Explore Voting & Elections in the United States of America: Election Fraud

Allegations of election-related fraud make for enticing press. Many Americans remember vivid stories of voting improprieties in Chicagoland, or the suspiciously sudden appearance of LBJ's [former president Lyndon B. Johnson's] alphabetized ballot box in Texas, or Governor Earl Long's quip: "When I die, I want to be buried in Louisiana, so I can stay active in politics." Voter fraud, in particular, has the feel of a bank heist caper: roundly condemned but technically fascinating, and sufficiently lurid to grab and hold headlines.

Perhaps because these stories are dramatic, voter fraud makes a popular scapegoat. In the aftermath of a close election, losing candidates are often quick to blame voter fraud for the results. Legislators cite voter fraud as justification for various new restrictions on the exercise of the franchise. And pundits trot out the same few anecdotes time and again as proof that a wave of fraud is imminent.

Allegations of widespread voter fraud, however, often prove greatly exaggerated. It is easy to grab headlines with a lurid claim ("Tens of thousands may be voting illegally!"); the follow-up—when any exists—is not usually deemed newsworthy. Yet on closer examination, many of the claims of voter fraud amount to a great deal of smoke without much fire. The allegations simply do not pan out.

These inflated claims are not harmless. Crying "wolf" when the allegations are unsubstantiated distracts attention from real problems that need real solutions. If we can move beyond the fixation on voter fraud, we will be able to focus on the real changes our elections need, from universal registration all the way down to sufficient parking at the poll site.

Moreover, these claims of voter fraud are frequently used to justify policies that do not solve the alleged wrongs, but that could well disenfranchise legitimate voters. Overly restrictive identification requirements for voters at the polls—which address a sort of voter fraud more rare than death by lightning—is only the most prominent example....

WHAT IS VOTER FRAUD?

"Voter fraud" is fraud by voters.

More precisely, "voter fraud" occurs when individuals cast ballots despite knowing that they are ineligible to vote, in an attempt to defraud the election system.

When every problem with an election is attributed to "voter fraud," it appears that fraud by voters is much more common than is actually the case.

This sounds straightforward. And yet, voter fraud is often conflated, intentionally or unintentionally, with other forms of election misconduct or irregularities.

There are many such problems that are improperly lumped under the umbrella of "voter fraud." Some result from technological glitches, whether sinister or benign: for example, voting machines may record inaccurate tallies due to fraud, user error, or technical malfunction. Some result from honest mistakes by election officials or voters: for example, a person with a conviction may honestly believe herself eligible to vote when the conviction renders her temporarily ineligible, or an election official may believe that certain identification documents are required to vote when no such requirement exists. And some irregularities involve fraud or intentional misconduct perpetrated by actors other than individual voters: for example, flyers may spread misinformation about the proper locations or procedures for voting; thugs may be dispatched to intimidate voters at the polls; missing ballot boxes may mysteriously reappear. These are all problems with the election administration system ... but they are not "voter fraud."

Conflating these concerns is not merely a semantic issue. First, the rhetorical sloppiness fosters the misperception that fraud by voters is prevalent. That is, when every problem with an election is attributed to "voter fraud," it appears that fraud by voters is much more common than is actually the case.

This, in turn, promotes inappropriate policy. By inflating the perceived prevalence of fraud by voters, policymakers find it easier to justify restrictions on those voters that are not warranted by the real facts.

Moreover, mislabeling problems as "voter fraud" distracts attention from the real election issues that need to be resolved. It draws attention away from problems best addressed, for example, by resource allocation or poll worker education or implementation of longstanding statutory mandates, and instead improperly focuses on the voter as the source of the problem....

VOTER FRAUD AND PHOTO IDS

The most common example of the harm wrought by imprecise and inflated claims of "voter fraud" is the call for in-person photo identification requirements. Such photo ID laws are effective only in preventing individuals from impersonating other voters at the polls—an occurrence more rare than getting struck by lightning.

By throwing all sorts of election anomalies under the "voter fraud" umbrella, however, advocates for such laws artificially inflate the apparent need for these restrictions and undermine the urgency of other reforms.

Moreover, as with all restrictions on voters, photo identification requirements have a predictable detrimental impact on eligible citizens. Such laws are only potentially worthwhile if they clearly prevent more problems than they create. If policymakers distinguished real voter fraud from the more common election irregularities erroneously labeled as voter fraud, it would become apparent that the limited benefits of laws like photo ID requirements are simply not worth the cost.

Royal Masset, the former political director for the Republican Party of Texas, concisely tied all of these strands together in a 2007 Houston Chronicle article concerning a highly controversial battle over photo identification legislation in Texas. Masset connected the inflated furor over voter fraud to photo identification laws and their expected impact on legitimate voters:

Among Republicans it is an "article of religious faith that voter fraud is causing us to lose elections," Masset said. He doesn't agree with that, but does believe that requiring photo IDs could cause enough of a dropoff in legitimate Democratic voting to add 3 percent to the Republican vote.

This remarkably candid observation underscores why it is so critical to get the facts straight on voter fraud. The voter fraud phantom drives policy that disenfranchises actual legitimate voters, without a corresponding actual benefit. Virtuous public policy should stand on more reliable supports.

Often, what appears to be voter fraud—a person attempting to vote under a false name, for example—can be traced back to a typo.

THE TRUTH ABOUT VOTER FRAUD

There have been a handful of substantiated cases of individual ineligible voters attempting to defraud the election system. But by any measure, voter fraud is extraordinarily rare.

In part, this is because fraud by individual voters is a singularly foolish and ineffective way to attempt to win an election. Each act of voter fraud in connection with a federal election risks five years in prison and a $10,000 fine, in addition to any state penalties. In return, it yields at most one incremental vote. That single extra vote is simply not worth the price.

BENIGN ERRORS MISTAKEN FOR FRAUD

Instead, much evidence that purports to reveal voter fraud can be traced to causes far more logical than fraud by voters. [There are many] ... common ways in which more benign errors or inconsistencies may be mistaken for voter fraud.

In the course of millions of recorded votes and voters, it is virtually certain that there will be clerical errors. Often, what appears to be voter fraud—a person attempting to vote under a false name, for example—can be traced back to a typo....

The most common source of superficial claims of voter fraud, and the most common source of error, probably involves matching voter rolls against each other or against some other source to find alleged double voters, dead voters, or otherwise ineligible voters....

Those searching for fraud—politicians, pundits, and even occasionally prosecutors—sometimes jump to unwarranted conclusions with a limited amount of information. The "birthdate problem" ...—mistaking two different people with the same name and birthdate—is one example. But there are many other circumstances in which observers draw illicit conclusions from data that in fact have a benign explanation....

Voter "caging" [, as another example,] is a tactic involving a mass mailing to registered voters to sniff out mailings that are returned undelivered; these undelivered mailings are then used to compile a list of voters allegedly enrolled under invalid addresses. But for many reasons, undelivered mail need not be an indication that a person registered at the given address is not entitled to vote there. A voter may be away from home for work, like a Louisiana Congresswoman challenged because she received her mail in Washington; or for military service, like an Ohio servicewoman challenged because she received her mail where she was stationed, in North Carolina; or for an extended vacation, like an Oregon woman rendered inactive because she was out of the country for a few months. A voter may live with others but be unlisted on the mailbox. Or, like Ohio resident Raven Shaffer, he may receive mail at a post office box or other mail service, and not at his registered residence. Moreover, some mail is simply not delivered, through no fault of the voter: in the 1990 census, for example, The New York Times reported that "[a]lthough at least 4.8 million [census] forms were found to be undeliverable by the Postal Service, 1.8 million of those were later delivered by hand." And recent reports found that government records used by Chicago postal workers to deliver mail contained more than 84,000 errors.

Of the relatively small number of ineligible voters who mistakenly cast ballots, most are citizens rendered ineligible by criminal conviction.

