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Trump’s Election-Security Disclosures Lead Back to Sacramento County

AENN

July 17, 2026 by Joe Hoft

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Mark Cook and I documented unresolved security questions in 2020. Sacramento County denied access to the forensic evidence that could have answered them.

Executive Branch


By Christine Bish

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“Any single issue might have had an innocent explanation. Taken together, they demanded an independent audit.”

President Donald Trump’s July 16, 2026, election-security address did not begin my investigation into the 2020 election. It returned national attention to the same category of election-system vulnerabilities Mark Cook and I were examining in Sacramento County more than five years ago.[1]

The White House released declassified materials concerning vulnerabilities in electronic voting and ballot-counting systems and China’s acquisition of American voter data. Those documents do not, by themselves, prove that Sacramento County’s vote totals were changed or that a foreign actor determined the outcome of the 2020 election. Reuters and other fact-checkers reported that the released material did not establish alteration of actual votes.[2]

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But the disclosures do validate the central question behind our work: were American election systems as isolated, secure and independently verifiable as the public was repeatedly assured? In Sacramento County, the documentary record shows that important questions were left unresolved before certification.

The System Was Built Before COVID

My three earlier articles traced how then-Secretary of State Alex Padilla helped transform California elections before the pandemic through DMV-based voter registration, vote centers, ballot drop boxes, centralized processing and automatically mailed ballots. Sacramento County began operating under the Voter’s Choice Act in 2018. When COVID arrived, much of the framework was already in place.


COVID then disrupted traditional election staffing and public observation. Many experienced volunteers were discouraged from serving because of health concerns, while temporary paid personnel were recruited. At the same time, private money entered public election administration.


Sacramento County received $1,349,703 from the Center for Tech and Civic Life. County grant records in my files show $531,892.72 for poll workers, $450,739.50 for ballot drop boxes, $289,281.12 for voter education, $48,758.60 for polling-place rental and cleaning, and $29,031.06 for translated materials. Poll workers and drop boxes accounted for nearly 73 percent of the grant.[3]

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Private funding does not prove misconduct. Nor does the use of temporary workers. But mass-mailed ballots, replacement staffing, private funding, drop boxes, outside vendors, emergency procedures and reduced access all converged in the same unprecedented election. Then Sacramento County’s own Grand Jury identified significant security deficiencies.

The Grand Jury Warning

The Sacramento County Grand Jury report, “Election Security in Sacramento County,” found that the County Department of Technology was not regularly and consistently performing vulnerability scans and penetration testing. The Grand Jury also said it could not determine when the last external security audit of Sacramento’s election systems had occurred or who had performed the testing.[4]


The report described Sacramento’s central tally environment as an air-gapped system physically isolated from unsecured networks. It recommended regular third-party penetration testing, vulnerability scans after significant changes, expanded election-security policies, multi-factor authentication before the November election, and a report on the CyberDefenses review and Department of Homeland Security assessment by September 30, 2020.[4]


The County’s own response placed portions of the work beyond Election Day. The report listed December 31, 2020, as the completion target for part of the multi-factor-authentication rollout, January 15, 2021, for portions of the social-media security work, and described the DHS assessment as being “in the roadmap.”[4]

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Sacramento nevertheless conducted and certified the November 2020 election. In a July 21, 2021 email, Registrar Courtney Bailey-Kanelos wrote that all Grand Jury recommendations had been implemented except the DHS assessment. She stated that remote testing was scheduled for August 16-20, followed by on-site testing August 23-27, 2021.[5]


That raises a question the County should answer with records: if the central tally system was air-gapped, what systems did DHS test remotely for five days? Remote testing does not necessarily mean DHS entered the Dominion tabulation system; it may have examined public websites, email, voter-registration infrastructure or the County network perimeter. The scope of work, network diagrams, testing records and final report would show what was examined—and what was not.

