By Nancy Thorner –
On April 23, 2020, North Carolina Physicist John Droz, Jr., along with his team of independent experts, announced the official public release of their Election Integrity: Recommendations Report.
I've been following John's excellent reports for years. This one demanded widespread public attention.
Although eight other major reports pertaining to U.S. elections have been written by John and is team of experts, this one is the most important one by far. Election integrity should be the top priority in every state legislature, after the problems encountered in the past November 2020 presidential election.
As John related, the report took the group about four months to develop, during which time they set for themselves the following four standards: Competent, Comprehensive, Collaborative and Creative.
Mr. Droz admitted there was no shortage of partisan ideas regarding the U.S. election process (e.g. HR.1/ S.1); however, an attempt was made to reasonably bridge the currently cavernous divide, which did prove to be an herculean challenge.
Notes provided by John Droz
These notes were provided by John Droz to better understand his group's April 3, 2020 Election Integrity: Recommendations Report:
Note 1: How does our Recommendations Report differ from the dozens of reports done on the election issue to date?
- It is written by independent scientists, outside the election analysis field,
- It is a meta-analysis of dozens of election related reports, extracting the best ideas from each,
- It is an exceptionally comprehensive report, with thirty (30) election integrity recommendations,
- Among these thirty recommendations are ideas never suggested before,
- It aims to be reasonably non-partisan, with concessions made to both camps, and
- It takes advantage of the latest election developments that happened through April 2021.
Note 2: What is urgently needed, for election integrity allies to come together to aggressively support a package of improvements such as we are formally proposing today — then to agree on effective messaging, plus a quality plan-of-action.
Note 3: Our Recommendations Report is a living document and will be updated as improvements are warranted.
The entire report should be read, but for brevity, and to pass along, here is the link to a one-page document listing the group's proposals to address the U.S. election system.
Thirty Election Integrity Recommendations
This list was put together by a team of independent experts, who volunteered their time to advance the cause of US election integrity.
The items on this list are explained in more detail in Part 3 of the Election Integrity Recommendations Report.
As stated in that report, it is child’s play to advance partisan election requirements. The objective of these recommendations is to bridge the currently expansive gap between Democrat and Republican proposals, as it’s imperative that we negotiate a middle ground that meets the pro-American objectives of both.
- Election laws and regulations may not be changed within 180 days prior to that election.
- Primary elections must be closed.
- All votes, regardless of voting method, shall be held to equal standards.
- Every state would set up three-week advance voting, at convenient locations in every precinct.
- Absentee voting would be allowed only in specialized circumstances.
- Drop Boxes would be prohibited.
- It would be illegal to do ballot harvesting.
- It would be illegal for any state, county or precinct to accept third-party election-related fund.
- Day would be a national holiday.
- All absentee ballots must be received by Election Day.
- Provide voter assistance where needed.
- Some type of legal ID would be required when voting.
- It would be illegal to have any voting machine (or connected server) accessible from the Internet.
- Election day voting would end at 5 PM.
- Absentee and early-voting ballots would be tabulated, and reported, first.
- Election observers are allowed complete access to the election process.
- Fixing deficient ballots (or mail-in envelopes) is not allowed.
- Counties would be required to report their election results in a standardized format (e.g., Excel).
- Example forensic audits should be automatic.
- Chain of custody must be maintained for all ballots for at least 22 months.
- Negative vote tabulations (e.g., Edison) are prohibited without detailed transparent supporting data.
- All eligible US citizens will be automatically registered to vote.
- Every state is required to annually update their election rolls.
- Rules prohibiting non-citizens from voting are tightened.
- A national 800 number and website is setup for citizens to report possible improper election actions.
- Uniform requirements for state vote certification.
- State legislatures have legal standing to file election-related lawsuits.
- Citizens have legal standing to file election-related lawsuits.
- State recall rules must be consistent with state election rules
- An equally weighted bi-partisan Federal commission is created in 2021 to research and issue a pubic report on the voting rules and regulations of European Countries, Canada, Mexico and Australia.
Urgent request
As John noted, the above items need to be considered as part of a package, rather than individually. Time is of the essence to constructively move forward here.
Please pass this information onto your social media sites, friends & family, and anyone else who values America. If we don’t have election integrity, every other aspect of our life will be adversely affected.
