Resurfaced rumors of a “stolen election” years ago in New Jersey are accurate, but the catch is that the most likely culprit this particular time was human error and incompetence.
The “stolen election” occurred on June 21, 2011, when a Democrat primary election was held for seats on the Fairfield Township Executive Committee.
According to NJ.com, then-Fairfield Deputy Mayor Ernest Zirkle received 9 votes, while his wife, Cynthia, received 10 votes. The other two candidates, Vivian and Mark Henry, received 34 and 33 votes, respectively.
However, following the election, the Zirkles obtained affidavits from 28 voters swearing they’d voted for them, not the Henrys. This founded the basis of the rumor that began circulating recently on the social media platform X:
Small local NJ election STOLEN using electronic voting machines with only 43 voters.
The final count was 33 to 10, but the woman who lost called the people that voted because she knew all of them, and they found out that her votes were switched with her opponents by someone on… pic.twitter.com/vW2zUg9mlo
— The SCIF (@TheSCIF) April 14, 2026
The couple subsequently filed a Superior Court petition demanding that the results of the election be voided, the touchscreen voting machine made by Sequoia be impounded, and a new election be held using paper ballots.
In the suit, the couple cited known issues with Sequoia machines, including firmware defects, bugs, hardware faults, and insecurity.
“The Sequoia AVC Advantage Direct-Recording Electronic Voting Machine utilized at this polling place was obviously not operating properly,” the petition read.
Their petition tied into broader criticism of New Jersey’s electronic voting machines by groups like the Coalition for Peace Action.
The group “filed a lawsuit in Oct. 2004 that alleged touch-screen voting machines are unconstitutional because voters cannot be assured their vote is counted as cast or recorded,” according to NJ.com.
Speaking with NJ.com, CPA chairwoman Irene Goldman called what happened in Fairfield “very fishy.”
The following month, Princeton University computer science professor Andrew Appel, an expert on Sequoia machines, was appointed an expert witness and given the task of examining the evidence in the case.
Appel discovered that the Zirkles and Henrys’ positions on the electronic ballot had been swapped, so votes for one pair went to the other. He further confirmed that most voters pressed buttons for the Zirkles, but that results showed the opposite due to the swap.
Here’s the catch: He was unable to determine who swapped the names.
“Appel was unable to determine if an unauthorized person flipped the names for [the] Democratic Executive Committee or if it was a county employee oversight while preparing the ballots,” according to NJ.com.
“Appel believes ‘an unauthorized intruder wishing to flip the election results, either through Internet access to the WinEDS (a voting software program) laptop or by physical access to the (laptop)” could swap ballot files,” the outlet reported.
Part of the reason he was unable to determine who made the swap was that critical computer files on the county Board of Elections laptop were deleted on Aug. 16 of that year — just one day before Appel’s visit — during what was described as “routine maintenance” by county employee Jason Cossaboon.
“At no time did I delete any information concerning the programming of the voting machine used in the June 7, 2011, election,” Cossaboon swore afterward.
The case became a notable example in New Jersey debates over the reliability and security of paperless direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machines like the Sequoia AVC Advantage.
It highlighted issues with programming errors, lack of verifiable paper trails, and evidence handling, but the system ultimately self-corrected through judicial intervention and a redo election.
The Zirkles, for their part, were vindicated at the ballot box in a new election held that September and assumed their positions, while calls for deeper accountability on the original mishandling largely did not lead to prosecutions or systemic changes beyond the immediate case.
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