7.08

Risk Assessment

Principle 7 - Identify, Analyze, and Respond to Risks

Attribute 7.08 - Management estimates the significance of the identified risks to assess their impact on achieving the defined objectives at both the entity and transaction levels. Management estimates the significance of a risk by considering the magnitude of impact, likelihood of occurrence, and nature of the risk. Magnitude of impact refers to the likely magnitude of the effect of the risk on the entity's ability to achieve its objectives. It is affected by factors such as the size, pace, and duration of the risk's impact. Likelihood of occurrence refers to the level of possibility that an unintended event or result will occur. The nature of the risk involves factors such as the degree of subjectivity involved with the risk and whether the risk arises from fraud or from complex or unusual transactions.

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Jamie's Story

No examples are available to illustrate governance gaps for this attribute.

Election Anomalies

Principle 7 addresses the need to Identify, Analyze, and Respond to Risks. The identification and analysis of risk are presumed to have been performed at the state level, which are addressed in the Arizona Secretary of State's Election Procedure Manual. The MC leadership team's Response to Risk is the primary governance weakness with respect to the Green Book's Principle #7, including this attribute.

Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020)

Governance issues identified from Arizona Attorney General's Office 2020 General Election Investigation of Arizona Senate allegations of Maricopa County Election Department - Drop Box Collections issues. Section 2 of the AZ AG's inspector's report identifies numerous issues, which present risk to potential fraud.

The Green Book refers to the magnitude of risk, which is affected by factors such as the size, pace, and duration of the risk's impact. In this case, the drop box issues increase the risk of fraudulent votes entering the tabulation process and magnitude of corrupted vote count. It's an exponential relationship; one procedure violation can allow tens of thousands of fraudulent early votes to be tabulated.

• See the heading Deviation: Missing Entries on Election Forms from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.
• See the heading Deviation: Missing Ballot Counts from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.
• See the heading Deviation: Used Email instead of EVBTS Forms from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.
• See the heading Deviation: Unfulfilled Party Representation Requirements for Couriers from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.
• See the heading Deviation: Allegations Confirmed from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.

The Green Book refers to the likelihood of risk, which is best represented by the over 56,000 pieces of undelivered mail handled by the USPS. This large quantity of undelivered mail can be generated by fraudsters with fraudulent voter registration forms (i.e., fictious address). Each undelivered early ballot is still valid and will be tabulated if filled out if a fraudster obtains these early ballots, completes the ballot in favor of the candidate of their choice and submits them for tabulation using a drop box. The large pool of over 56,000 undelivered ballots at USPS increases the likelihood of use for fraudulent purposes, especially when the early ballots are treated as all other undelivered first-class mail, with no chain of custody requirements from return to subsequent destruction.

• See the heading Deviation: Fictious Addresses in MC Voter Registration Database from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage.
• See the heading Noteworthy: Transmission of USPS Data to MC and Runbeck from Maricopa Dropbox Collection (2020) webpage

Maricopa County Signature Verification (2020)

Governance issues identified from Arizona Attorney General's Office 2020 General Election Investigation of Arizona Senate allegations of Maricopa County - Signature Verification Process issues.

This attribute directs manage to estimate the significance of a risk by considering the magnitude of impact, likelihood of occurrence, and nature of the risk.

• Magnitude of impact refers to the likely magnitude of the effect of the risk on the entity's ability to achieve its objectives. It is affected by factors such as the size, pace, and duration of the risk's impact. Currently, there is no possible method to assess the magnitude of the impact because there is no way to identify a fraudulent ballot, except possibly through forensic analysis. The magnitude of the impact appears to be related to the amount of actual fraud given that less than 600 signature mismatches were identified by Signature verifiers.
• Likelihood of occurrence refers to the level of possibility that an unintended event or result will occur. Likelihood of risk from Signature Verifiers is influence by factors such as the size, pace, and duration of the risk's impact, contrary to the Green Books suggestion that those factors affect the Magnitude of impact. Signature Verification is a seldomly performed activity, normally during a few weeks of the primary and a few weeks during the General or Mid-term elections. There is a demanding pace considering the election results are expected to be announce a few hours after the polls close.
• The nature of the risk involves factors such as the degree of subjectivity involved with the risk and whether the risk arises from fraud or from complex or unusual transactions. There is a direct correlation between the increase from fraud risk and poor Signature Verifier accuracy.

MC Elections Department has appearently not assessed the nature of risk from Signature Verifier errors with respect to the likelihood of occurrence.