Old Dominion News

The Virginia State Board of Elections (VSBE) has failed to clarify why there is a 63,984-vote discrepancy between those residents marked as having participated in the 2020 election and the number of ballots certified as being cast.

The state’s election authority did not respond to a request for comment from Old Dominion News regarding a recent analysis showing the state certified a ballot total higher than the number of voters it says voted.

“I take it as (VSBE) unwilling to stand behind their own data and as an admission that they cannot definitively say how many cast ballots were counted and how many registered voters voted,” Gina Swoboda, executive director of Voter Reference Foundation (VRF), said in a statement provided to Old Dominion News.

The nonpartisan VRF released its findings on Wednesday.

In response, VSBE said the vote certifications occur on a per office basis, not a wider vote count.

“(T)he State Board of Elections certifies the Abstract of Votes for each office; the Board does not certify overall voter turnout,” the VSBE told Swoboda in an email.

Despite saying VRF’s analysis is inaccurate, VSBE did not fully explain the discrepancy.  

“Utilizing a Vote History List to review voter credit is not an accurate method to assess actual ballots cast as a one-to-one relationship does not exist between voter credit, voter turnout, and election results for an office,” the VSBE told Swoboda.

The Virginia state code related to the cancellation of voters says the state must retain “registration records of voters whose registration has been canceled” for at least 2 years.

Federal law notes records in a presidential race must be kept for 22 months.

In contrast, the VSBE noted it cancels voters and deletes their records on an ongoing basis.

“From the date of a request, a Vote History List list will only show active/inactive voters on the day the data is pulled. Anyone cancelled after casting a ballot in an election pursuant to Va. Code 24.2 Chapter 4, Article 5 will not appear on a Client Server List produced after the cancellation date,” the VSBE told Swoboda.

The State of Nevada also erases recent voter history when it cancels voters from rolls. Similarly, Nevada Secretary of State Barbara K. Cegavske said her office deleted voter records after they died or moved. However, the Silver State Times reported on 38 Nevadans who recorded votes after they died and an additional 17,000 that had moved voted in the 2020 presidential election.

The VSBE chairman of the board is Robert H. Brink. 

Brink formerly served as senior legislative adviser to Democrat Terry McAuliffe who is facing Republican Glenn Youngkin in Virginia's Nov. 2 gubernatorial election.