Michigan clerks speak up in support of bill to preserve local authority over voting machine testing

Kent County Clerk Lisa Posthumus Lyons at a meeting of the House Election Integrity Committee. July 1, 2025. | Photo by Kyle Davidson/Michigan Advance

Election clerks from across the state spoke up before the House Election Integrity Committee Tuesday, offering their support for a piece of legislation aimed at preserving their say in pre-election testing of voting machines. 

Committee Chair Rachelle Smit (R-Martin), a former election clerk, told her colleagues that for years, local clerks have successfully conducted logic and accuracy testing of their machines by working with vendors of their choosing. However, Smit raised concerns that a recent contract acquired by the Michigan Secretary of State could require clerks to use only their contracted vendor to generate test decks. 

“This represents a fundamental shift from our local control to state mandated centralization, a shift that raises concerns about the integrity, transparency and fiscal responsibility. The bill before us today provides very clear, common sense protections that preserve local autonomy while ensuring proper standards. Specifically it protects local choice,” Smit said.

Smit’s House Bill 4602 states that the Secretary of State cannot bar or restrict local clerks from using any lawful source for creating testing materials.

“Our local clerks are directly accountable to their communities. This legislation ensures that they retain the tools and autonomy necessary to fulfill that responsibility. When problems arise, clerks need direct control over the processes and relationships with their vendors,” Smit said, later emphasizing that local jurisdictions operate under tight budgets. 

However, Smit’s proposal drew some questions, both from the committee’s Democratic members and representatives from the Department of State. 

State Rep. Matt Koleszar (D-Plymouth) questioned if Smit’s proposal would eliminate all oversight on these kinds of vendors, raising concerns that this could benefit bad actors, or vendors who simply are not good at supplying testing materials. 

However, Smit said the election commission in each county would retain their oversight under her bill. 

Adam Fracassi, deputy director of elections for the Michigan Bureau of Elections broke down the contract with Ballot IQ, which is intended to create an expanded form used in testing the voting machines used in the state. This expanded deck would include an additional test to ensure results between different races have not been swapped, he said. 

“The reason for this is in an effort to provide just a stronger safeguard against errors, a stronger safeguard against the processes, and enhance the integrity of our election,” Fracassi said. 

As the bureau begins to roll pieces of this new system out, Fracassi said some clerks were interested in having this deck available as an option, and the bureau is looking at ways to make the test deck available to them. 

“The idea is that this test deck would be available to clerks without cost, so it’s an option for them to be able to utilize it to save them money,” he said.

Having this test deck as an option, not as a requirement, would offer clerks another resource in the testing process, Fracassi said. 

The second part of the contract with Ballot IQ would be to develop an electronic system for clerks to submit ballot proofs to the Bureau of Elections, so the bureau can review them more efficiently. 

Michigan’s election law requires county clerks to submit ballot proofs for approval, which Fracassi emphasized is largely done manually, and must be done in a very short period of time. 

“One of the other requirements for the contract is to provide us with additional resources to be able to streamline that a little bit better, to make it faster for us to review ballot proofs, and to make it easier for clerks to transmit the information to us and us to transmit the information back to the county clerks,” Fracassi explained. 

Erin Schor, the Michigan Department of State’s legislative policy director, echoed earlier concerns about Smit’s bill stripping oversight over testing vendors, asking for a potential change to clarify that these vendors would still be subject to the Department’s rules on the testing process.

 The department also holds concerns about one of the bill’s provisions barring the Secretary of State from centralizing ballot information for the purpose of creating test decks. 

“It would be one thing if that just talked about mandating, but I’m concerned that with the language, the way it’s written, if we were in a situation where best practice required Michigan to update our rules, and for some reason, there was only one vendor that was prepared to meet the new threshold at that time, we would not be able to update the rules to meet the best practice,” Schor said. 

Schor also raised concerns about the bill’s requirements for the test deck creation process to be reproducible, noting that the rules they had recently put forth on election system testing were not that specific as far as how to set up the math and programming to create these decks. 

While the Department of State did not offer a position on the bill, multiple election clerks offered their support to Smit’s legislation.

Kent County Clerk Lisa Posthumus Lyons, a former Republican state representative, told members of the committee that the contract’s requirements around streamlining the process of sending and keeping ballot proofs means they want official ballots with timing marks, not valid proofs. 

This creates significant security concerns, Posthumus Lyons warned, as holding a centralized record of ballots could result in nefarious action, where these ballots are duplicated and sent out.

She also emphasized that local clerks know what works best for their jurisdictions. 

“I and my colleagues have spent years promoting how transparent testing of our equipment before each and every election ensures the accuracy of our votes. We’ve also touted our decentralized process as an important element of election security,” Posthumus Lyons said. “We can and we should seek to improve our process, but we shouldn’t do so at the expense of foregoing these foundational, tried and true elements that work so well.”

Oakland County Clerk and Register of Deeds Lisa Brown opened her testimony, joking that her agreement with Posthumus Lyons on policy was a historic moment given the pair’s past on opposing sides of the House. 

However, she emphasized that this policy is not a partisan issue, and is solely aimed at preserving the authority of local election commissions to create and oversee their testing process. 

“I understand that it’s being said that it’s an option right now. I’ve also heard that it’s eventually going to be mandated, and that is so problematic,” Brown said, noting her discomfort in sending her ballots to someone she did not contract with. 

“I think that’s problematic. I think it’s overreach, and I think that there is a security issue to it,” she said. 

Extending terms for local office

Prior to hearing testimony on Smit’s policy, the committee also took comments on House Bills 4358, 4359, 4698, 4699, which Rep. Mike Hoadley (R-Au Gres) said would extend the terms of office for various local elected officials until after election results have been certified by the appropriate board of canvassers. 

Under Proposal 2, approved by voters in the 2022 election, clerks are permitted to tally absentee ballots submitted by servicemembers and overseas voters that are postmarked by election day and received up to six days after election day. 

However, local officials take office not long after the election, meaning they can take office before these ballots are even counted, Hoadley noted.  

The bills also received strong support from the clerks in attendance. 

The committee adjourned without voting on any of the legislation considered at Tuesday’s meeting.