Actual Vote

Democracy Counts

About this app

The Actual Vote app doesn't represent a government entity. America Counts, the makers of this app, also are not a government entity.

Poll tapes are long strips of paper printed during the vote counting procedure by election tabulating machines. They contain tabulated vote totals for a given precinct and voting method. There are many situations in which the general public may legally view such poll tapes and the information they contain. See https://americacounts.us/using-actual-vote-is-legal/ and https://americacounts.us/get-started for more.

When an Actual Vote user is viewing a poll tape, they may use the app to video-record that poll tape. By comparing recordings of poll tapes made by yourself and others against official results provided by local election authorities, discrepancies can be identified and acted upon. The videos you take are reviewed by our experts. Videos of poll tapes that don't have any inappropriate material get approved and displayed on our website av.democracycounts.org. The Terms and Conditions that users of that site agree to are at https://av.democracycounts.org/TermsAndConditions.

View America Counts's privacy policy at https://americacounts.us/privacy-policy/ for more on how the videos you submit with the Actual Vote app are used. Users of the Actual Vote app agree to this User Agreement: https://americacounts.us/actual-vote-user-agreement/

Poll tapes typically contain government information like precinct names and aggregated vote totals. Vote tabulation and poll tapes are managed by state boards of elections, and the vote totals on such poll tapes may be used by state boards of elections as a part of the official vote reporting process. You can find more information about state boards of elections by internet-searching for "[state] board of elections". For example, the North Carolina State Board of Elections site is https://www.ncsbe.gov/. For Florida, it's https://dos.fl.gov/elections. For Georgia it's https://sos.ga.gov/elections-division-georgia-secretary-states-office.

America Counts is an election audit initiative of Democracy Counts, Inc., a 501(c)(3) registered non-profit non-partisan corporation. Democracy Counts, Inc. does not represent a government entity.

How Does It Work?

1. Users download the Actual Vote app on their smart phones which provide links to training materials.
2. After a polling place has closed and publicly posted its official results, use Actual Vote to make digital recordings of the results and upload to our website.
3. Once election officials have released official election results, compare with the results recorded at https://av.democracycounts.org.

FAQs:
Q: Where and when are poll tapes displayed?

A: At most polling places, voting results are posted publicly on an outside surface such as a wall or door, or sometimes behind a window, once counting has completed. Because officials do not always take weather into account, it is vitally important to make recordings as soon as polling places close to avoid possible loss due to wind or rain.

Vote counting centers, unlike polling places, take much more time before making voting results available and may only do so upon request.

In either case, contacting your local election officials and planning ahead for any contingency is recommended.

Q. Is Actual Vote or America Counts affiliated with any political party?

A. No, America Counts is a non-partisan, non-profit and does not promote any particular political ideology.

Q. Is Actual Vote or America Counts sponsored by or affiliated with any government agency or receive any funding from the government?

A. No.

Ratings and reviews

Left a review, but it somehow disappeared 🤨. This works up until it's time to record video, but I get a video processing error after tapping ✔️ to upload. I have 8 video clips that's sitting in limbo. I'm not sure if it can be seen on the developers end, or whoever is suppose to be collecting the videos. But, from my end it shows 8 clips just sitting there w/the upload symbol, which u can't click bc the retry error msg is in front. Each time I hit retry, everything disappears, and repeat.

Americans can now crowdsource election audit data that is good enough to trust when the data is consistent with the official results, and good enough to take to court when the data does not agree with official results. In exchange for a few minutes of training in how to video a poll tape, and then about 15 minutes actually shooting the videos, you can verify that votes are being reported accurately. No petition or street demonstration can accomplish this.

What's new

• Updates and bug fixes