How Voting Works

Episode 8 – Tampering with Voting Equipment in Mesa County, Colorado.

Tina Peters is serving a jail sentence for tampering with voting equipment when she was clerk in Mesa County, Colorado. The situation has become particularly political, but what actually happened in Mesa County, Colorado? In this episode, we cover the technology and the facts. How voting works in a vote-by-mail state like Colorado, what Tina Peters actually did, and what actual election risks her actions caused. References: * Tina Peters [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tina_Peters_(politician)] * NYT [https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/17/us/politics/jared-polis-trump-tina-peters.html] and VoteBeat [https://www.votebeat.org/national/2026/05/19/tina-peters-colorado-governor-jared-polis-commutation-matt-crane/] coverage How Voting Works is a limited series podcast made by VotingWorks, the only non-profit maker of voting machines in the US. Questions and comments are always welcome. Email us at how@voting.works All episodes licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Use as you please, just give us credit by linking back to https://how.voting.works

Episode 7 – Fraud allegations in 2020 and 2024, what to make of them?

Typically, election security experts shy away from engaging with fraud allegations, because the theories are numerous and often lacking in evidence. But it's Christmas time, and you're probably hanging out with family, and surely stories about voting machines and election fraud are bound to come up. You need some cold, hard facts to bring to the table. This is the podcast episode for you. References: 1. https://medium.com/mit-election-lab/the-blue-shift-in-the-2020-election-669a0cffdb2f [https://medium.com/mit-election-lab/the-blue-shift-in-the-2020-election-669a0cffdb2f] 2. https://playingwithelectiondata.substack.com/p/anomalies-in-rockland-county-ny-voting [https://playingwithelectiondata.substack.com/p/anomalies-in-rockland-county-ny-voting] 3. https://risklimitingaudits.org [https://risklimitingaudits.org] How Voting Works is a limited series podcast made by VotingWorks, the only non-profit maker of voting machines in the US. Questions and comments are always welcome. Email us at how@voting.works All episodes licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Use as you please, just give us credit by linking back to https://how.voting.works

Special Episode – Election Office Hours with Professor Michael Alvarez

A special episode of How Voting Works. Last week, I was interviewed by Professor Michael Alvarez. We first met more than 20 years ago when we both worked with the Caltech/MIT Voting Technology Project. Professor Alvarez has a podcast and video series called Election Science Office Hours, and I was his guest. Check out the video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJkiWDh7igk [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJkiWDh7igk] And check out Professor Alvarez's whole video series: https://www.youtube.com/@LCSSPCALTECH [https://www.youtube.com/@LCSSPCALTECH] How Voting Works is a limited series podcast made by VotingWorks, the only non-profit maker of voting machines in the US. Questions and comments are always welcome. Email us at how@voting.works All episodes licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Use as you please, just give us credit by linking back to https://how.voting.works

Episode 5 – Post-election audits to check the machines

How do we trust our ballot tabulators? Post-election audits, that's how. * Risk-Limiting Audits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk-limiting_audit [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk-limiting_audit] * More about Risk-Limiting Audits https://risklimitingaudits.org/ [https://risklimitingaudits.org/] * Professor Halderman's analysis of Antrim County 2020 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk-limiting_audithttps://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity22/presentation/halderman [https://www.usenix.org/conference/usenixsecurity22/presentation/halderman] * Forensic Audit of Windham, New Hampshire 2020 https://www.doj.nh.gov/sb-43-forensic-audit [https://www.doj.nh.gov/sb-43-forensic-audit] How Voting Works is a limited series podcast made by VotingWorks, the only non-profit maker of voting machines in the US. Questions and comments are always welcome. Email us at how@voting.works All episodes licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Use as you please, just give us credit by linking back to https://how.voting.works

Episode 4 – Ballot Marking Devices and Voters with Disabilities

In most democracies other than the United States, voters with disabilities are often required to forgo ballot secrecy in exchange for their right to vote. In the United States, that's considered unacceptable, and in fact it is illegal. This is why we have ballot-marking devices. Sources * Can Voters Detect Malicious Manipulation of Ballot Marking Devices? [https://mbernhard.com/papers/bmd-verifiability-sp20.pdf] * Voter Verification of BMD Ballots Is a Two-Part Question: Can They? Mostly, They Can. Do They? Mostly, They Don't [https://arxiv.org/abs/2003.04997] * Can Voters Detect Errors on Their Printed Ballots? Absolutely [https://arxiv.org/abs/2204.09780] * Do Ballot Barcodes Threaten Election Security? [https://cdt.org/insights/do-ballot-barcodes-threaten-election-security/] How Voting Works is a limited series podcast made by VotingWorks, the only non-profit maker of voting machines in the US. Questions and comments are always welcome. Email us at how@voting.works All episodes licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 Attribution License. Use as you please, just give us credit by linking back to https://how.voting.works