Recount Likely in PA Special Election Amid Allegations of Irregularities

Yesterday's much-publicized special election in Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district remains close, with the Democrat Conor Lamb leading Republican Rick Saccone by just 627 votes out of over 228,000 cast.  A recount is expected:

A source familiar with the next steps said Republican attorneys are planning to go to court Wednesday to demand the impounding of all ballots and machines that were used Tuesday night in all counties, as they plan for a possible recount.

There are allegations of irregularities with the voting machines and with absentee ballot processing:

Republicans plan to probe allegations that touch screen machines in Allegheny County were not properly calibrated and could have possibly registered votes for Lamb when the voter intended to vote for Saccone. 

These attorneys also plan to allege that GOP attorneys were blocked from observing absentee ballots by Allegheny County election supervisors.

There are also some concerns that the newly court-drawn map for the next election caused confusion. 

Another absentee ballot processing irregularity occurred in Washington County, which originally did not plan to count its 1,195 absentee ballots until today.  It planned to hold them in a secured location overnight before distributing them back out to the election precincts to be counted and reported back to the county election board.  Then, late last night, county officials changed their minds and decided to count them last night because of the close nature of the race.

We will update readers of this blog on the status of the recount, any investigations, and any litigation resulting from this race.

ACLU Challenges CA's Signature Verification Requirement for Mail Ballots

In the latest episode of liberals turning to the courts due to opposition to election integrity protections and impatience with the legislative process, the ACLU has sued California over its signature matching requirement for mail ballots:

According to the ACLU, California’s election code requires election officials to reject vote-by-mail ballots if they believe a signature on the ballot does not match the signature on file. 

The problem lies in the lack of handwriting-analysis training for election officials, according to the petition – a problem compounded by the fact that voters whose ballots are rejected aren’t told, meaning thousands of voters are discounted without their knowledge. . . . 

[Secretary of State Alex] Padilla’s office pushed back against many of the claims made in the petition, saying that California has one of the lowest vote-by-mail rejection rates in the nation. . . . 

The petitioners want a judge to declare the specific elections statute unconstitutional while declaring that a ballot may be discarded on the basis of a signature mismatch only if the voter is notified first.

Signature verification is a vital protection for the integrity of mail ballots, particularly in a state like California with no accompanying voter ID requirement, extremely messy voter rolls, problems with deceased persons voting, and problems with mailing a large number of ballots to one address.  California needs reform of its mail ballot process.  

Providing notice to voters whose ballots are disqualified due to mismatched signatures is a good policy -- both to provide notice to voters that someone has fraudulently voted in their names and to allow voters whose ballots were incorrectly disqualified the opportunity for their votes to be counted -- but it is a policy decision that should be made by the people's elected representatives, not by unelected judges prodded by liberal activists not willing to go through the deliberative process to enact a new law.  It should be considered with other reforms as California's mail-in ballot system is a mess and the legislature should work together in a bipartisan process to fix it.  

ICYMI: Massive Mail Ballot Fraud Alleged in West Dallas

For the past month, officials have been investigating allegations of mail ballot fraud on a massive scale in a municipal election in West Dallas, Texas.  700 suspicious ballots have been sequestered, and prosecutors are asking a just to sequester all mail-in ballots submitted in the runoff election next week.  

This appears to be a broad scheme to steal the election, though by whom has yet to be uncovered.  700 votes can easily change the outcome of many municipal elections.

The first arrest warrant was issued today:

Miguel Hernandez, 27, of Dallas, is wanted on a charge of illegal voting, a third-degree felony. He is accused of visiting a woman around April 10 and collecting her blank absentee ballot, then filling it out and forging her signature on it before mailing it to the county, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.

Hernandez's alleged actions were part of a massive effort to defraud senior citizens of their votes by requesting and then collecting blank mail-in ballots:

During the weeks leading up to the elections, dozens of senior citizens in West Dallas and Grand Prairie filed complaints saying they had received mail-in ballots that they had not requested. Some of them had also been told their mail-in ballot applications said they had been assisted by a "Jose Rodriguez," a man they didn't know. . . .  

According to the affidavit, a voter who had complained that her application listed "Jose Rodriguez" told investigators that she had placed a blank ballot in a white envelope and put that inside a "carrier envelope," before giving it to the man who said he would "ostensibly" give it to the elections department.  