Mark Cook Came to Sacramento

The Grand Jury report triggered my investigation. After reviewing the findings and communicating with Bailey-Kanelos, I asked election-system investigator Mark Cook to come to Sacramento. Cook prepared a one-dollar proposal for a forensic evaluation and traveled to California. The formal audit did not proceed, but Bailey-Kanelos cooperated with the inquiry, escorted Cook through the facility and allowed him to photograph the equipment and conditions he observed.[6]


These were not anonymous photographs or images secretly obtained from outside the building. They were taken during an authorized facility visit on December 15, 2020. Great American Rebirth later preserved the proposal, photographs, records request, County denial and Sacramento’s response.[7]


Different Times on Critical Terminals

One photograph shows adjacent Ballot Definition and Tabulation & Reporting workstations displaying 1:17 and 1:21—a four-minute difference. The discrepancy does not prove that any vote was changed. It does matter because audit logs depend on accurate timestamps to reconstruct user access, database changes, removable-media activity and results transfers. The County should have been able to produce time-synchronization settings and logs explaining the difference.[8]


Exhibit A. Ballot Definition and Tabulation & Reporting terminals displaying different times. Photograph by Mark Cook, December 15, 2020; reproduced from Great American Rebirth.

Loose USB Devices and a Drive Marked “BIOS”

Cook also photographed multiple USB devices beside election workstations. One carried a handwritten “BIOS” label. The photograph does not establish what was stored on the drive, whether it was inserted, or whether firmware was changed. It does establish why an inventory, chain of custody, file listing and forensic preservation were warranted.[9]


Bailey-Kanelos later acknowledged that the USB drives should not have been left out and said procedures were updated to secure them immediately after use. She stated that the drives were labeled, recorded and retained for 22 months.[10]


Exhibit B. USB devices beside the Ballot Programming workstation, including a device labeled “BIOS.” Photograph by Mark Cook, December 15, 2020; reproduced from Great American Rebirth.


The Server Rack and the VoIP Telephone

Cook also photographed the reporting and tabulation server area with visible network cabling and a Voice over Internet Protocol telephone on the floor. The photograph alone does not prove that the Dominion system was connected to the public internet. Equipment can share a room or rack while remaining separated by different switches and isolated networks.[11]


Sacramento County responded that Dominion operated on two separate air-gapped networks using separate physical switches. Bailey-Kanelos said the VoIP telephone had been placed in the room for a fire-suppression and temperature-communication test, was not present during the election, and was never connected to the voting system.[10]

Courtney Bailey-Kanelos


That explanation could have been tested through network diagrams, switch-port assignments, firewall logs, the telephone’s MAC address and records showing when it was connected and removed. Those are the records an independent examination would have sought.


Sacramento County Denied the Records

Cook and I prepared a California Public Records Act request seeking forensic copies of hard drives and flash media used in the Election Management System, a file-level backup of Dominion Democracy Suite, encryption and login information, and records associated with tallying and reporting. I personally delivered the request on December 16, 2020.[12]


We expected at least part of the request to be denied. The request was also an investigative test: we wanted Sacramento County to state what evidence existed, what could be independently examined, and what legal basis it would invoke to prevent access.


County Counsel denied the request on December 22, 2020. The County said no forensic copies existed and that it was not required to create them. It invoked proprietary software, trade-secret and security concerns and said release of the requested materials could compromise future elections. It directed me to the certified Statement of Vote.[13]


Protecting active passwords, encryption keys and proprietary software was understandable. What the letter did not explain was why the County could not provide segregated, non-sensitive evidence such as USB inventories, serial numbers, custody records, audit logs, existing file hashes, access histories, backup reports, vendor work orders, time-synchronization records and redacted network documentation.


Cook and I were not asking Sacramento County to repeat its conclusion. We were asking for the evidence necessary to test it.

Exhibit C. Sacramento County Office of County Counsel denial of Christine Bish’s Public Records Act request, December 22, 2020.

Why We Preserved the Record

Cook and I attempted to get the developing Sacramento evidence reviewed by people connected to President Trump’s legal effort before Congress counted the electoral votes. We were unsuccessful. We then preserved the photographs, communications, Grand Jury report, proposal, records request and denial at GreatAmericanRebirth.com so the evidence would not disappear into private files.[7]


That record was not assembled years later to fit a new political narrative. It was created in the immediate aftermath of the 2020 election to memorialize what we saw, what we requested, what Sacramento County said, and what officials would not permit us to examine.

