Our election system is fragile. The state does provide controls to aid fairness, such as statutory authority allowing party observers during elections. But mechanisms intended to ensure fairness like observers, voter ID, adequate staff training and others are constantly tested by those wishing unfair advantage. The recent absentee ballot scandal is simply the tip of the iceberg for vote harvesters who attempt to skew results, get paid or both.
In 2016, our Election Day team received a call from one such observer in a precinct near the county line. The stationary observer witnessed a precinct judge feeding provisional ballots into the voting machine.
Our Election Day team typically consists of an attorney and a couple of experienced political observers. In the case of a presidential election, we also have a Washington attorney on board.
Arriving at the precinct, the team was allowed to perform a quick audit, revealing the count was off by about 25 votes. The chief judge was notified per protocol. Provisional ballots were indeed being fed into the machine.
The Washington attorney was informed outside the poll by witnesses who believed vote harvesters were voting people legally in Scotland County. But since they get paid for every voter they bring to the poll, they simply load people back up and take the voter across the county line to vote again.
The vote harvester doesn’t care that the voter will not show up on the voter roll at the next precinct and must cast a provisional ballot. The vote harvester gets paid simply for bringing a voter to the poll. Multiple visits means multiple pay.
If the poll feeds the provisional ballot through the machine, all the better. The harvester got paid twice for the same voter and the vote counted twice as well.
It was before 9 a.m. and the vote count was already off by 25. Without observers, how far off would it had been by the end of the day? Who would have known?
Some precincts welcome observers. Some precincts hate it. If they hate it, that’s a sign something is wrong in the poll. But there are other ways to throw an election despite observers or rogue poll workers.
Campaigns pull lists of voters who vote regularly. Vote harvesters gather names of voters who do not vote. Harvesters then presumably vote those names. They get paid more than once for hauling the same voter. If the real voter shows up later, the real voter will be forced to cast a provisional ballot. Finding the fake voter is difficult without voter ID.
Vote harvesters also sometimes request ballots for nursing home residents. Have you checked to see if a loved one’s vote was cast without their knowledge?
After an election, those provisional ballots are supposed to be unopened while someone sitting in an office determines if it’s a valid voter. An elections worker is left alone in a room researching these ballots. What could go wrong?
In the recent judicial race there were complaints provisional ballot envelopes appeared unsealed when they were brought into the room. It’s important to find out if this is true as provisional and absentee ballots decided that race and are the most unsecure forms of voting.
More people vote in Robeson than are even registered in Bladen. So fraud has more impact here and no one should pretend that candidates from only one party have sinners in their ranks.
Election fragility is a bipartisan concern. Typically, the shady activity is Democrat on Democrat crime hurting Democrats more so in a Democratic county. And sometimes local Republicans have had to fight with state Republicans to ensure the right thing is done for Robeson regarding these issues. But if you follow the media, you’d think Republicans have been in charge for 100 years using shady methods.
The issue is pervasive for both parties. Both parties should work together to fix it.
