MUSKEGON COUNTY, Mich. — A Muskegon County committee meeting took a heated turn Tuesday evening when two officials said their election integrity was called into question over a situation involving flash drives with voting information on them.
Muskegon County Clerk Karen Buie and Elections Coordinator Lori Hayes brought their concerns before the county board of commissioners during the Ways and Means Committee meeting. The two voiced their frustrations with Holton Township Clerk Malinda Pego surrounding the August primary election.
Buie said during the meeting, "I cannot and will not allow anyone to malign this office and question the integrity of the county clerk's election office or my election staff," and "it's truly unfortunate that we are here today to address such a spurious and contrived group of allegations."
Buie and Hayes alleged Pego turned in three flash drives on election night that stored votes from her township. However, Hayes noticed overnight, results for that township were not posted online.
"I said you need to bring your unused drives in so I can run them because we need to figure this out," Hayes added during the meeting.
They said Pego brought in two unused drives Wednesday, totaling five. The two brought in had nothing on them. They said at that point, Pego had been given a 6th drive that was unaccounted for.
Hayes explained, "the next thing I know, she said, well, here it is, and pulled the drive out of the bin. And I said, fine, just give it to me. I put it in, and I watched it, and up came some votes. I said, okay. I said, we're good to go. I said, this is fine. I didn't say anything. Everybody makes a mistake. I let it go."
Hayes and Buie told 13 ON YOUR SIDE the situation could have ended there. Instead, however, Buie said Pego posted a message on Facebook and sent it to county commissioners.
Buie shared the message with 13 ON YOUR SIDE.
Hayes said Tuesday, "I'm sorry, our election integrity is impeccable," and, "this is very upsetting to me that someone would question my integrity, question my office's integrity, and question my boss' integrity, and that just is not going to stand."
Buie confirmed no votes were ever lost and there were always backup methods to tallying votes aside from the flash drives.
She intends to report this situation to the Michigan Secretary of State and Attorney General.
Pego ran in the primary for the Republican nomination for Muskegon County Commissioner District 2, but lost.
13 ON YOUR SIDE called and emailed Pego Tuesday evening, but has not yet received a response.