The Kansas ELECTION Conundrum - Ballots, Backdoors, and the Illusion of Oversight

Integrity Intercept Eyes on the Truth

Integrity #21

Election Integrity Part #3

September 24, 2025

Douglas County Clerk Jamie Shew spent weeks training volunteers for Kansas’s recent local elections, presumably to ensure they were “sharp” enough for 2024.

But let’s be honest, no amount of clipboard drills or voter flow charts can prepare anyone for the kind of algorithmic sleight-of-hand we’re about to unpack.

While Shew fine-tunes logistics, the real game plays out in code, not at the check-in table. And in a state where “Nearly one-third of Kansas election officials have left since 2020 amid harassment and criticism fueled by unsubstantiated voting fraud claims,” the stress isn’t just logistical – it’s existential.

Ralph Pezzullo’s Stolen Elections: The Takedown of Democracies Worldwide doesn’t just echo these concerns, it documents them. With receipts.

Let’s Begin

In April 2015, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission convened in Williamsburg, Virginia – a city steeped in the legacy of American governance. Clyde Haulman opened the meeting with reflections on how other nations view U.S. election infrastructure: with admiration, but also with pointed curiosity about its vulnerabilities. The symbolism of the setting was unmistakable.

Just miles from Jamestown, where in 1607 colonists unsealed a box naming seven men to govern the settlement, the EAC (Election Assistant Commission) gathered to confront its own sealed history, four years of dormancy and dysfunction.

From 2010 to 2014, the Commission lacked a quorum, an executive director, and a general counsel. It couldn’t certify voting systems or convene its advisory boards. But by January 2015, a new quorum had formed, determined to prevent such paralysis from recurring. The meeting at William and Mary College wasn’t just procedural, it was a resurrection.

From that moment forward, the Commission began to modernize. VVSG 1.1 clarified testing protocols, strengthened security, and expanded accessibility.

Then came VVSG 2.0 in 2021, a full reimagining of how voting systems should be designed, tested, and trusted. Principles-based, software-independent, and future-facing, it marked a turning point in election integrity.(2)

Integrated Section:

To be clear: ERIC (Electronic Registration Information Center) focuses on voter roll accuracy through data-sharing.

The EAC governs the certification and modernization of voting systems themselves. But in an era of digital distrust and decentralized oversight, the deeper question remains – who certifies trust?

If a machine can alter the image of a ballot during the voting process, whether through software manipulation, firmware vulnerabilities, or hidden backdoors, then pre-certification becomes a ceremonial stamp, not a safeguard. And if post-election audits can’t detect those alterations because the system was designed to obscure them, then what exactly are we certifying? (2)

This is where the conversation shifts from compliance to consequence.

The EAC’s VVSG 2.0 may emphasize software independence and voter-verifiable paper trails, but if the machine itself can subtly distort the ballot image before it’s stored or tabulated – without leaving a detectable trace – then the integrity of the vote is compromised at the point of capture.

And if the only audit tools allowed are digital recounts of the same potentially manipulated data, then the system becomes self-reinforcing.

It certifies its own deception.

This is precisely the kind of vulnerability Patrick Byrne has been warning about. In his interview with Stephen Gardner,(3) Byrne describes the global architecture of election interference, one that doesn’t just exploit software flaws but embeds them.

He claims that foreign actors, including Venezuela and Serbia, helped build systems designed to simulate fairness while enabling control. According to Byrne, the real manipulation happens not in the counting, but in the coding, where the image of the vote is shaped before it ever reaches the tally.

And this is exactly why Jovan Hutton Pulitzer refuses to play in the digital sandbox. His method, Kinematic Artifact Detection, bypasses software entirely.

Instead of trusting the machine’s version of events, he turns to the physical ballot itself, treating it like a crime scene. Using forensic imaging and computer vision, Pulitzer analyzes folds, fiber compression, ink dispersion, and machine marks to determine whether a ballot was genuinely handled by a voter or mass-processed by machines. His claim? The paper doesn’t lie. It carries the fingerprints of manipulation that digital systems are designed to erase.

Critics call it pseudoscience. (4) (5)

Supporters call it the only audit that doesn’t rely on the very machines under suspicion. (Specifically, Senate Republicans who supported the controversial Maricopa County audit who hired Cyber Ninjas, Patrick Byrne from his book, Deep Rig and General Michael Flynn.)

