Jocelyn Benson

Opinion contributor

Millions across the nation will be looking to Michigan’s voters today in what could be a decisive moment for the Democratic Party’s nominee for president of the United States. Indeed, as the state’s chief election official, I am keenly aware that the eyes of the country will be awaiting the outcome of our presidential primary this evening.

And they will need to wait a little longer than usual. Because it is a new day for democracy in our state, with new rights for voters and greater security measures in place than ever before.

This election will be our first statewide election since 2018, when Michiganders overwhelmingly voted to amend our state constitution to expand access to our democracy. Among the changes they made were giving all Michigan voters the right to vote by mail and to register to vote up to and on Election Day itself.

These are historic changes that have made our elections more accessible for every voter.

Requests for absentee ballots are up more than 95% compared to the 2016 presidential primaries, but our state legislature has yet to update our laws to give clerks more time and resources to process them ahead of the election. Additionally, on Election Day, we’ll see thousands of people — many of them young, first-time voters — register to vote and cast their ballot, which for security reasons they can only do at their local clerk’s offices.

This means that across Michigan clerks and their teams will have significantly more work to do today than on previous election days, and that the results of today’s elections may not be known until well into Wednesday.

We’re also going to be methodical in ensuring Michigan’s election systems are more secure and that the results of the vote are accurate. Here are some of the ways we do that:

All Michigan jurisdictions use paper ballots, and don’t connect the tabulator machines to the internet. Only once they have finished counting, and a paper record of the tally has been created, will some jurisdictions connect the machines to the internet to send unofficial results. Many jurisdictions won’t even then, and election workers will call or drive their results to their county clerk’s office. Regardless of how these unofficial results are shared, there is always a paper record that can be checked.

We partner with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and other organizations so that they can test our systems and tell us how to improve them if they encounter vulnerabilities. We also hired the state’s first election security expert on staff in 2019, to constantly improve our systems.

Last year we also joined ERIC, the national Electronic Registration Information Center, to ensure our voter rolls are accurate. And we have implemented security upgrades to the Qualified Voter File — the state’s voter registration list.

Finally, our elections are decentralized, in that they are carried out by more than 1,500 local jurisdictions across the state. This would make it very difficult for foreign entities to make any significant impact on the system as a whole.

While we know there may be a rush to predict and prognosticate the outcome tonight, we in Michigan are prioritizing accuracy and security above all else. So if and when it takes longer that usual for Michigan’s results to come in tonight or tomorrow, it’s not a sign of errors or fraud. It is evidence that our election administrators are working diligently to carry out the additional work on their plates in a way that is ethical and accurate.

In other words, they are doing their jobs as our democracy requires and as all Americans would want them to.

Jocelyn Benson is Michigan’s secretary of state.