Following scrutiny from the Republican Party and guidance from Wyoming Secretary of State Chuck Gray, the Park County Clerk’s Office conducted a second round of tests on its electronic vote tabulators early Sunday morning. The additional testing reaffirmed that the machines are ready for today’s (Tuesday’s) primary election, the clerk’s office said.

“We feel that the retest was successful and that we are ready and eager for Election Day,” said Park County Elections Deputy Katie Johnson. “[W]e hope that we have a strong turnout for the primary election.”

The clerk’s office initially tested its Election Systems & Software (ES&S) tabulators without issue on July 8-9, but controversy arose earlier this month, after the Wyoming Republican Party and Gray pointed out apparent problems with the tests conducted in multiple counties.

At issue is a section of state law related to testing, which mandates that, “a different number of valid votes shall be assigned to each candidate, and for and against each measure.”

Differing totals offer a way to double-check that the tabulators are assigning votes to the right candidates. However, that may not be possible when two candidates have the same number of votes.

Gray’s office specifically highlighted the requirement in a June 25 memo to clerks, but on Aug. 6, the Laramie County Republican Party reported that its local clerk had conducted a test that featured the same number of votes for each candidate. When Laramie County Clerk Debra Lee didn’t immediately schedule a new test, the party filed a formal election complaint and then a lawsuit, while the Wyoming Republican Party urged its members to look into their counties’ tests.

Working in conjunction with the state party, Park County Republican Party Chair Martin Kimmet filed a couple requests seeking the results of Park County’s earlier testing. His requests spawned conversations between Wyoming Republican Party attorney Brian Shuck, Park County Attorney Bryan Skoric and the Park County Clerk’s Office.

“I don’t think anything nefarious was at hand,” Kimmet said in an interview, “but I think it behooves any and all of the electorate to be informed and keep an eye on these elections.”

Gray, meanwhile, issued an Aug. 12 letter urging clerks to retest if they had candidates with identical vote totals. Having different vote numbers for each candidate “is crucial to ensuring that the electronic voting machines are accurately counting and tabulating the votes,” he wrote.

After getting a handle on the issue and the party’s and secretary’s concerns, Johnson said a decision was made to run the test again.

Park County Clerk Colleen Renner announced Friday morning that, given the identical vote totals, she had “chosen to retest to alleviate any concerns.”

“Although this did not affect the actual validity of the test itself, it is a technicality that is not in compliance with Wyoming statute,” Renner said in Friday’s statement.

Two representatives from the Republican Party, Dave McMillan and Vince Vanata, Kelly Tamblyn from the Park County Democratic Party, two private citizens and two media members showed up for Sunday’s 7 a.m. test. (That’s up from the three who attended the initial tests in July.)

Things initially got a bit heated between elections staff and one of the citizens, Andris Vaskis of Powell.

First Deputy Clerk Hans Odde and Renner became frustrated after Vaskis made allegations about the 2022 primary election, in which he'd served as an election judge. Vaskis, meanwhile, became frustrated when he was told the compartment containing the voting machines’ USB drives would remain sealed until the test was completed, as he said he couldn't stay for the whole thing.

“So you don’t want us to look in there,” Vaskis charged. He left around 8 a.m.

The compartments on the dozen DS200 machines were unsealed and opened in front of the remaining attendees later on, when the testing finished and results were tabulated. The entire process — which involved feeding the equivalent of 1,403 ballots into 13 different machines — wrapped up around 1 p.m.

According to the clerk’s office, Park County was among 16 or 17 counties around the state that conducted a second round of tests.

On Friday, Secretary Gray thanked the clerks who were retesting their equipment to ensure compliance with the law.

“Voting is a crucial aspect of our republic, and I am proud of our efforts to ensure we are ready for Election Day,” he said in a statement. “I am excited for Tuesday’s primary election.”

Hours after the secretary’s message, the Wyoming Republican Party offered its own “heartfelt thank you to the many County Clerks and their election officials across the state for their positive and diligent response to our inquiries about voter machine testing.”

Johnson, the elections deputy, said Park County has been working in conjunction with ES&S to ensure that they avoid any similar issues with the test ballots that will be generated ahead of November’s general election.