The Power of Evidence: Venezuela’s Battle Against Electoral Fraud
Maria Herrera Mellado 
A week after the elections in Venezuela, disputes over the final electoral results between the tyranny and the opposition continue, and what is worse, Maduro is increasing violence and persecuting domestic and international journalists, protesters as well as volunteers at home.
Does our audience remember that 24 hours after last Sunday’s elections, María Corina Machado announced on social media that her coalition had gathered more than two-thirds of the voting records from polling stations across the country and that, Nicolás Maduro had lost the presidential election? This announcement came as a shock not only for the tyranny but for all those who considered Venezuela was a lost cause due to Maduro’s tight control.
That Sunday, Machado announced that they had all these records and that this was the last piece of evidence needed to refute the electoral result that the tyrant would soon announce.
[Watch the video](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lWnP9hDNqfU)
Political analysts consulted by Gateway Hispanic explained to us that the opposition had been preparing to unmask the regime for months and that, thanks to the work of thousands of volunteers who participated, they achieved what seemed impossible. Some citizens even claimed that the military personnel helped deliver some of those records to the opposition!
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C-IC3l1twPo/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
After Machado made this public statement, thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets to demand the end of Maduro’s tyranny, asking peace and democracy. Many protesters told the press that they were fed up with the misery and the lack of freedom in their home country.
Maduro soon reacted violently and called on all security forces to arrest not only opposition leaders but regular citizens and demanded prison for all those protesters he labeled as terrorists. To date, he proudly claims that over 2,000 people have been arrested. Protesters are being brutally assaulted by Maduro’s henchmen and 11 have died. He claims these are paid protesters who came to Venezuela to create chaos and who were trained in Texas, Chile, or Colombia.
Growing repression against observers and witnesses can be seen on social media.
Up until today, Maduro tried to justify any irregularities and lack of transparency on his part due to an alleged hacking of the system by none other than Elon Musk without any basis.
But how effective was the Strategy the Opposition prepared to gather these Records?
Machado talked the press in the presence of representatives from other parties, where she provided many details of the work of both observers and thousands of volunteers.
These volunteers had participated in training workshops across the country in recent months to serve as electoral observers she said. This was key to have inside information. We contacted some volunteers who preferred to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals but confirmed this.
On an article that was trending, AP reported that many volunteers were able to get near the voting machines even before the polls opened, and remain here until the results of these were electronically transmitted to the National Electoral Council in the capital, Caracas.
On election day, Many polling places were guarded by soldiers, civilian militias, police, and loyalists of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. However, in some places, the observers succeeded and, once inside the polling stations, did not leave their posts until after 11 p.m.
They were around 90,000 party representatives who were taught how to obtain a copy of the voting records—printed from electronic voting machines after the polls closed—and before the results were transmitted. According to Machado, the party representatives and other volunteers should be considered the heroes of this process that finally unmasked the tyrant.
«Our representatives have the right to their record.” ‘No representative leaves their polling station without the document in hand,’ Machado stated. The records obtained by the opposition show the total votes broken down by candidate, the QR code, and the signatures of the party representatives, an electoral body employee, and the polling station workers who are randomly selected to participate. The QR code scans gave a campaign team immediate access to voting results, which they tabulated Sunday night and Monday.
Volunteers were also trained to use an application to report irregularities at polling stations, such as delays in opening or power outages, and to scan a QR code printed on each record.
In Venezuela, they have used electronic voting machines since 2004. The machines have changed over time, but today they are like a personal computer. The company in charge previously was Smartmatic. However, after the 2017 Venezuelan Constituent Assembly elections, Smartmatic claimed there was «manipulation of the turnout data» by at least one million voters and said that «an audit would allow for the exact turnout figure to be known.» After that, they stopped working with the Venezuelan government and ExClé, a multinational of Argentine origin, is working in Venezuela supplying these voting machines.
These machines provide a paper receipt for each voter, and, after polls close, print copies of the voting records. They used around 30,000 machines this time. To be able to unmask the regime, the opposition needed all the votes to be fully scanned using specially designed equipment.
As far as collecting and saving all voting records go, a strategy was created by Machado so if party representatives did not feel safe or could not reach the places where the scanners were housed, other volunteers would meet with the representatives, grabbed the records, and transported them by motorcycle, car, bicycle, and even boat to the appropriate locations AP reported.
According to opposition data, they managed to have witnesses present at 95% of the polling stations. Each witness would have been able to request a voting record, which can then be audited.
