Pennsylvania court upholds counties' right to inspect electronic voting equipment

The Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania on Tuesday upheld the right of Pennsylvania counties to inspect electronic voting equipment, an authority granted to them by the state Legislature.

The court sided with a brief filed by conservative election integrity watchdog The Amistad Project on behalf of Fulton County, Pa. The county had conducted an inspection on two Dominion voting machines in an attempt to determine whether they had functioned correctly during the 2020 election.

The state's top election official, the secretary of the commonwealth, then retroactively banned the practice and decertified both of the machines without providing the county with state funding to replace them.

The ruling establishes a precedent that counties have the statutory authority to inspect electronic voting equipment to ensure safe and honest elections are taking place.

"The court not only overturned the secretary of the Commonwealth's unlawful decertification of Fulton County's voting machines, but also affirmed that the secretary cannot prevent counties from exercising their statutory authority to inspect voting machines as part of their duty to ensure 'safe and honest conduct of elections,'" said Phil Kline, director of the Amistad Project.

"This ruling affirms what the U.S. Constitution says, which is that the state legislature has authority over federal elections, and has the right to take appropriate measures to ensure that elections are conducted lawfully in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania."