I'm waiting for confirmation, but I'm almost positive the Tulare County "using Starlink" was for their Electronic Pollbook software, used for processing voters and handling voter registrations. Elections in California have become more complex with same-day registration, and the move from traditional voting precincts to vote centers. The software Tulare County is using, DFM EIMS, requires a real-time connection to the central California voter registration database, necessitating a networked device. I'm not familiar with the software, but it apparently uses a VPN to connect to the county/state. A VPN connection would make it impervious to tampering over an internet connection like Starlink, due to all data being encrypted across the untrusted network (if implemented correctly, with a bunch of caveats, etc). It seems natural that something like Starlink would be an obvious choice to provide temporary internet access to remote locations.