The Hamilton County Board of Elections still gets requests from citizens wanting an audit of the 2020 presidential election, elections officials told The Enquirer.
The board of elections did audit the presidential election, as each county does every election, and found the results 100% accurate, according to the Ohio Secretary of State.
But, on average, one email a week comes in from someone asking the board to look into the 2020 results, said Deputy Director Alex Linser.
Elections officials want to reassure the public.
On Tuesday, as audits for the 2021 election begin, Secretary of State Frank LaRose will travel to the Hamilton County Board of Elections in Norwood for a press conference. Hamilton County will begin Tuesday its audit for this year's general election.
He wants to instill confidence in the voting system.
"We’re coming to show Ohioans how safe, secure and accurate our elections are in Ohio," said Rob Nichols, spokesman for LaRose, told The Enquirer.
Election officials face threats
He's not singling out Hamilton County. He's traveling the state. He appeared last week at the board of elections in the Republican-leaning Muskingum County, a county President Donald Trump won with 69% of the vote.
Every board of elections in the state is required to perform an audit after each election. It involves a manual recount of ballots in randomly selected precincts in certain races.
"The purpose of this, and the purpose of doing it in public, is to show everybody they can have confidence in the results published on the board of elections site are in fact the results of the voters intent on Election Day," Linser said.
It's a routine procedure that has drawn much more scrutiny in the past year. President Donald Trump's false claims of a rigged election in 2020 have elections officials across the country trying to reassure the public. Elections officials nationally have faced threats; earlier this year the Justice Department announced the formation of a task force to protect election officials.
LaRose has defended Ohio's election process, including 2020, calling that election "the most successful election we've ever had."
LaRose, a Republican elected as Ohio's Secretary of State in 2018, faces a Republican primary challenge from former state legislator John Adams, a Trump loyalist who has touted debunked claims that cast doubt on President Joe Biden's win.
Democrat Chelsea Clark, a councilwoman from Forest Park, is also running for secretary of state in 2022.
How November's election will be audited
So how will the audit work tomorrow at the board of elections? It involves a roll of the dice.
Elections officials will roll dice to determine which precincts get ballots counted by hand. The hand counts are matched with the results from the electronic tabulations. They will audit the races with the top three vote totals in Hamilton County, two issues and the Cincinnati School Board race. The two issues were Issue 1, which was the Children's Services levy, and Issue 29, the Great Parks of Hamilton County levy.
In presidential election years, the presidential races are automatically one of the three races that get audited.
This is not the only safety precaution. In close races, the board of elections does a recount automatically when the margin of difference is 0.5 percentage points. This year, the Hamilton County Board of Elections recounted ballots in eight races across the county with no change in the results.
"I think there's definitely an effort of election officials throughout the country to showcase the procedures and security procedures in place to ensure an accurate count," said Hamilton County Board of Elections Director Sherry Poland.
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