Pennsylvania’s 67 counties are required after each election to audit their results to ensure accuracy.

The first check I do is the “statistical sample”, which is more commonly called the “2% audit”. This is a legally required recount of 2% of the ballots cast in a county, or 2,000 total ballots if that number is less, which is usually the case. Ballots are chosen randomly.

Counties use a different method to count ballots during the audit than they originally did. Some do this using vote tabulation machines that are different from those used on election day, while others count ballots by hand.

Counties must complete these recounts before the deadline to certify their election results, which this year is Nov. 25. Some counties have already completed the audit, while others will do so in the next two weeks.

This is not the only audit that the counties carry out. As a result of a 2018 settlement in a lawsuit brought by Jill SteinGreen Party candidate for president, Pennsylvania now leads audits with limited risk at the state level.

With the 2% audit, an election administrator might choose to examine only the ballots from just a few precincts. While this analysis might uncover a problem with those specific precincts or the ballots cast there, it won’t reveal much about the election as a whole.

A risk mitigation audit is designed to check the margin of a race to confirm that the reported winner actually won. The process begins with Pennsylvania Department of State workers rolling a set of 10-sided dice to generate a random number, which is fed into an algorithm that determines which ballots counties need to review. This process guarantees that no one knows in advance which ballots will be recounted, making it impossible to manipulate the result.

If a race has a closer margin, the algorithm requires multiple batches of ballots to be reviewed to verify the result. If the margin is wider, fewer lots need to be checked.

The races to be included in this year’s risk mitigation audit will be announced on Wednesday and the roll of the dice will take place on Friday, according to a State Department spokesman. Counties where a lot is selected will have until November 25th to certify the deadline to recount.

When a race goes to a recount

Pennsylvania’s presidential contest was decided by a wide enough margin that the outcome would be obvious shortly after Election Day. The same cannot be said for the US Senate race.

While the Associated Press called the race for Republican Dave McCormick based on an analysis of the remaining votes to be counted — including provisional ballots issued when a voter’s eligibility is in question — incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey had not yet acknowledged as of Tuesday.

As of 5 p.m. Tuesday, McCormick had 48.93 percent of the vote to Casey’s 48.5 percent, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State. website.

Under Pennsylvania law, a recount is triggered automatically when the result of a race falls within 0.5%. Pennsylvania’s top election official, Commonwealth Secretary Al Schmidt, will order the recount by Nov. 14, unless the next candidate requests that the process not move forward until noon the day before. Counting must then begin by November 20, and the results submitted to the secretary by November 27.

However, stories rarely change the outcome of a race.

FairVote, a non-profit organization that advocates for voting by choice, analyzed nearly 7,000 statewide races between 2000 and 2023. He found 36 reports in that time, only three of which resulted in a change in outcome.

“All three reversals occurred when the initial margin was less than 0.06 percent of all votes cast for the top two candidates,” the report said.

According to the Pennsylvania Department of State, there have been seven statewide recounts since the 0.5 percent rule went into effect in 2004. No one has changed who won.

Three voters in a constituency can also request a recount if they believe fraud or error has occurred. Such a recount applies only to ballots cast in the polling station, which is the smallest voting district, usually only a few hundred voters and sometimes no larger than a block.

Although there were fears that such recounts would be armed this year and delay the certification of resultsso far this has not happened.