Mail sent to a listed registration address may also be returned as undeliverable because the voter has moved—even though the citizen remains wholly eligible to vote without re-registration. Each state has different rules determining when a voter who has moved must inform election officials of her new address. At a minimum, however, federal law provides that if a voter has moved within the same area covered by a given polling place—if, for example, a voter moves from one apartment to another within the same apartment complex, as a 2000 Oregon voter did—she may legitimately vote at that polling place even if she has not yet notified a registrar of her move. Similarly, a voter who has moved within the same registrar's jurisdiction and Congressional district may return to vote at her former polling place without re-registering. Especially in urban areas where there is high mobility within a particular neighborhood, undeliverable mail may simply reflect the recent move of a voter who remains fully eligible to vote....

VOTER MISTAKES

Even after accounting for the false conclusions above, investigations reveal that ineligible voters do sometimes cast votes. It is important, however, to distinguish those cases in which voters know they are ineligible but vote anyway—real voter fraud—from cases in which ineligible voters mistakenly believe themselves to be eligible. Both scenarios are unquestionably of concern. But it is likely to be more productive to address mistakes with remedies different from those often proposed for fraud.

Of the relatively small number of ineligible voters who mistakenly cast ballots, most are citizens rendered ineligible by criminal conviction. The laws concerning eligibility vary from state to state and can be confusing: different voters are disenfranchised for different convictions for different lengths of time. Moreover, the process of restoring a citizen's right to vote varies as well, from automatic restoration upon release from prison in states like Pennsylvania, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and Michigan, to the excruciatingly burdensome application process in Kentucky—which requires all would-be voters to submit a written application accompanied by three character references, an essay explaining why they should be eligible to vote, and a filing fee.

These rules are not merely difficult for voters to navigate: election officials with special training in the rules and regulations governing eligibility routinely get the law wrong. A 2004 survey, for example, found that 43% of New Jersey's county election offices did not follow state law in restoring citizens' right to vote. In New York, a much-publicized 2003 survey found that more than half of the local election officials did not follow state law; when the survey was repeated just two years later, 38% of the local boards of elections still got the law wrong.

It is difficult to expect disenfranchised voters to navigate the election laws successfully when so many election officials with expertise do not. Indeed, in Milwaukee, one voter asked to present identification at the polls showed his Department of Corrections ID card, with "OFFENDER" printed in bold letters across the face—but he was not informed by any poll worker that he might be ineligible to cast a ballot. Such cases show confusion ... but not voter fraud.

From the Opposing Viewpoints Database

Levitt, J. (2010). Allegations of Voter Fraud Are Greatly Exaggerated. In D. A. Miller (Ed.), Current Controversies. Federal Elections. Detroit, MI: Greenhaven Press. Retrieved from https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010626222/OVIC?u=lincclin_sjrcc&sid=OVIC&xid=9797f4a7

It is difficult to describe the enormity of the crime being committed by the [Barack] Obama administration and their Democratic allies. They flagrantly flout the law, while simultaneously turning it into a weapon against political opponents, use government agencies to target innocent Americans, attempt to create legal voters through amnesty, and undermine voter integrity measures to facilitate vote fraud, while denying it even exists. In short, they are corrupting the entire process.

Thus, it is fitting to begin this report by recounting a story of deliberate, blatant official voter fraud. This April 17 [2014], the Illinois House Executive Committee voted to authorize $100 million to construct President Obama's future presidential library and museum in Chicago. AP [Associated Press] reported that the Committee voted "unanimously," 9-0 to support the plan. The report was false. Only four of the 11 Committee members were in attendance—all Democrats. They did not even have a quorum. Furthermore, this was supposed to be a "subject matter only" hearing, i.e., entailing no votes. No matter; the legislators simply made up the results—even counting absent Republicans as "yes" votes. Republican State Representative Ed Sullivan observed, "In this case they didn't even care to change the rules; they just flat out broke them."

The [National Voter Registration Act] was authored by socialists Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, and many believe it was deliberately constructed to pave the way for ACORN-style massive registration fraud.

