Hand counting ballots is less secure, less accurate and more time consuming than counting ballots using voting machines, according to an elections study in New Hampshire published in Palgrave Macmillan and another in Wisconsin published in Election Law Journal.
But a new law signed by Gov. Mark Gordon requires county clerks to audit some ballots by hand in this year's elections.
Senate File 113, 2026 election hand count comparison, requires county clerks to audit by hand about 5% of all the ballots cast in their county during the 2026 general and primary elections.
Then, county clerks will need to compare the results of the hand count to the results of the county’s electronic voting machines. The audits will include the results from one federal and one statewide race in each county, and will be conducted via audit boards made up of at least three county residents.
The bill was drafted in consultation with county clerks, according to Fremont County Clerk Julie Freese. She said it’s meant to prove to Wyomingites that voting machines in the state are safe. It comes as doubts about election integrity have increased following false claims that the 2020 general election was stolen from Pres. Donald Trump.
“We as clerks have done research about proving that our machines do work the way they're supposed to, since there's concerns about that,” Freese said.
She continued, “I've been on a committee nationally where we talked to several states about that, and they said, ‘Having an audit, proving that your machines work really help[s] your communities.’ And then we also met with – as a county clerk's association – with a county clerk in Utah who does audits, and also talked about how it really helps, again to help your community feel a lot better [about] their machines. The machines do work.”
The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Barry Crago (R-Buffalo), said its intent was to address some state residents’ “concerns about the accuracy and integrity of our tabulating machines.”
“I may not be one of those people, but I do respect the opinion of a lot of those folks,” Crago told the Senate Corporations Committee on Feb. 16.
Freese, who chairs an elections committee within the clerks’ association, agreed to meet with Crago along with other clerks before the session. He incorporated all of their suggestions on the bill, she said.
The bill is adding more work for county clerks in this year’s primary and general elections, Freese added.
“Then, if the Legislature wants to do something in the next session to make it part of the statutes, they certainly could,” she said. “But right now we wanted a test type of thing.”
Freese said she opposed an amendment to the bill from Rep. Jeremy Haroldson (R-Wheatland), a member of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus, that would’ve allowed candidates in 2026 to request hand recounts of their races.
She said the amendment would’ve made the bill “unworkable” in the time frame county clerks would’ve had to prepare for it.
That amendment later failed.
This reporting was made possible by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, supporting state government coverage in the state. Wyoming Public Media and Jackson Hole Community Radio are partnering to cover state issues both on air and online.