Either way, it’s a method born of the same distrust that fuels Byrne’s warnings, and it raises the uncomfortable possibility that the most secure vote might be the one least touched by technology.

Byrne contends that the 2020 election was stolen through these mechanisms, and that only in 2024 were they neutralized, allowing a legitimate outcome. Byrne’s narrative isn’t just about machines or ballots; it’s about the illusion of oversight. He positions himself as someone who saw behind the curtain, who was asked to bribe Hillary Clinton, who worked under Brennan and Comey, and who now claims to be “kryptonite to the Deep State.” (6)

“Fourteen Ways to Cheat – and the Fifteenth Is Serbia”

In his interview with Debbie Georgatos on America, Can We Talk, Patrick Byrne lays out a chilling architecture of election manipulation.

He claims that election systems, especially those involving Dominion machines, were compromised through 14 distinct methods, some coded into software, others woven into the procedures, logistics, and oversight gaps that surround the vote.

But the most potent, he says, is the 15th method: a foreign backdoor maintained in Serbia, where Dominion reportedly has a software development branch.

Byrne alleges that this Serbian connection allows remote access to voting machines during live elections, enabling real-time manipulation of ballot images and vote totals. The machines, he claims, are not truly “air-gapped” or isolated but instead contain firmware that can be activated externally. The result? A system that simulates transparency while concealing its most critical vulnerabilities.

He describes this setup as a kind of “ghost in the machine”, a phantom layer of control that bypasses local oversight and certification. According to Byrne, this is not just theoretical. It’s operational. And it’s been used. (7)

Byrne describes Serbia as the 15th method, a remote access hub that enables real-time manipulation, serving as the digital switchboard through which other tactics can be executed. He suggests that this is where the real-time manipulation occurs, outside the reach of U.S. jurisdiction

“The Balkan Switch”

In one of the more startling revelations from Patrick Byrne’s interviews, he recounts a meeting between General Michael Flynn and a group of whistleblowers from Europe, specifically Serbia. According to Byrne, these insiders confessed to Flynn that they had been manipulating elections in 72 countries for over 20 years. This is also outlined in the book, Stolen Elections: The Takedown of Democracies Worldwide by Ralph Pezzullo, (8) who investigated this for four years.

The epicenter of this operation, Byrne claims, is a server hub in Belgrade, Serbia, originally built to support Smartmatic’s infrastructure. From this location, election results could allegedly be altered remotely, even after local ballot manipulation had occurred. Byrne calls it their “ace in the hole”, a digital switchboard that overrides national sovereignty with a keystroke.

He describes the election manipulation algorithm as a stealth mechanism, not something that flips votes in dramatic sweeps, but something that shaves percentages, subtly redistributes votes, and operates beneath the threshold of statistical noise. According to Byrne, the algorithm is designed to target specific counties, especially swing jurisdictions, and adjust vote totals just enough to tip outcomes without triggering automatic recounts or raising red flags.

He claims the algorithm works by fractionalizing votes, counting them not as whole numbers, but as weighted decimals. For example, a vote for Candidate A might be counted as 0.97, while a vote for Candidate B is counted as 1.03. Over thousands of votes, this fractional difference accumulates into a meaningful shift, but one that’s nearly invisible in a standard digital recount, which simply re-tallies the same manipulated data.

“It’s not about flipping votes. It’s about shaving them, just enough to win, just enough to avoid detection.” Patrick Byrne, paraphrased from his interview with Stephen Gardner and multiple interviews. In fact, the final tallies will appear close, even if the original margins were drastically different, because the numbers are kept within legal thresholds.

Byrne argues that the algorithm is embedded in the firmware or middleware of voting machines, meaning it can operate independently of the software that election officials interact with. It’s not visible in the user interface, and it doesn’t leave behind a clear audit trail. That’s why, he says, digital recounts are useless – they’re just re-reading the same altered numbers.

To detect it, Byrne insists, you’d need access to the raw ballot images, the source code, and the network traffic logs – none of which are typically available to the public or even to most election officials.