MOTOR VOTER

The National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), also known as "motor voter," promotes easy voter registration at motor vehicle, welfare and other state and local government offices. Voters can apply in person or by mail, and, until a recent court ruling, the federal application required no proof of citizenship. The NVRA also dictates voter roll maintenance, but it is a confusing procedure that can take over two election cycles. States have also frequently been lackadaisical about taking advantage of the methods afforded by the law. Some election boards actually have to be sued to clean up their voter rolls.

As a result, nationwide, voter rolls are a shambles. According to a Pew report, approximately 24 million voter registrations nationally are either invalid or inaccurate, including about 1.8 million deceased individuals and 2.75 million multi-state duplicates.

The NVRA was authored by socialists Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, and many believe it was deliberately constructed to pave the way for ACORN-style massive registration fraud. The pair is notorious for the Cloward/Piven Crisis Strategy—a plan to overwhelm government with demands for welfare spending, thereby leading to systemic crisis. Cloward and Piven helped launch ACORN to advance their strategy.

They also had other intentions for those burgeoning welfare rolls. "If organizers can deliver millions of dollars in cash benefits to the ghetto masses," they wrote, "it seems reasonable to expect that the masses will deliver their loyalties to their benefactors." Cloward and Piven developed the Motor Voter idea to simplify voter registration for this demographic. In 1993, it became law. Successive NRVA lawsuits have forced state agencies to become de facto taxpayer-funded voter registration drives.

Through its criminal activities, massive voter registration fraud and numerous convictions, ACORN made voter fraud national news. Prodded, and in some cases sued by activists, state legislatures began cleaning voter rolls and enacting ballot integrity measures like photo voter ID.

VOTER SUPPRESSION

Democrats responded by executing a nationwide propaganda campaign of contrived outrage to deliver one relentless message: widespread voter fraud is a myth created by racist Republicans to justify voter ID and other laws that suppress the minority vote. MSNBC even called it a war on voting.

This President [Barack Obama] has proven over and over, however, that Democrats lie, and the Obama administration has institutionalized the practice. As Robert Popper writes in The Wall Street Journal:

In an April 11 speech to Al Sharpton's National Action Network, President Obama recited statistics purporting to show that voter fraud was extremely rare. The "real voter fraud," he said, "is people who try to deny our rights by making bogus arguments about voter fraud."

Popper responds, "These arguments themselves are bogus."

Having rationalized the moral high ground with their "voter suppression" charge—Democrats go on the warpath. In recent years this has involved lawsuits, organized slander and a nationwide campaign to resist election reform.

And of course he's right. While they deny, obfuscate and attack, Democrats don't even bother to hide their true intentions. In an event that can only be described as bad optics for the President, Sharpton's NAN had just hosted a "Welcome Home Party" for serial convicted vote fraudster Melowese Richardson. After serving only eight months of a five year sentence for her crimes, Richardson was celebrated by Sharpton as a conquering hero.

VOTER FRAUD AS REPARATIONS

Democrats' attitude toward voter fraud is the voting version of reparations for slavery. Some Democrats have even said that because minorities and the poor have little influence, "extraordinary measures (for example, stretching the absentee ballot or registration rules) are required to compensate." Democrat election officials do this all the time, and a form of it has actually become official Justice Department policy in its effort to boost Hispanic representation.

Hispanic voters in Port Chester, New York were allowed to use something called "cumulative voting" in an election for village trustees. There were six trustee seats and Hispanics were allowed to cast six votes in any way they chose, for example, casting one vote for each of six candidates or all six for one candidate. Cumulative voting has also been used to elect a school board in Amarillo, Texas, the county commission in Chilton County, Alabama, and the city council in Peoria, Illinois.

Having rationalized the moral high ground with their "voter suppression" charge—Democrats go on the warpath. In recent years this has involved lawsuits, organized slander and a nationwide campaign to resist election reform. Under the Obama presidency, it has also included using federal agencies to attack private citizens and organizations....

CROSSCHECK PROGRAM

In 2005, the Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska and Missouri Secretaries of State agreed to initiate a program called "Crosscheck." Participating states provide voter data for comparison with voter rolls in other states. One can compare first name, last and date of birth, vote history, and when states provide it, the last four digits of the voter's Social Security number. This can uncover duplicate registrations, and, potentially, voter fraud. Starting with only those four states, the Crosscheck program has now grown to 28.