When she handed her ballot over, she hadn't signed her voter signature or that anyone had assisted her, she told investigators. But authorities showed her the one that the elections office had received, which showed both lines signed.

The problems that have been alleged in West Dallas are indicative of how easily mail ballots can be manipulated and fraudulently voted.  Sadly, the vulnerable populations, like senior citizens, that rely most heavily on mail ballots are the ones disenfranchised by such fraud.   

We hope that the Presidential Commission on Election Integrity can bring to light more cases like this and develop recommendations for ensuring that senior citizens and others are not disenfranchised through mail ballot fraud.

Sessions' "Racist" Vote Fraud Prosecution Was to Protect Black Voters' Voting Rights

Liberals, particularly the NAACP, in the past few weeks have repeated the claim that Sen. Jeff Sessions is a racist based on his 1985 prosecution of civil rights activists for absentee ballot vote fraud.  

What are the facts and legal history of that case?  Then-U.S. Attorney Sessions was acting pursuant to a complaint brought by African-American candidates who believed that their African-American supporters' votes were being stolen or altered to steal the election away from them.  He prosecuted after a grand jury indictment, with the assistance and oversight of the Department of Justice, and evidence of the stealing of African-Americans' votes was presented at trial. He was upholding his duty as a federal prosecutor to prosecute violations of the law for which there is sufficient evidence to believe a conviction may be achieved; it was not a malicious prosecution on racist grounds:

“No federal prosecutor faced with the evidence seen by the grand jury would have failed to take the case and go forward with the prosecution,” [former head of the Election Crimes Unit inside the Department of Justice’s Public Integrity Section Craig] Donsanto told me. “The evidence in the case was overwhelming. I was there with the other assistant U.S. attorneys and not one dissented — everyone thought it was a solid case. I told Jeff Sessions to go forward with the case.” . . . 

Donsanto is highly offended by any claims that the prosecution was racist. The federal prosecutors were “trying to protect black voters who were having their votes stolen,” he notes. Moreover, the investigation was initiated only after local black voters and candidates complained to the Justice Department. When asked about the fact that a jury found the defendants not guilty, Donsanto says that as a former federal prosecutor, he respects the jury system. . . .  

In Perry County, Jeff Sessions and the other Justice Department lawyers were trying to protect black voters from having their right to vote stolen — a precious right that those voters had fought very hard to obtain during the civil rights battles of the 1950s and 1960s. Unfortunately, a jury let the defendants off despite the evidence in the case, including testimony from black residents of the county about how their ballots had been altered and changed without their permission. And that is the real tragedy of this case. 

As Craig Donsanto says, this was a prosecution intended to preserve and protect the right to vote, something to which he dedicated his entire professional career. Anyone who claims this was a racist prosecution by Jeff Sessions is, according to Donsanto, “a liar and a political opportunist of the worst kind.”

Similarly, the Public Interest Legal Foundation pointed out five important ways in which former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick had distorted the facts and history of the case in his opposition letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee:

Mr. Patrick misleads readers to believe the ‘Perry County Three’ in Alabama were prosecuted by Mr. Sessions for ‘assisting’ voters. They weren’t. 

Prosecuting voter fraud is not itself an act of voter intimidation. 

Mr. Sessions was not a rogue prosecutor – he acted with oversight from multiple DOJ offices. 

If Sessions’ advancement of the case was as faulty as Patrick alludes, why did the Court refuse to acquit the defendants from the outset? 

Patrick fails to remind Congress that the defendants offered to enter guilty pleas for the misdemeanor election crimes.

Unfortunately, the facts of the case will not prevent liberals from using it as a basis to call Sen. Sessions a racist, despite all evidence to the contrary.  We can only hope that the American people will see through this name-calling and learn about the actual history of the Perry County absentee ballot fraud prosecution. 

Florida Vote Fraud: A Case Study of the Need for Open, Fair and Honest Elections

The Republican National Lawyers Association (RNLA) fights for open, fair and honest elections. 

A prime example of the need for this is what is going on right now in Florida. Let us explain.

Open Elections

The Broward County Supervisor of Elections “engaged in ongoing violations of Florida law governing the canvassing of vote-by-mail ballots [absentee ballots]. [T]ens of thousands of vote-by-mail ballots in Broward County are being opened by your staff: (1) before they have been canvassed by the county canvassing board; and (2) without providing the public the opportunity to review or file a protest against the canvass of a ballot believed to be legally deficient. These illegal actions must stop immediately.”  [Letter from the Republican Party of Florida to the Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes, Nov. 2, 2016.]

Under pressure and possible legal action, Snipes is now opening the processing a little bit but not enough.  An RNLA member was key to shining sunlight on this process.  

How can there be confidence in the system when one election official is counting ballots illegally behind closed doors? 

Fair Elections

Election officials in Florida have already been caught committing vote fraud. 

Gladys Coego, 74, a temporary Election Support Specialist for the Miami-Dade Elections Department tasked with opening mail-in ballots and scanning them into the machine, is accused of marking ballot choices that were originally left blank, according to CBS4 News partner The Miami Herald. . . . In a second arrest, police said Tomika Curgil, 33, filled out voter-registration forms for five citizens without their consent and submitted at least 17 forms for people believed to not exist, including several who are dead.  

Honest Elections

Vote Fraud has already disenfranchised Florida voters. 

By mid-October, Susan Halperin became concerned that she and her husband hadn't received their absentee ballots in the mail.  So Lawrence Halperin called the Seminole County Supervisor of Elections Office to find out what was going on. He was stunned to learn their ballots had already been cast. Someone had stolen the Halperins' ballots, faked their signatures and voted. . . .Supervisor of Elections Mike Ertel said they were among five voters in three homes in Spring Valley whose absentee ballots were stolen and then fraudulently submitted with votes cast by someone else. 

No one thinks these are the only cases; just the only ones who got caught.  Why does this matter?  Every fraudulent vote overrides a legitimate, real vote and disenfranchises an honest, eligible voter. 

Florida is just one state but it shows the need for open, fair and honest elections.  The RNLA seeks to promote open, fair and honest elections at all levels of American society in a non-discriminatory manner and to provide access to the polls to all qualified and eligible voters. Through its efforts, the RNLA strives to strengthen the faith and confidence of all citizens of the United States in their government and the electoral process.

Democrats Fighting for Zombies, While Republicans Try to Protect the Living

There are problems with the dead registering in Virginia and voting in Colorado and California.  The most common way that the dead are fraudulently "voting" is via absentee ballot.  It is hard for zombies to actually get the polls.  The respective parties could not take a more radically different approach. 

Republicans like those in Virginia have proposed making absentee ballots less susceptible to fraud by measures such as 2015’s HB1318, which stated:

Applications for absentee ballots; photo identification required. Requires that any voter submitting his application for an absentee ballot by mail or by electronic or telephonic transmission to a facsimile device shall submit with his application a copy of one of the forms of identification acceptable under current law. The bill exempts from this requirement military and overseas voters and persons with a disability. Currently, only a voter who completes his application for an absentee ballot in person is required to show a form of identification.

This was vetoed by former DNC Chair and friend of the Clinton’s, Governor Terry McAuliffe. 

Democrats on other side continue in their efforts to bring chaos and discord to the election process regarding absentee ballots.  As the nonpartisan Lawyers Democracy Fund describes it:

The Tampa Bay Times reports that the Democratic Party has filed a lawsuit against Florida on equal protection grounds to remove a key integrity check of Florida’s mail voting process. The signature review requires a comparison of the mail ballot signature and the registration signature on file by the Florida Supervisor of Elections. If the signatures do not match, the ballot is rejected. The plaintiffs seek a last minute judicially created cure period for only some of these non-signature match voters because the truly absent voters or military overseas voters would not have an opportunity to update their signature. The lawsuit comes less than 35 days prior to the November 8 Presidential Election with millions of ballots already being mailed to voters. The current mail ballot rules have been in place for years, and mail ballots have already been sent to tens of thousands of overseas and military voters.  Absentee or mail balloting is already vulnerable to fraud and abuse without an ID requirement. Removing one of the key integrity measures increases the likelihood of potential fraud.  

So in a nutshell, the Democrats are supporting efforts to disenfranchise legal voters through vote fraud; Democrats are trying to take away even the few safeguards there are for absentee ballots.  Zombies or the dead are not a protected class under the Constitution and should not have their votes counted. 

More Potential Vote Fraud in Florida

This past week, three courts rolled back common sense voter ID requirements while allegations of vote fraud continue to surface in advance of November’s Presidential Election. The most recent example is occurring in the battleground state of Florida.

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is reviewing allegations that fraudulent mail-in ballot requests have been submitted in Palm Beach County for the upcoming primaries, agency spokeswoman Gretl Plessinger said Friday.

County Commissioner Priscilla Taylor, who is running for re-election, is accusing her opponent, former State Rep. Mack Bernard, of submitting false requests for mail-in ballots. In Florida, voters can ask to submit their ballots by mail, rather than voting in person.

Unfortunately Florida has a long history of such problems.  

Ballot brokering has been an ongoing issue in Miami-Dade County. For a fee, operatives known in Spanish as "boleteros," canvass neighborhoods to collect absentee ballots. Some have crossed the line by filling out the ballots for voters.

Fraud issues have plagued the primaries and many other elections this year, and yet, the left and media continues to willfully ignore it.  Fraudsters continue to get more creative in their methods which makes the case not only for Voter ID laws but also indicates a need for an updated process for absentee balloting. In the greatest democracy in the world, election integrity should never be in question or left to chance. 

ICYMI: How Voter ID Can Stop Absentee Voter Fraud

Vote fraud deniers often criticize voter ID saying it does not address absentee ballot fraud.  Heritage scholar Hans Von Spakovsky has a great comeback based on Kansas’s law:

An excellent model would be Kansas’ voter identification law. Under the Kansas S.A.F.E. Act, voters must provide photographic identification to vote at the polls. A few of the accepted forms of identification include driver’s licenses, state identification cards, U.S. passports, student ID’s, and concealed hand gun licenses.

To vote absentee, one must include a copy of an accepted form of photo identification, or provide a full Kansas driver’s license or nondriver ID number when requesting the absentee ballot or returning the voted ballot.

Voter ID is a great tool to stop all kinds of vote fraud.  Maybe this is one of the reasons it is so popular.    

Vote Fraud Consequences, Those Elected by it Should Resign

The argument that vote fraud does not matter is no longer credible as, most famously, vote fraud allowed Obamacare to pass.  The most recent example is in Alabama. 

A Houston County woman was found guilty Wednesday of 24 counts of voter fraud for promoting illegal absentee voting, according to the Dothan Eagle.

Olivia Reynolds, 66, was convicted after the jury deliberated for a mere hour.

Reynolds was arrested in May 2014 after an investigation into a 2013 county election she worked revealed evidence of voter fraud.

In the August election, Commissioner Amos Newsome, for whom Reynolds worked, beat challenger Lamesa Danzey by 14 votes. Newsome received 119 of the 124 absentee votes that were cast, but Danzey received more votes than Newsome at the polls, prompting the closer look.

The effect of vote fraud is real, as Mr. Newsome’s fellow commissioners have called on him to resign for the integrity and legitimacy of the process. 

 “It’s obvious to me now, whether Newsome knew or not, that a substantial number of absentee ballots that were counted in his favor are in fact, invalid. As a result, Commissioner Newsome has to go,” Ferguson said Friday.

“I think it would be the right thing to do, not only for the voters and the citizens, but also for those who have already been convicted,” Kenward said. “I think it would be the best course of action for everybody.”

“Three words – integrity, integrity, integrity,” Dorsey said. “I ran a clean race and there were rules and, you know, I had to abide by them. We have to have integrity on the commission as a whole to serve the people.”

“I am concerned about the sanctity of the election process. If there were illegal votes cast, then Mr. Newsome should consider stepping aside,” Baxley said.

Vote fraud matters as the commissioners of Dothan are saying. 

What Happens When Everyone Works Together to Stop Vote Fraud

What happens when you have a vote fraud hotline, a sheriff interested in investigating vote fraud, and a State’s attorney willing to prosecute vote fraud?  Results.  Vote fraud is found and hopefully deterred in the future. 

A Centreville woman faces vote-fraud charges that accuse her of improperly marking an absentee ballot and perjury charges for allegedly making a false statement.

The tip came into the Voter Integrity Hotline. It was investigated by the St. Clair County Sheriff’s Department.

