Granite State Times

While the 2020 general election will likely be remembered for unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud, there were isolated incidents that have come under scrutiny long after the last ballots were counted.

In Windham, a town of about 14,000 residents in Rockingham County, the New Hampshire Legislature mandated an audit after a Democratic candidate requested a recount, according to the Associated Press (AP). That audit found that miscounts were caused by the way the ballots were folded. The audit was sparked after the recount showed Republican candidates getting many more votes than initially had been counted. 

“It is not impossible that the folds affected the outcomes of some contests in the 400-seat New Hampshire House of Representatives, but we can conclude that Windham was not the tip of a massive miscount iceberg," the auditors wrote in their report, according to the AP. “Nonetheless, people’s votes must be counted accurately, so procedural reforms are warranted.”

U.S. Sen. Chris Pappas | Wikimedia Commons

However, the findings of the audit panel weren’t enough to quiet critics, who, according to the Concord Monitor, were saying -- even before the report was finalized -- that it didn’t go far enough. 

“I still have a lot of questions that have to be answered,” Bruce Breton, a member of the Windham Board of Selectmen, told the Concord Monitor. “I still have questions in my mind about the folds and a couple of other items. Are the folds the real reason for the miscount?”

However, U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas (D-New Hampshire) has been critical of efforts at election reform, particularly in Texas and Georgia, claiming that election integrity efforts may hint at darker motivations.

"It says everything you need to know when a political party, using the lies they created about the last election, undertakes a nationwide effort to restrict voting access,” Pappas said in a March 26 Tweet. “We the People means all the people, and laws like this tear at the fabric of our democracy.”

In Georgia, lawmakers seem to be taking things a step further, approving reforms allowing them to exert influence over local elections by taking over a county board. NBC News has reported that a group of state legislators, including Georgia State House Speaker Rep. Jan Jones (R),  submitted a letter to the state election board seeking a performance review of the board of registration and elections in Fulton County, a predominantly Democratic county. This has drawn the ire of Democrats, claiming it is overreach and a clear attempt at voter suppression. 

“The critics of it are alleging that this allows the board to just willy-nilly take over boards and change the results of elections, but there’s a lot of due process that’s built into this," state election board member Matt Mashburn, a Republican, told NBC News. 

As members of both parties scramble to enact election reform in both New Hampshire and Georgia, the idea of "election integrity" remains central, and the states have subtle differences and some similarities in their voting laws, despite the fact that New Hampshire is seated in the heart of New England and Georgia is positioned squarely in the South. 

One key difference is that the Granite State does not allow no-excuse absentee voting, according to Ballotpedia. Instead, New Hampshire voters must provide a valid reason why they cannot cast a ballot in person. In the Peach State, Ballotpedia noted that Georgia voters can vote absentee with no excuse required. While Georgia does not permit same-day voter registration, voters in New Hampshire can register the same day that they cast a ballot.  

Despite geographic separation, there are similarities between election laws in the two states. According to Ballotpedia, both Georgia and New Hampshire prohibit automatic voter registration, and both states have voter ID requirements.