He believes this is why forensic audits like Jovan Pulitzer’s Kinematic Analysis are essential: they examine the physical ballots, not the digital echoes.

We will finish this in part 4. However, the typical question is often the lawsuits that Dominion and Smartmatic have brought, especially to Patrick Byrne. Why Are Dominion and Smartmatic “winning” these lawsuits?

The term “winning” here often refers to settlements or favorable rulings, not necessarily courtroom victories. Here’s what’s happening:

The Dominion’s Strategy

Dominion has filed multiple defamation suits against figures like Patrick Byrne, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and media outlets including Fox News, Newsmax, and OANN.

In Fox’s case, Dominion secured a $787.5 million settlement – a massive payout that avoided trial but was widely interpreted as a legal win. (9)

Courts have repeatedly allowed Dominion’s cases to proceed, rejecting motions to dismiss and affirming that the company plausibly alleged actual malice – that defendants knowingly spread false claims.

The Smartmatic’s Approach

Smartmatic has also sued Newsmax, OANN, and others. It recently settled with Newsmax just as jury selection began.

These settlements are confidential, meaning the public doesn’t see the terms – but they’re often framed as victories by the plaintiffs.

What About Patrick Byrne?

Patrick Byrne, former Overstock CEO, which has now distanced itself from Byrne in 2019 and rebranded to Beyond, Inc. Patrick is being sued by Dominion for defamation. His case is still active, but it’s mired in controversy:

Byrne’s attorney, Stefanie Lambert, was accused of leaking protected discovery materials and is facing criminal charges in Michigan for alleged voting machine tampering.

Dominion filed a motion to disqualify Lambert, citing violations of court orders and concerns about misuse of confidential documents.

Byrne claims the lawsuit is being stalled because he intends to expose evidence Dominion wants hidden. However, Dominion argues that the leaked materials do not prove fraud and instead show misconduct by the defense.

So, while Byrne says the case is in “limbo,” the court is actively responding to procedural violations, not suppressing discovery. The delays appear to stem from legal disputes over conduct, not avoidance of evidence.

In essence, Stephanie Lambert is leaking information that Dominion claims they agreed to keep private. She has broken the law and was arrested for one night by the U.S. Marshalls and now faces felony charges in Michigan.

In Bryne’s defense they claim emails in “Serbian and foreign languages,” namely “Top level Dominion employees directing and tasking foreign nationals to remotely access voting machines utilized in the United States during the November 3, 2020, election.” (10)

Dominion simply responded that this “xenophobic conclusion is that emails from non-U.S. based Dominion personnel is conclusive evidence of criminal activity.”

Are These Companies “Paying to Win”?

This is more a speculative claim, suggested also by Pezzullo, who outlines in an interview in the Adam Carolla Show with this issue. (11)

Settlements often involve non-disclosure agreements, and while critics argue that payouts are used to control the narrative, legally speaking:

A settlement is not an admission of guilt. It’s a strategic decision to avoid trial, reduce risk, and manage public relations. In Fox’s case, the settlement avoided exposing internal communications in court. Smartmatic’s settlements similarly sidestep prolonged litigation.

BREAKING NEWS ADDED TO THIS ARTICLE: One day before Free State News was going to post this article, Patrick Bryne revealed 2020 evidence for the Michigan elections.

Through a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request by New Jersey activist Yehuda Miller, nearly 1 million documents were obtained from Detroit’s 2020 election records. These included absentee ballots, signed envelopes, and other chain of custody materials. This is one of the largest hauls in U.S. History. Byrne describes Mr. Miller as a “clutch player” (one who thrives in critical moments) who noticed 11-20% discrepancies (in stuffed ballots) in the 2020 Michigan results. This news release builds on Patrick Bryne’s efforts to substantiate claims of irregularities in Dominion Voting Systems machines used in Michigan. Patrick Byrne has alleged 2020 election issues with 154,000 votes. He also claims to have invested $200 million personally to gather evidence. He has claimed how Dominion and other systems (Smartmatic) manipulated results. (12)

Final Thought before Part 4

While Dominion and Smartmatic claim legal victories, the deeper story is about narrative control and strategic silence. Settlements may end lawsuits, but they don’t always resolve the public’s questions. And when discovery is contested or suppressed, the courtroom becomes less about truth and more about tactics.