Yellow Jacket InitiativeBy E. Lawrence Anderson, Yellow Jacket Initiative
As of Saturday, October 24, 2026, about 5:10 p.m. ET. Source: U.S. Election Assistance Commission, Office of Inspector General, Interim Report: Review of Physical Configuration Audits Supporting EAC Voting System Certifications, Report No. P26HQ0007-27-01 (October 22, 2026), including Appendix B, the EAC's response; the EAC's Democracy Suite 5.20 system page and its Certificate and Scope of Conformance (issued February 4, 2025).
The inspector general for the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) has found an error in the federal certification record for one voting system, and has also found that the error had limited practical effect. Both findings are in the same interim report, No. P26HQ0007-27-01, dated Thursday, October 22, 2026.
What the report found. The Office of Inspector General (OIG) "confirmed that the EAC's Certificate of Conformance for Democracy Suite 5.20 erroneously listed a scanner that had not been tested by the voting system test laboratory" (Highlights). The report identifies the scanner as the PCOS-321C, the test laboratory as Pro V&V, and the manufacturer as Liberty Vote USA Inc. (Appendix A, p. 5).
The OIG then set out why it considers the impact limited: "OIG found no evidence that the scanner was sold to jurisdictions as part of the certified system's configuration." The system was certified in February 2025, while manufacturer records show the scanner "was last sold to a jurisdiction in September 2022. Because the scanner was not deployed as part of the certified system, the practical impact of this discrepancy was limited" (p. 3). The sales finding rests on the manufacturer's invoice records as the OIG reviewed them (p. 5).
How it happened, according to officials. The report records officials' account that "the scanner was never intended for inclusion in the voting system configuration. A component list from a prior custom voting system configuration, which included the scanner, was incorrectly submitted with initial manufacturer paperwork" (p. 3). That is the officials' explanation as the OIG reports it.
Why the OIG still called it a control failure. The same paragraph continues: the error "was not identified through subsequent testing and certification documentation reviews. Nonetheless, listing an extraneous component in an EAC-certified configuration represents a breakdown in the controls intended to ensure that certified voting system configurations accurately reflect the components subjected to certification testing" (p. 3).
The control in question is the physical configuration audit, which "establishes a baseline identifying the hardware and software that comprise the system under test" (p. 2). It is how the federal program ties a certificate to the equipment actually tested. The review began with a hotline complaint received Sunday, August 23, 2026; EAC officials confirmed the discrepancy and "requested that OIG independently review the matter" (p. 2).
The recommendation and the EAC's commitment. The OIG made one recommendation: "Correct the Democracy Suite 5.20 voting system's Certificate of Conformance and other public-facing supporting documents to accurately reflect the components tested, working with the voting system test laboratory and manufacturer as necessary" (p. 4). The EAC's executive director responded, "The EAC agrees with the recommendation," and gave a "Target Completion Date: October 26, 2026" (Appendix B, pp. 7-8). That date, Monday, October 26, is the EAC's commitment. It has not yet arrived.
The EAC also says it is not limiting its check to the scanner. It is "verifying the full system configuration documented in the Democracy Suite 5.20 certification record against the components subjected to certification testing" (Appendix B, p. 8). Separately, it opened a laboratory-conformance process under Chapter 4 of its Voting System Test Laboratory Program Manual, Version 3.1 (Appendix B, p. 7). According to the OIG, Pro V&V "has already agreed to revise its policy and procedures" to reconcile manufacturer configuration information with the certification baseline "before certification documentation is finalized" (p. 3).
What the public record shows today. As of about 5:10 p.m. ET on Saturday, October 24, the EAC's Democracy Suite 5.20 page links one certificate: "DVS 5.20 Certificate and Scope of Conformance," issued February 4, 2025. Its hardware table still lists the PCOS-321C as a precinct scanner (Scope of Conformance, p. 9). No revised certificate is posted yet. We will check after Monday.
What this report does not say. It is an interim report, and the OIG states that it "does not present conclusions regarding matters outside the scope of the findings described herein" (p. 6). It does not say which jurisdictions use Democracy Suite 5.20. Whether other systems tested by the same laboratory have similar errors is still open; the broader review covers Pro V&V-tested systems "reported as actively deployed," and the OIG will report those results separately (pp. 3, 6). The report concerns certification documents; it says nothing about how any vote was counted.
Primary sources: EAC OIG Report No. P26HQ0007-27-01 (October 22, 2026, 12 pp., including the EAC's October 21 response); EAC Democracy Suite 5.20 system page; Certificate and Scope of Conformance (issued February 4, 2025).
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