Data science provides election protection

Trust in election results is vital for a healthy democracy, but with limited resources how do election officials decide which claims of fraud to investigate?

Portland State researcher Stephanie Singer, an assistant professor with PSU’s Hatfield School of Government Center for Public Service, received a $300,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to find an answer. She’ll study the role of data science in election verification and build tools for officials. Her project will use a 2018 analysis conducted by North Carolina election officials into a hotly contested and controversial congressional race, with the goal of building a tool that can indicate if an investigation into fraud or ballot discrepancies is merited. She also plans to merge data published by state election boards with census data and information about voting machines to develop predictive modeling. 

“Just as an accountant knows to ask questions when actual expenditures don’t match budgeted expenditures,” she said, “election officials and candidates will know to ask questions when the actual voting breaks an expected pattern.”