The “compasso” case
Consecutive votes (one after the other), with the same time. The same beat, the same “compasso”.
The two patterns added together
These are two ways of measuring each voter’s time: from the recorded vote to the next recorded vote, and from the voter ID typed in to the next voter ID typed in. Each vote goes into a single count.
When a vote is already in a vote to vote run, it is taken out of the voter ID to voter ID count. The vote right after it is taken out too, because that vote’s time passes through a vote already counted. That is why they can be added: no vote is counted twice.
On the scale
On one side, the votes in runs, with the two patterns added together. On the other, the difference in votes between the two presidential candidates, across all of Brazil, from each voting machine’s poll tape.
The voting machine’s log says when each voter voted, not for whom.
From vote to vote
Each voting machine records, second by second, every step of the voting. In many voting machines, several consecutive votes were recorded with exactly the same time between one and the next. Here is how many times this happened, how many times coincidence would give and, for each voting machine, the lines of the official TSE file for you to check.
What the “compasso” is
Each voter’s time begins when the poll worker types in their voter ID and ends when the voting machine records the vote. In between, the voter votes for every office.
- Voter ID typed in
- Deputy
- Governor
- Senator
- President
- Vote recorded
Then comes the next voter. The time of each vote runs from the previous recorded vote up to it. When that time repeats, second by second, vote after vote, the votes are in the same beat.
- 13:49:56previous vote
- 64 s13:51:001st vote
- 64 s13:52:042nd vote
- 64 s13:53:083rd vote
- 64 s13:54:124th vote
- 64 s13:55:165th vote
Real example: São Paulo (SP), zone 372, polling section 738, 1st round. Five consecutive votes with the same time: each one recorded 64 seconds after the previous one. The voting machine’s clock marks whole seconds.
Two consecutive votes with the same time happen by coincidence all the time. The question is how many times this shows up with 3, 4, 5 or more.
Consecutive votes with the same time, across all of Brazil
The vote is secret: the voting machine’s log does not say who each vote in a run went to. That is why, below each row, are the votes for president of the whole voting machine, added up across all the voting machines in that row, from each polling section’s poll tape (boletim de urna). The candidates’ percentage is over the valid votes, as the TSE counts; that of blank and void, over all votes.
In the same voting machine, on the same day
Here each size counts only itself: “3 votes” are exactly 3 consecutive votes with the same time. Each number is the number of voting machines in which that happened once, twice, three times in the day.
The same voting machine also had different sizes on the same day (for example, once 2, once 3 and once 4).