Executive Branch


Administratively Certified—But Not Credibly Certifiable

Sacramento County formally certified its 2020 election. No court declared the County’s results legally void, and the photographs do not independently prove that a ballot was added, removed or altered.


But the County proceeded while known security work remained incomplete, before the DHS assessment was finished, and without permitting an independent forensic examination afterward. In my judgment, the election was administratively certified but not credibly certifiable from a cybersecurity and evidentiary standpoint.


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President Trump’s July 16 release does not prove every allegation surrounding the 2020 election. It does establish that election-system vulnerabilities and foreign acquisition of voter information were serious enough to be examined at the highest levels of government. That is the same category of risk Mark Cook and I were demanding Sacramento County examine in 2020.[1]


Any one issue might have had an innocent explanation: the legal changes, mass-mailed ballots, COVID restrictions, private election funding, temporary workers, unresolved Grand Jury findings, delayed DHS testing, loose removable media, inconsistent clocks, network-connected equipment in the server room and the denial of forensic access.


Taken together, they demanded an independent audit.

President Trump did not start this investigation. Sacramento County’s own records did. More than five years later, the question is not why we asked. The question is why Sacramento County never produced the evidence necessary to answer.

 

Sources and Exhibits

[1] The White House, “Election Integrity,” including President Trump’s July 16, 2026 address and released documents. https://www.whitehouse.gov/election-integrity/

[2] Reuters, “Trump accuses China of 2020 election interference, contradicting U.S. intel,” July 16, 2026. https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/with-midterms-deck-trump-deliver-primetime-speech-election-security-2026-07-16/

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[3] Sacramento County CTCL grant application, expenditure records and final reporting, obtained by Christine Bish through public-records requests; author’s investigative files.

[4] Sacramento County Grand Jury, “Election Security in Sacramento County,” 2019-2020 Final Report, pp. 87-102. https://www.sacgrandjury.org/docs/reports/19-20/report-5-election-security-sacramento-county.pdf

[5] Courtney Bailey-Kanelos email to Christine Bish, July 21, 2021, stating the DHS assessment remained outstanding and listing August 2021 remote and on-site testing dates; author’s records.

[6] Mark Cook / WizWare Technologies, “Sacramento California Voting System Forensic Evaluation Proposal,” December 14, 2020. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/2020-12-14-Sacramento-County-California-Voting-System-Forensic-Evaluation-Proposal.pdf

[7] Great American Rebirth, “Sacramento Registrar of Voters: Election 2020 — A Limited Case Study,” preserving the authorized tour, photographs, proposal, request and response. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/sacramento-ca/

[8] Mark Cook, photograph of Ballot Definition and Tabulation & Reporting terminals, December 15, 2020, Great American Rebirth Photo No. 10. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/sacramento-ca/

[9] Mark Cook, photograph of USB devices including a device labeled “BIOS,” December 15, 2020, Great American Rebirth Photo No. 12. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/sacramento-ca/

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[10] Courtney Bailey-Kanelos, “Response from Courtney Bailey-Kanelos,” January 7, 2021. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/response-from-courtney-bailey-kanelos/

[11] Mark Cook, photographs of the Reporting & Tabulation Server rack and VoIP telephone, December 15, 2020, Great American Rebirth Photos Nos. 15-16. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/sacramento-ca/

[12] Christine Bish, California Public Records Act request delivered to Sacramento County Registrar of Voters, December 16, 2020; reproduced in the Great American Rebirth exhibits and retained in the author’s records. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/sacramento-ca/

[13] Sacramento County Office of County Counsel, “Public Records Act Request,” letter to Christine Bish, December 22, 2020, signed by Assistant County Counsel Krista C. Whitman, County reference No. 2022669. https://greatamericanrebirth.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Bish_-Sacramento_FOIA_Response_122220.pdf

Editorial note: This article distinguishes documented vulnerabilities and unanswered audit questions from proof that vote totals were altered. Statements framed as the author’s judgment are identified as such.


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