It’s just hard to get people to want to take a 13-hour day and take off of work to work at the polling locations.”

Boardman said they have 302 poll workers countywide.

“That is a little more than we’ve had in the past, but only because it’s a presidential year,” she said. “I’ve tried to get a little more, so we have a faster process at the polling place, so people are not having to wait in long lines for hours on end. We have people at the polling place to help with the check-in process and get people in and out.”

Poll workers are paid $25 for a two-hour training course and then $145 for a full 13-hour day. There is one inspector at each precinct who is paid $170 for a day.

—erica.smith@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2460.