In the past, disorganization had constantly limited the opposition’s ability to secure and safeguard records in previous elections. But this time, the opposition claimed that it had obtained more than 70% of the records and eventually grew to more than 80%, which was enough to secure victory.
It is important to note that the National Electoral Council has not yet shared the records on its website, which has been down since Monday. To be clear, they are not required by law to publish images of any voting records, but they previously had, so suddenly it became suspicious.
Council president Elvis Amoroso provided the initial results and then an updated results from the alleged 96.87% of the records last Friday, giving Maduro 6.4 million votes and González 5.3 million. Eugenio Martinez, a Venezuelan journalist and expert in the electoral system explained to BBC that these results were inconsistent. With 40% of the records totaled, the difference between Edmundo González and Nicolás Maduro was almost of 30 points. For the remaining 45% of the records to change this trend, Edmundo González would need to have to get zero votes in those other records, and Nicolás Maduro would have to get all the votes.
The Associated Press (AP) and independent journalists conducted an analysis of the opposition’s records. AP processed almost 24,000 images of tally sheets, which represented the results from 79% of the voting machines. Each sheet contained vote counts encrypted in QR codes, which AP decoded using a program and analyzed, resulting in counts of 10.26 million votes.
According to those calculations, González received 6.89 million votes, almost half a million more than the government claims Maduro received. The counts also show that Maduro received 3.13 million votes from the electoral records released.
AP could not independently verify the authenticity of the 24,532 scrutiny records provided by the opposition. The agency successfully extracted data from 96% of the released records. The quality of the remaining 4% of the images was too poor to analyze.
Scrutiny records—resembling very long purchase receipts—have long been considered the definitive proof of electoral results in Venezuela.
Besides Edmundo González, eight other men were running for the presidency, including Enrique Márquez, a former electoral council member, who denounced the official results and criticized the authorities for the lack of transparency. «Most of our witnesses…were prevented from accessing the polling stations,» he told reporters. «Those who managed to get in witnessed the process and waited for the records, but they were not handed over as required by law and its regulations. This not only violates the law but also generates darkness, opacity, and lack of transparency.»
Mr. Márquez also attended the event at the Electoral Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice in Caracas on August 2, 2024, where he demanded that the national electoral authority (“CNE”) not «hide under the robes of the magistrates.»
Since last Sunday, Maduro has faced a cascade of criticism and rebukes from international observers, experts, and world leaders, including leftist governments like Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Colombian President Gustavo Petro, both allies of Maduro, who have urged the government to release the complete records. The OAS and the European Union have also done so, and many countries have declared Edmundo González the winner of the presidential election based on this evidence.
Biden has not formally recognized Edmundo as the winner but Secretary of State Antony Blinken issued the following statement, “At least 12 million Venezuelans peacefully went to the polls and exercised one of the most powerful rights granted to people in any democracy: the right to vote,» said U.S.. «Unfortunately, the processing of those votes and the announcement of the results by the Maduro-controlled National Electoral Council (CNE) were deeply flawed, producing an announced result that does not represent the will of the Venezuelan people.»
María Herrera Mellado es una abogada de EE.UU. y licenciada en España. Doctora en Ciencias Jurídicas y Analista política. La Dra. Herrera es conocida por su amplia experiencia en análisis y consultas en el diseño de políticas públicas, propuestas de ley y gestión en relaciones internacionales.
Su reconocimiento proviene de sus contribuciones al análisis y representación legal de diversas organizaciones, empresas e individuos que han visto abusados sus derechos humanos, su privacidad o en la inclusión de políticas efectivas fundamentalmente en el ámbito de la transparencia y la rendición de cuentas, así como la lucha contra la corrupción.
Su formación académica y experiencias profesionales la convierten en una voz respetada en el debate público y en el análisis de temas de actualidad sobre todo en los desafíos políticos y legales contemporáneos.
María Herrera Mellado is a U.S.-based attorney also licensed in Spain. She holds a PhD in Legal Sciences and is known as a media legal and policy analyst.
Dr. Herrera is recognized for her extensive experience in analyzing and consulting on public policy design, legislative proposals, and international relations management.
Her recognition stems from her contributions to the analysis and legal representation of various organizations, companies, and individuals whose human rights or privacy have been violated, or who have benefited from the inclusion of effective policies, primarily in the areas of transparency, accountability, and the fight against corruption.
Her academic background and professional experience make her a respected voice in public debate and in the analysis of current issues, particularly in contemporary political and legal challenges.