CONCORD, N.H. — New Hampshire officials said Friday that a reference to the state in documents released by the White House relates to a technology anomaly discovered and corrected during a 2023 upgrade to the state’s voter registration system.
State describes the finding as already addressed
Secretary of State David Scanlan told reporters he was surprised to see New Hampshire named in the White House materials, calling the matter "old news." He said state election staff and hired contractors identified the issue while the database was still in development and before it went into public use.
"When it occurred, we were very open about it, and it was widely reported," Scanlan said.
According to Scanlan, the state engaged a vendor to assist with coding during the upgrade. That contractor incorporated a piece of pre-built code that, under a specific condition — running on a computer identified as being in Russia — would trigger playback of the Ukrainian national anthem. Scanlan said the element was removed once it was found and that the state reviewed the software line by line during the build phase.
Context and expert perspective
Saint Anselm College politics professor Chris Galdieri told News Block that embedding hidden or novelty code snippets is not unheard of among programmers, though it carries different implications when it appears in systems tied to elections. He emphasized that the important element in this case was discovery and correction during testing.
"While it's not great that they found these sorts of things in the software, the good news is that by doing their due diligence, they found the problem and solved it before anything could happen," Galdieri said, according to the White House release and state comments.
What officials say about risk
State leaders and outside observers in New Hampshire stressed that, to date, there is no evidence presented that vote tallies were altered or that voting machines malfunctioned because of this code. Scanlan framed the episode as part of routine maintenance: the voter file needed updating because the existing software had aged, prompting the 2023 rebuild.
- Timeline: Database upgrade occurred in 2023.
- Discovery: The code was identified during pre-launch testing and removed.
- Impact: Officials report no evidence of altered votes or live-system intrusion.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Upgrade year | 2023 |
| Issue found | Pre-launch testing |
| Action taken | Code removed and lines of software reviewed |
Scanlan acknowledged that software development inevitably uncovers bugs and unexpected elements, and said his office follows careful review procedures. He said the discovery shows the value of scrutinizing code before deploying systems that manage voter information.
As the White House materials continue to be examined, New Hampshire officials are leaning on transparency and prior reporting to make clear the state’s handling of the matter — framing it as a contained software anomaly identified and fixed during the update process rather than evidence of a breach affecting election outcomes.
