Tippecanoe County approves public test of voting machines after Microvote reports a minor one-vote shift

Tippecanoe County elections staff told the board they have 116,556 registered voters and that early voting will start next Tuesday with 11 vote centers and more than 400 hours of early-voting availability. "We are ready for the public test," the elections presenter said, noting heavy candidate activity and 196 ballot styles proofed.

The board conducted its statutory public test of voting equipment with vendor Microvote. Microvote representative Steve Shamo explained the three-stage public test (zero tapes to show no prior votes, verify mode voting, and an absentee test deck). "When we did the test today, it appears that one of the voting stations duplicated one of their voting activations and omitted another," Shamo said, describing a systemic one-vote shift visible when precinct reports were compared to central-system reports.

Elections staff confirmed the recording and reporting reflected what was cast and that their internal pre-checks had produced the expected cascading pattern. The vendor demonstrated how walk-in absentee ballots and the absentee deck would be tallied and how a hypothetical retraction (if a voter dies before election day) is handled in the system.

After the demonstration and review of test tapes and evidence forms, the board voted to accept and approve the results of the public test. The signed forms and test artifacts were entered into the meeting record for transparency.