“We follow up on any complaint we get out of the Voter Integrity Hotline, then we make our case,” said Sheriff Rick Watson.

This is not the first case either.  Because of the work of all three groups (the Hotline, the Sheriff and the State’s Attorney), vote fraud in the future in this part of Illinois may be stopped.  Unlike most of the country, at a minimum, vote fraudsters will know they are in danger of being prosecuted.  As the State’s Attorney has said:

Kelly has said that he believes defendants convicted multiple times of vote fraud should face mandatory jail time.

While this may not seem like a big deal, this is actually a very strong stance compared to other places in the country where they threaten the police for even investigating vote fraud.  When everyone (the public, the police, and prosecutors) are committed to fair and honest elections, everyone wins, except those who commit vote fraud.   

ICYMI: What Happens When You Have a Voter Integrity Task Force

On May 8, the Belleville, Illinois News Democrat reported:

A newly-elected Alorton trustee and a Cahokia man were charged Friday afternoon with four counts of vote fraud stemming from the April 7 election.

This was uncovered because of the work of the Sheriff and the “Voter Integrity Task Force of the County Clerk.”  This is unusual and something the left very much opposes.  Yet is it is working:

“The voter integrity hotline we established continues to be working. It is generating very intense oversight from federal state and local law enforcement,” County Clerk Tom Holbrook said.

“In America, we have free and open elections. I believe in that. I believe in the Constitution,” Sheriff Rick Watson said. “If you want to insult a veteran, cheat in an election — the very thing they fought for.”

This case makes seven vote fraud charges filed by Kelly since 2012:

Kudos to those in Illinois for working to stop vote fraud and to Sheriff Watson for speaking so eloquently on the matter.  We have no doubt much more vote fraud would be uncovered if more task forces were formed.  

Did John Lewis Admit that Liberals are Lying on Early Voting?

It is the mantra of the left and Democrats that early and expanded absentee voting increases turnout, especially for minorities.  Well, at least publicly that is the mantra.  The reality is Democrats know that this is not true.  Don’t take our word for it; take the word of eight liberal House Democrats including 1960s civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis of Georgia who wrote in a letter to the Government Accounting Office:

Some federal, state, and local governments have attempted to make voting easier by expanding early and absentee voting. Despite these efforts, GAO reported in 2012 that there is limited evidence to show that these interventions increased turnout overall or among groups that historically had lower levels of turnout.

In other words, early voting does not hurt turnout among minorities.  Everyone who has studied the issue knows this but it is very significant that in addition to Lewis a number of leading minority Democrats’ signed this leader such as ranking Oversight and Government Reform Member Elijah Cummings and Rep. Danny Davis who voted against counting the electoral votes in Ohio for President George W. Bush in 2004.  The eight Democrats made this statement on a letter on voting technology to the GAO on March 4 of this year. 

The signers of this letter are among the most partisan members of the House unlike other Democrat early voting opponents such as the Democrat Secretary of State of New Hampshire Bill Gardner. 

This is further proof that the efforts by the left to cry racism and vote suppression in regards to efforts to oppose increased absentee or early voting are, at best, merely a partisan ploy.  Of course, at worse expanded absentee and early voting makes vote fraud easier. 

Regardless, expanding early voting and absentee voting needs to stop as even a 1960s civil rights leader such as Congressman John Lewis admits that early voting does not increase turnout for minorities.  

Cautionary Tale: Alabama Woman Pleads Guilty to Absentee Fraud

Yesterday, an Alabama woman plead guilty to eight counts of falsifying absentee ballot applications in a 2013 City Commissioner's race. Janice Lee Hart was one of three individuals charged in the voter fraud scheme that resulted in the re-election of the sitting Dothan, Alabama commissioner Amos Newsome. Newsome's girlfriend was also allegedly involved in orchestrating the effort. 

We know voter fraud, particularly in absentee voting, is very hard to detect without proper safeguards like voter ID and proper voter registration list maintenance so how did officials uncover the scheme? Perhaps it was because the candidate implicated in the fraud won by only 14 votes yet somehow managed to win 119 of 124 of the absentee ballots cast in the race. That obviously raised a few eyebrows and led to an investigation which uncovered the illegal activity. 

