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Primary election day comes and goes, and Utah’s elections are still secure

Written by Derek Monson

June 30, 2022

Primary election day in Utah has passed, and initial election results are in. Most incumbents won, while a few did not. Primary voter turnout in Salt Lake County and Utah County – accounting for the majority of Utah’s total population – was about 33%. While this was low, voter turnout in a primary during a midterm election year is often low.

In other words, the results reflect a typical primary election.

Regarding the security of primary voting, there were no credible claims of fraud regarding the election results. One public complaint was aired in the days leading up to election day regarding primary voting. However, state election officials found no evidence of fraud based on that complaint.

It is still possible that a credible claim of fraud could come forward before election results are finalized. However, to this point, there has been no substantive evidence made public questioning the security of Utah’s voting systems.

And that should come as no surprise. Earlier this year, Sutherland Institute released an analysis of Utah’s vote-by-mail (VBM) based election system and found that:

There are at least 20 distinct and unique policies, procedures and processes … to protect the integrity and security of Utah’s vote-by-mail system, and Utah election officials continue to propose additional layers of security for VBM and other forms of voting.

It is also worth noting that oversight and administration of these election security measures are spread out over multiple election officials at both state and local levels. The bottom line is that the number of procedures and levels of government that would have to be penetrated to commit impactful levels of voter fraud via VBM make such fraud highly improbable.

So while some individuals and groups have sought to stoke public fear regarding election integrity, the facts say that voting in Utah is safe and secure from significant or widescale fraud. Remember that the next time some mailer asking for action or an email asking for money rings alarm bells about election integrity in Utah.

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