Utah law requires County Clerks to mail a ballot to every active, registered voter. While we move to a opt-in model, Utah will continue to administer elections primarily by mail, and if elected the next County Clerk I will ensure that Utah County administers the best election possible. I have the experience and confidence necessary to administer secure, safe, transparent, free, and fair elections.

Citizens are justifiably concerned about many ballots being sent out, and the critics rightly point to inaccurate voter rolls as weakness of vote-by-mail systems.

The solution isn't to abandon vote-by-mail and its many advantages. The solution is to maintain clear voter rolls.

This is a Herculean task. Utah County is one of the fastest growing counties in the nation. That means that we are constantly experiencing people moving in and teenagers pre-registering when they apply for driver's licenses. We have two major universities and all of the moving that goes on with young people. Utah County has nearly 350,000 registered voters. But our elections staff is up to the job and I will fight for the necessary resources and provide the leadership necessary for this task.

The task is never finished. Construction on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco began in 1933 and it opened in 1937. But when was the iconic red-orange painting completed? The painting is never completed. It is an ongoing process of consistent maintenance. Voter rolls are the same. Elections employees work year-round in their efforts to keep it up to date.

New registrations are manually added. Any time there is a new voter registration, from a registration drive on a college campus, or from the Lt. Governors website, or from the Driver's License Division, the details are verified and entered by a human being. In addition to checking information for citizenship, the address is plotted on a map to assign to the correct precinct. This also alerts us as to whether the address is a home, apartment building, or empty field. New voters will only be added to the list if everything checks out.

USPS Change of address information is used. With regular updates from change of address forms voters are updated to reflect their new addresses.

Vital Records Death Index is used. Voters who have passed away are removed from the rolls as we look at official death records. Time permitting, we check the voter rolls against the local obituaries as well.

Duplicates are searched. The staff periodically runs a "duplicate report" to see if two (or more) different voters share unique identifiers such as date of birth, name, last 4 of SSN, or drivers license number. These are researched and resolved. This applied to ballots, but also to other mailings from our office such as party affiliation letters.

Returned undeliverable mail is investigated. By law election mail can not be forwarded. Any undeliverable mail is returned to our office and our staff looks into the situation. Was it a move that we didn't catch earlier? Is an apartment number missing from the address?  Recognizing that no system is perfect, the national standard for undeliverable election mail is about 5%. When Utah County started vote-by-mail in 2017, the undeliverable rate was 15%. By 2021 it had dropped below 2%. 

Incorrectly mailed ballots can be spoiled. Years ago there was a minor glitch were pre-registered voters such as 16 and 17-year-olds not yet eligible to vote were mailed ballots. It was quickly discovered, the mistake was owned and admitted, and somewhat embarrassing. However, each of those ballots had a unique bar code connected to the voter registration. All of those ballots were spoiled so that if they were returned our system would recognize them as invalid and those votes would not count. If a voter needs a new ballot because they have recently moved, or their first ballot was damaged it is an easy thing to spoil that ballot so only the correct one gets counted. 

Voter address verification audits will take place. Legislation requires an audit of voter rolls. I look forward to implementing this important safeguard and plan to go beyond the minimum requirements in verifying the accuracy of our rolls.

We need your help. Although the elections division is part of the government, we don't have the resources people think the major intelligence agencies have. Some registrations slip through the cracks, some errors get overlooked. Your help in keeping your registration up to date is critical. Party precinct chairs can share updates they may have encountered during caucus night.

I am committed to secure, safe, transparent, free and fair elections - no matter what election processes are used. I understand and support the many safeguards that are in place and if elected, will hit the ground running and have a smooth transition into the municipal elections of 2027.