This is a cautionary tale to states who look to exclusive vote-by-mail states like Colorado, Oregon, and Washington as the future. It is very difficult to detect absentee voter fraud. In this instance, there simply weren't many ballots cast and the fact that in such a close election the absentee votes were so inexplicably lopsided in favor of one candidate made further investigation a no brainer. How does one detect similar schemes when there are millions of votes cast in a close race? Most of the time it is impossible. In this instance, the criminals were too stupid to realize the fraud would be obvious but that will not always be the case.

While better than nothing, RNLA does not believe that minimal safeguards like comparing a voter's signature on the absentee ballot application materials with that in the voter file is enough to deter and detect fraudsters from trying to sway a close election. And right now there isn't much to deter people from trying. Most states have little to no absentee voting ID requirement beyond the minimum imposed in HAVA and state and local law enforcement resources are not there to properly investigate claims of voter fraud. It is simply not a priority. (And we know Holder's DOJ has obviously shown no interest in going after voter fraud.)

States need to resist the seduction of vote-by-mail. 

Why the Use of Provisional Ballots is Important

In the 2004 election, there were allegations that supporters of John Kerry for President in Ohio at a few ballot locations were handing out flyers to voters leaving predominantly Democrat polling places AFTER voting stating: “If you feel you vote did not count, please go to one of the following places and vote provisionally.” 

As President George W. Bush won Ohio, little follow up was done to corroborate these reports or allegations.  President Bush had no desire to talk about a Presidential election after a clearly victory.  Meanwhile some supporters of Senator Kerry were yelling to fight after election day over the large number of provisional ballots.  The Kerry campaign resisted this. 

However, that tactic may not have been forgotten. 

At least 26 voters from one Ohio county cast two ballots in the November election, but no extra votes were actually counted.

Hamilton County elections officials say they caught the double votes and are investigating why they happened. If voters intentionally cast more than one ballot, they will be referred to prosecutors for possible criminal prosecution.

Two brief comments on this. 

1. While we don’t know for sure what happened yet, election officials may be focusing on the wrong place.  Most of the above voters were elderly who cast absentee and provisional ballots, a follow up question may be: Why did they do this?  Were they encouraged to do so like in the 2004 allegations?  Were they taken advantage of by unscrupulous political operatives?  We have seen this with vote solicitors encouraging ineligible felons to vote in the past. 

2.  After Democrats in Congress supported the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) which mandated states use provisional ballots, a few liberal advocacy groups have been staunchly opposed to this practice. They have called for everything short of completely eliminating the use of provisional ballots.  Prior to the existence of provisional ballots, most of these votes would have counted and there is nothing that could have been done about it. 

"The system worked the way it should," said Tim Burke, chairman of the Board of Elections and leader of the county's Democratic Party. "The appropriate number of votes were counted. Whether these particular voters acted properly, they did not impact the election because only one vote was counted."

If opponents of provisional ballots had their way, the system would not have worked. The truth is provisional voting in these instances offers a practical compromise between protecting the integrity of the ballot and preventing fraud while affording accessibility and that voters aren't turned away. 

Early Voting Should be the Exception, Not the Rule

Early voting and absentee ballots have become more commonplace nowadays, and that might not be a good thing. As John Fund writes in the National Review, a Sun-Sentinel article in Florida – where there is an intense battle for governor – entitled “People Who Vote Before Election Could Decide Outcome of Governor’s Race” ran over the weekend.

As John Fund explains,

In Florida, a third of the electorate will vote by mail, a third will vote early by going to a voting center, and a third will cast their ballots on Election Day. Nationwide, some 2 million people have already voted, even though scheduled debates haven’t even finished in many states. We are seeing an early-voting craze: In 35 states, people can vote early without having to give an excuse for missing Election Day. That’s up from 20 states just over a decade ago. Half the states also allow no-excuse absentee-ballot voting by mail. Oregon, Washington, and Colorado have abolished the traditional polling place; in those states almost everyone votes by mail.

Fund continues to explain that this expansion isn’t just bad election practices, but it might even violate the Constitution,

The notion of Election Day isn’t just a tradition; it’s in the Constitution. Article II, Section 1 states that “Congress may determine the Time of choosing the Electors, and the Day on which they shall give their votes; which day shall be the same throughout the United States.” Congress codified this requirement in 1872 by setting a uniform presidential election date.

