Risk Limiting Audit for June 18 Election Taking Place Today in Franklin Co

The Franklin County Board of Elections will be conducting a risk-limiting audit today on the results of the June 18 Runoff election.

The audit will take place at 10a at the Franklin County Board of Elections office in Carnesville.

Four County races from the May 21 Primary Election had run-offs.

They included the race for Sheriff, the County Commission Chair race, and two County Commission races – for Districts 1 and 2.

The audit today will only be for the District 1 County Commission race in which local veterinarian Wanda Thompson narrowly beat challenger Tyler Owenby by 16 votes.

In 2023, the Georgia legislature passed Senate Bill 129, which revised Georgia’s audit provisions so that, as of July 2023, the statute requires “precertification tabulation or risk-limiting audits.”

Not only does the law require a risk-limiting audit before the votes are certified in a November even-year election, but it also requires audits of all elections with federal or statewide contests, including primaries, special elections, and runoffs.

According to the law, the audit should be “conducted by manual inspection of random samples of the paper official ballots.”

In other words, they must be hand-counted.

All ballot types are audited, including those cast in person, by absentee ballot, early voting, and provisional ballots.

Finally, risk-limiting audits must also be transparent according to the law and are open to the public.

Local election superintendents must provide details of the audit to the public within 48 hours of completion.

Again, today’s risk-limiting audit of the June 18 County run-off election is being held today at 10a at the Board of Election office in Carnesville and is open to the public.