Heritage Foundation and MIT Assessments of Election Administration Fall Short

Dueling ideologies fail to identify why a majority of Americans no longer trust the way we elect our public officials.

Author’s Note: I recently announced my partnership with Pure Integrity Michigan Elections as a special advisor. Last month, PIME’s sister organization, Michigan Fair Elections Institute, ran my analysis of two competing election rating systems on their website.

That analysis is shared below.

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Michigan’s voter roll maintenance, or lack thereof, has been a hot button topic for years, dating back to the Muskegon registration fraud ring’s uncovering in 2020 and extending through the 2024 election cycle, in which more than 83% of Michigan’s population was registered to vote.

Recently, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Heritage Foundation released dueling scorecards evaluating the perceived effectiveness and fairness of each state’s election laws, processes, and overall infrastructure. Rather than observing relative harmony, in which each state scores similarly across both matrices, readers will find significant divergence between the two models.

For instance, Michigan ranks second best in MIT’s model but well into the bottom half of Heritage Foundation’s, in 31st place. In observing other inconsistencies, such as Arkansas ranking dead last in MIT’s but first in Heritage’s, it is obvious that these systems are devised with ideology in mind rather than a consistent model that can be accurately used to assess election security across all 50 states and Washington, D.C.

Here are five key evaluating factors for MIT’s model which help Michigan score so high and place just behind New Mexico’s first place rating:

• Disability access

• Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) membership

• Mail ballot rejection rate (a lower rejection rate equals a better score)

• Provisional ballot acceptance rate

• Risk-limiting audits authorized

Naturally, states with extensive mail-in balloting will be scored as having allowed maximum access, even though a number of first world nations have banned the practice of mail-in balloting altogether because of the ease with which ballot fraud may occur. Additionally, ERIC is ineffective, expensive, and not trusted by all Secretaries of State, as evidenced by the withdrawal of nine states from it.

Additionally, acceptance of mail and provisional ballots does not consider any reasonable scrutiny or the quality of signature verification, if there is any done at all; therefore, states that have excessive mail-in voting with low rejection rates should be scrutinized more than they should be celebrated, especially when ballot harvesting is legalized.

Here are five key factors used in the Heritage Foundation’s scorecard:

• Voter identification (adoption of Voter ID equals better score)

• Accuracy of voter registration lists

• Restrictions against ballot harvesting

• Mail ballot controls

• Same day voter registration restricted

In comparison, the Heritage Foundation prefers states that run “tight ships” and allow for fewer workarounds and accommodations. MIT prefers accommodations with little regard for restrictive measures intended to enhance security.

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How Michigan Stacks Up

For a prime example concerning Michigan, voter roll accuracy should be considered. In the run up to the 2024 election, Michigan’s voter rolls were bloated to dangerous levels that should concern all Americans.

On August 16, 2024, I wrote the following assessment:

Michigan claims 8,384,910 registered voters with a population of 10,037,621 using the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2023 estimates. Go ahead and visit the links yourself if you’re reading this from the perspective of critic.

That means 83.5% of Michigan’s population is registered to vote.

Another important thing to keep in mind when highlighting this sort of corruption is that 22.1% of the population is under 18, and therefore not eligible to cast a vote. The Census Bureau also counts illegal aliens and non-citizens in the totals, and in many states, felons can’t vote ever again or at least not right away. It is safe to say that at least a quarter of the population isn’t eligible to vote, meaning anything over 75% of the total population being registered should make eyeballs bulge and lawsuits fly.

Now, highlights on Michigan:

• Roscommon County has 23,930 registrants and a population of 23,863, good for Michigan’s high registration rate of 100.3%.

• Eight other counties are over 95%: x, y, z

• Wayne County, home to Detroit, has a number just under the state average, with 83.0% registered. If it had only 60%, which would surpass most metros in Texas, then it currently sits 402,932 registered voters too high.

• Only four counties are under 75% of total population registered: x, y, z.

• Bringing the state down even to Pennsylvania’s 68.1% mark would remove 2,674,786 registrations from Michigan’s voter roll.

• For reference, from states not automatically registering voters: Pinal County, Arizona – 55.4%; Tarrant County, Texas – 58.1%; Milwaukee County, Wisconsin – 53.7%.

Data do not lie. Michigan’s voter registration rolls were bloated by hundreds of thousands of registrations, and only recently has the state acknowledged that a cleanup is needed. With the simple fact that Michigan does not maintain its rolls responsibly, voters have no reason to trust the election system in the state or MIT’s lofty ranking.

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World Class System Needed

Ideology aside, a hypothetical world-class system to govern election integrity and ensure acceptable opportunities to audit election processes would be of great service to citizens of every state. A group of volunteer data experts in Michigan, known as Data Evaluating Election Processes (DEEP), says such a system would entail:

• Statewide, county, and local vote history records for auditability, validation, and certification to precinct level tabulator values.

• Vote history records retention for 22 months per federal standards.

• Single Source of Truth, meaning, 1) no data manipulation, 2) history does not change depending on who provides the data, and 3) direct data accessibility by citizens’ free and real time access.

• Ballot and data chain of custody.

• A robust and repeatable process.

• Compliance with state and federal law.

• Data Retention Standards.

Election administration is only as good as the integrity behind it; this extends from compliance with the law to a single set of world-class standards in which the election process can be audited for suitability to a guarantee that Americans can once again trust the elections process.

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Seth Keshel, MBA, is a former Army Captain of Military Intelligence and Afghanistan veteran. His analytical method of election forecasting and analytics is known worldwide, and he has been commended by President Donald J. Trump for his work in the field.