J. Christian Adams also weighed in on the transition to early voting, and opined that while the government’s butchered response to Ebola has become an important issue in this election, many voices – and votes – will not have a chance to speak to this because they have already spoken.

Adams states,

This is the one of the serious problems with early voting — voters making dumb or uninformed decisions about fast-moving events.  If you voted weeks ago, you voted before the administration’s bungling of the Ebola problem became conventional wisdom. The list of congressional leaders calling for a travel ban continues to grow.  Yet the Obama administration continues to oppose it for some frighteningly outlandish reasons.

While Ebola is a recent epidemic and issue, Adams saw this as an issue way back in February and even then, realized early voting has the potential for problems.  He wrote an article in the Washington Times about eight reasons to stop early voting. Those eight reasons were:

First, early voting produces less-informed voters. After they cast an early ballot, they check out of the national debate. They won’t care about the televised debates, won’t consider options, and won’t fully participate in the political process. […] Second, early voting is extremely expensive. When election officials drag out an election for weeks, that means more poll workers, more broken machines, more salaries, more costs, more everything. […] Third, early voting is a solution in search of a problem. Those who claim America is plagued by long lines on Election Day aren’t being honest. MIT conducted a study of the 2012 presidential election and found that the average wait in line to vote was 14 minutes. […] Fourth, early voting puts more money into politics. Campaigns will be more expensive and complicated. [...] Fifth, fewer election observers means more voter fraud. Election observers in open polls are an essential tool to ensure that the democratic process functions cleanly. […] Sixth, the most toxic part of early voting is that it increases American political polarization. It rewards those who are the most extreme. Early voting is a subsidy to those most stubbornly committed to one party. […] Seventh, early voting doesn’t increase turnout. Studies have shown that states that adopt early voting have no empirical turnout increase. Finally, early voting destroys one of America’s last surviving common cultural experiences — turning out as a single nation on a single day to elect our leaders.

After an examination of the facts, it is clear the early voting should go back to being the exception in voting, not the rule it has become in recent years.

Former Police Chief Pleads Guilty to Vote Fraud

Richard Toney, the former police chief of a small township in western Pennsylvania, Harmar Township, has pled guilty to violating federal election laws and soliciting absentee ballots in an effort to benefit his wife and her running mate.

While Toney has officially retired from his police chief position since this event, he was still officer-in-charge of police in 2009, when he committed the violations.  Federal prosecutors assert that in 2009, Toney sought absentee ballots for his wife Kim and her running mate in the Democratic primary for Harmar Township supervisor.  

Richard Toney allegedly applied for absentee ballots and then had them filled out by people who should not have filled them out, because they were not going to be absent for the primary.   

The soliciting of the ballots had a profound impact on the primary – prior to absentee ballots being counted, no one had a clear majority.  Kim Toney and one opponent won the top two slots, but after 50 absentee ballots were counted, Kim and her running mate prevailed and won the general election, including two seats on the five-member board that runs Harmar Township.

Neither Kim Toney nor her running mate, Jerry Chalmers, have been accused of any wrongdoing.  

Toney entered into a plea agreement with federal prosecutors that landed him three years of probation. 

Politics is Triumphing Over "Common" Vote Fraud Problem

The Miami-Dade Police Benevolence Association is sick of vote fraud in Florida and is going to do something about it, offer a reward. 

“We decided to do this because absentee ballot fraud has been in this community for years and nothing has happened,” said Blanca Torrents Greenwood, executive director of the group. “We thought, let’s do this to see if we get results.”

The problem is so bad that it is considered “common” in Miami, and the article lists a number of incidents including a key staffer to a US Congressman.  The best quote in the article addresses something that the “vote-fraud deniers” have used for years to deny vote fraud.  To them, vote fraud only exists when there is a felony conviction. Yet the common fraud problem in Miami rarely results in that kind of conviction.

Absentee ballot fraud is a felony in Florida, but in Miami offenders often end up with only probation or little jail time, although violations have proven common in recent years.

Thus, the left denies there is even a problem in Florida.  What’s worse is, nationally liberals even attack those as racist who try to fix the problem, or ask the police to be prosecuted for vote fraud for even investigating. 

