One of Michigan's most populous counties will post all ballots online

[RandySF]

Macomb County has begun to post online an image of every ballot cast in the pivotal swing county.

The county, Michigan’s third most populous, is using a program called “Ballot Verifier” to upload scans of every ballot cast for anyone to see. More than 80,000 ballots from the November 2025 election are already online, as is the “cast vote record,” which shows how tabulators read each ballot.

Images of cast ballots — which do not include a voter’s name, address, party affiliation, or other identifying information — are already public record and can be requested through local officials. Putting them online simply improves transparency, Macomb County Clerk Anthony Forlini said.

“We all wonder, when we put our ballot in, ‘did it score it the right way?’” Forlini told Votebeat. “This takes a little bit of the mystery out of it and adds a little bit of accountability for all of us.”



https://www.votebeat.org/michigan/2026/03/06/ballot-verifier-macomb-county-anthony-forlini-ada-county/

[questionseverything]

1. I think this is a great step towards transparency

Theoretically anyone or any group of people could print the images and hand count the ballots ( as long as a system was in place to make sure all ballots were included in the scanning process)

Every counting machine already has the scanner so it seems like a win/win