Security of the ballot requires that once cast a ballot cannot be tracked back to the person who cast it. In all jurisdictions I know of, that is done by the ballot stub. It bears an identifying number that matches to the voter it was issued to. Once the stub is removed, the ballot is no longer individually identifiable. That happens just before the ballot is sent through the reader for in person voting, and when the mailed ballot (sealed in an envelope) is checked for things like identification and the envelopes are sent for batch processing. I don't remember the mechanics, but there is a similar mechanism to protect ballot secrecy with touch screen ballot stations.

🤔

If Republicans have learned anything over the last couple of years it's that they, for the most part, can largely ignore rules and laws, especially now when they control almost everything.
On paper there is no way they can throw out those 60k votes. But they likely will anyway because who is going to tell them they can't? The NCSC is in their pocket. They control the legislature. Even if Democrats wanted to sue, who would they sue?

The thing that has either been missed or just ignored is that after Friday there is nothing that can stop them. There is no accountability . No guardrails. Nothing. The fatal flaw in our system of government is the assumption that everyone will follow the rules and there is no mechanism to stop anyone that doesn't if they are already in control of the government.