Kansas SOS Kris Kobach Combats Voter Fraud

Since taking office in 2011, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach has fought to protect the integrity of elections in Kansas.  He created a system for citizens to report instances of voter fraud:

The Kansas Secretary of State's office administers elections at the national and state level for the state of Kansas. In order to ensure that Kansas elections are among the most secure in the nation, we must safeguard our voting process. Election and voter fraud undermines the precious right of each citizen to be heard at the ballot box. Each step of the process must conform to the law, from voter registration to casting votes to counting ballots and certifying results.

To the dismay of many liberals, Sec. Kobach sought and obtained the power to actually investigate and prosecute reported instances of vote fraud:

The conservative Republican pushed for legislation last year that gave him the authority to prosecute voter fraud. Gov. Sam Brownback signed the measure last summer, making Kobach the only secretary of state in the nation with such power. 

At the time, Kobach said he had identified more than 100 potential instances of double voting, casting ballots in the same election in different jurisdictions. 

Kobach announced three voter fraud cases last October and three more in January. One of the October cases resulted in a guilty plea in December, and one was dismissed last Friday. 

Sec. Kobach rightly recognizes that prosecuting vote fraud is not a high priority for prosecutors and state attorneys general, whether through political motives or simply lack of manpower and expertise.  But vote fraud is a real problem, and prosecution is the only true deterrent:

“One of the principal reasons of exercising this prosecutorial authority is letting people know they won’t get away with it,” [Kobach] said. 

Kobach said any instance of voter fraud is serious. 

“Every time an illegal vote is cast, that effectively cancels out the vote of a legitimate voter,” he said. “In close elections, those illegal votes can alter an election.”

Thank you, Secretary Kobach, for standing up for the integrity of the voting process in Kansas and serving as an example to the rest of the country of what the chief election administrator in a state should do.