The left’s circular logic, while dishonest is working.

“I don’t know if there is problem related with the state attorney’s office, laws (in place), or if it is about evidence, but I know politics has a lot to do with this,” she [Greenwood] said.

Thanks to the Police Benevolence Association for trying to fight vote fraud.  

Vote Fraud “Likely Gone on Here for Years” in Alabama

An Alabama grand jury indicted the girlfriend of Dothan commissioner Amos Newsome on 23 counts of vote fraud in the campaign to re-elect Newsome last August. After absentee ballots favored Newsome by a 119-5 margin, his opponent filed a complaint, because Newsome won by only 14 votes. Prompted by the wide discrepancy, the county sheriff conducted a thorough investigation over several weeks, interviewing more than 100 witnesses.

The alleged vote fraud scheme includes two additional women besides Newsom’s girlfriend. The first woman is charged with 20 counts of vote fraud, the second is charged with 10 counts.

Sheriff Andy Hughes says that, “voter fraud has likely gone on here for years, usually in the same districts.”

The three women are charged under a state statute that criminalizes changing absentee ballot votes of another, voting more than once by absentee ballot in the same election, voting on behalf of another, and soliciting illegal absentee voting. Furthermore, “Any person who willfully aids any person unlawfully to vote an absentee ballot, any person who knowingly and unlawfully votes an absentee ballot, and any voter who votes both an absentee and a regular ballot at any election shall be similarly punished.”

Vote Fraud “Happens All The Time” in South Texas

A Texas judge has invalidated a city commissioner election as the result of vote fraud. The judge called for a new election after, “Lupe Rivera won the election against Letty Lopez by 16 votes.” Lopez contested the results of the November 2013 election and claimed that 44 votes were illegally cast.

The judge carefully evaluated each of the 44 contested votes individually. Many of the votes were cast by people who deliberately, illegally registered under a “home is where the heart is” residency standard. These individuals registered at homes belonging to Rivera’s friends, neighbors, and relatives, including several at Rivera’s childhood address. Other ballots were disqualified because legal voters testified in court that they had not voted in the election, despite the existence of ballots cast in their names. Additionally, there were questions surrounding the validity of some of the absentee ballots.

At the end of the investigation, Rivera led by only two votes. As a result of the tremendous confusion and uncertainty created by the contested ballots, the judge refused to declare a winner and ordered a new election.

This is not the only current instance of vote fraud in Westlaco. Earlier this month, a 72-year-old former campaign worker pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to one count of vote-buying.

Letty Lopez’s attorney said the fraud he found in this case isn’t unique. “It’s not unusual at all. . . . I’ve had calls from other people with similar issues, and I think it happens all the time here.”

More Vote Fraud in Ohio, More Voters Disenfranchised

Hamilton County Ohio is finding more people who committed vote fraud. 

Two more people were indicted today on charges of illegal voting, bringing the total of indicted voters in Hamilton County to eight.

One of those indicted today - Ellen Elizabeth Duncan of Avondale - was a poll worker at the Urban League offices on Reading Road. She is accused of voting by absentee ballot and in person at last fall's election.

The other, Timothy Merman of Fairfax, is accused of using a Fairfax business address as his residence when voting in 2012. Prosecutors say Merman actually lived in Kentucky at the time.

Hamilton County has a long history of vote fraud problems.  Take 2008 for example.

In Hamilton County, near Cincinnati, there is overwhelming evidence that fraudulent votes have already been cast during the week when voters could register and cast their ballot on the same day. Attorney Mike O'Neill has been appointed to investigate 41 percent of the 610 ballots that were subpoenaed by Hamilton County Prosecutor Joseph Deters. Deters stepped down from the case amid controversy over his Republican Party affiliations.  Assistant County Prosecutor for the Board of Elections Dave Stevens said, "We should be able to resolve some of these fraudulent votes before the election, but my guess is there are over 100 illegal votes in the system already and they will not be taken care of until after the election."

The only difference is now they are doing something about it.  However the problem remains that people who voted legally were disenfranchised as a result of the double voting.  Unlike the fail-safe of provisional ballots which allows voters who were wrongly removed from the voting rolls to still have their vote counted, there is no remedy for the voters who have been disenfranchised as a result of these crimes.