Statistical Analysis of the Post Election Audit Data 2008 February Elections

The Center for Voting Technology Research (VoTeR Center) at the School of Engineering of the University of Connecticut received the data gathered in the post-election audit performed in the State of Connecticut following the February 2008 election. The audits of the randomly selected approximately 33% of the districts were conducted in February and March of 2008, and the returns were subsequently conveyed by the Office of the Secretary of the State (SOTS) to the VoTeR Center. The audit data received by the Center contains 624 records per each party, where each record represents information about a given candidate. Specifically, each record contains the following significant information: date, district, machine seal number, office, candidate, machine counted total, undisputed hand counted total, questionable hand counted total, overall hand counted total, that is, the sum of undisputed and questionable ballots. This report contains several statistical analyses of the audit returns. Among the 624 records about 98% of the records show discrepancy of 0 votes between the machine counts and audit hand counts, and the rest show discrepancy of 4 votes or lower. These results hold for both parties. The highest absolute discrepancy is 4 (four) and it can be seen only once for each party. This analysis was performed on request of the Office of the Secretary of the State.

Full report: audit08-february-v3


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