About the Election Technology Initiative

The Council of State Governments partnered with The Turnout to establish the Election Technology Initiative in July 2023. The initiative is dedicated to maintaining and supporting open-source election software tools that ease administrative and financial burdens on election offices and increase access for all voters regardless of location, disability, or language while improving voter confidence in election results.

The Election Technology Initiative is a state-driven initiative whose strategic direction will be informed by public sector officials’ and industry stakeholders’ experience and expertise. This includes state legislators, state and local election officials and representatives from the National Association of State Election Directors, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and the Federal Voting Assistance Program. These individuals will constitute the initiative’s advisory council and working group, opening direct lines of communication between election experts and the Election Technology Initiative on topics such as future technology solutions, pilots and implementations, updates to technologies and upcoming publications.

What Are Open-Source Election Software Tools?

The Election Technology Initiative is dedicated to supporting and maintaining open-source election software tools that increase ballot access, ease administrative burdens and enhance the transparency of elections. Open-source election software tools are powered by source code made available to the public so that they can view, copy and learn from or alter the code. Developers do not restrict access to the source code but actively collaborate with a community of stakeholders to improve it through open-source repositories such as GitHub and public discussion boards. These tools pose several benefits to election administrators, including:

Cost-effectiveness. Open-source technologies can typically be used for free, allowing jurisdictions to use and modify the software according to their needs without incurring significant costs upfront.

Transparency. Open-source tools allow election officials and members of the public to inspect the software’s security and integrity. Community discussion boards and open-source repositories can also act as additional resources for voters to learn about a system’s design and security from various stakeholders.

Enhanced security. Open-source software is not inherently more secure than its proprietary counterparts. However, developers and security experts can continuously view, comment on and improve the code of open-source software. This allows for any potential issues with the software to be quickly identified and fixed.

Current Projects – ElectionGuard

Currently, the Election Technology Initiative oversees all public utilization of ElectionGuard, an open-source software program developed by Microsoft’s Democracy Forward Initiative. ElectionGuard lets voters confirm their ballot was counted and provides independent verification that the election results are correct. It adds confidence to the election results without revealing how an individual voted or changing how a voter casts their ballot.

ElectionGuard has been used in elections in Fulton, Wisconsin; Franklin County, Idaho; and College Park, Maryland. In these elections, ElectionGuard is generally well-received by voters regardless of their demographic characteristics. For example, Franklin County and College Park voters differed significantly in age, race and political affiliation. However, most voters surveyed felt comfortable using ElectionGuard and that the election was more secure. They also thought the technology made them feel more confident that their vote was counted.

About the Partners

The Council of State Governments is America’s largest organization of state officials and the nation’s only nonpartisan, not-for-profit organization serving all three branches of state government. Founded in 1933, CSG is a region-based forum that fosters the exchange of insights and ideas to help state officials shape public policy to help communities across the nation and advance the common good.

For over nine decades, CSG has leveraged the power of states learning from states, helping build a stronger nation by harvesting the best ideas and solutions from the states, our nations’ laboratories of democracy.

Casandra Hockenberry
Project Manager
The Council of State Governments
chockenberry@csg.org

The Turnout brings decades of experience in technology and policy and a deep commitment to understanding each client’s unique goals and challenges. By leveraging established relationships and expertise, The Turnout assembles a skilled team to develop grounded and actionable solutions—constantly collaborating with clients rather than simply working for them.

The Turnout helps public and private organizations better understand and assess their operational processes, conduct thorough policy and workflow assessments, apply security assessments to existing systems and procurement processes, and visualize and analyze their workflows. The Turnout’s projects encompass a wide range of services, including business process modeling, policy research, data analysis, custom program development, and project administration.

Jared Marcotte
President
The Turnout
jared@turnout.rocks