The numbers of potential duplicate registrations are astronomical, about 3.5 million for the participating 28 states, but the data must be evaluated with caution. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach states that surprisingly, there are many Americans with an identical first name, last name and date of birth (DOB). Election lawyer J. Christian Adams also warns that voter records are notorious for data entry errors. Still, individual Crosscheck states have found striking results worthy of closer scrutiny. North Carolina's State Board of Elections (SBOE) analyzed Crosscheck data for 2012 and found:

• 765 voters with matching first and last name, DOB and last four digits of SSN registered in NC and another state, and voted in both.
• 35,750 voters with the same first and last name and DOB registered in NC and another state and voted in both. (This includes data from states that do not provide SSN info.). Approximately one-third (11,560) came from border states.
• 155,692 voters with the same first and last name, DOB and last four digits of SSN registered in NC and another state—and the latest date of registration or voter activity was not in NC.

Vote thieves access the voter database and commit vote fraud using names of inactive voters.

SBOE Director Kim Strach warned against reading too much into the crosscheck numbers yet. The SBOE intends to examine each record individually. Separately, the SBOE also revealed:

• 50,000 new death records not previously provided to SBOE
• 13,416 deceased voters on the rolls in October 2013
• 81 deceased voters that had voter activity after they died

Other groups have explored voter rolls and found numerous problems. The Virginia Voters Alliance worked with Election Integrity Maryland and found 44,000 registration matches. The group also found 31,000 dead voters on the Virginia rolls. The North Carolina Voter Integrity Project handed over 20,000 voters with invalid addresses to the SBOE, and identified 5,167 dual registrations in Florida, of which at least 147 appear to be "either a victim or perpetrator" of voter fraud. In 2013, Kansas found 484 potential double voters through crosscheck. Twenty-one were referred for prosecution.

Double voting is only one explanation for dual votes, however, and perhaps not the main one. Susan Myrick of North Carolina's Civitas Institute, a veteran elections official, has long believed that vote thieves access the voter database and commit vote fraud using names of inactive voters. Vote officials could never prove it before, but now Crosscheck provides a methodology.

OUT-OF-STATE VOTERS

Democrats now openly say "vote where your vote will count," i.e., if you live in a dark red or blue state, your vote is wasted; go vote in a swing state. However, in order to do so legally, one must establish residency in the target swing state. How does one establish residency where one does not actually live, or intend to live for any extended period?

A long time ago, the Left began calculating ways to do this. The most promising demographic was college students. They are reliably liberal, reliably malleable, and move temporarily in large numbers. In 1972, the ACLU's New Hampshire chapter brought a class action suit in US District Court on behalf of an out-of-state Dartmouth college student who was denied the right to vote in NH because he informed authorities he intended to leave NH upon graduation. The judge ruled that out-of-state students could vote in NH, as long as they were "domiciled" in NH.

Black's Law Dictionary defines "Domicile" as "not for a mere special or temporary purpose, but with the present intention of making a permanent home, until some unexpected event shall occur to induce him to adopt some other permanent home." Normally, your domicile is where you live permanently, where you are licensed to drive, where you pay taxes, are called for jury duty, etc. That is usually not a college dorm.

Leftists love [same day registration voting] because it simplifies the task of getting out the vote and makes verification difficult.

One can immediately see the irony in the judge's ruling. For example, how can a student be classified as out-of-state for tuition purposes and yet "domiciled" in-state to vote? What about NH residents who go out-of-state to attend college? New Hampshire still considers them NH residents. This out-of-state condition is called "temporary absence." Why then are out-of-state students attending school in NH not considered to be temporarily absent from their own home state, and thus ineligible to vote in NH?

Today, out-of-state students in all 50 states can vote wherever they attend college. This has created essentially two classes of voter. Laws vary, but in many states students don't have to meet usual residency requirements, like registering a car. Cloistered away on campus, students are largely insulated from state and local politics. They will bear no long-term consequence for the outcomes of those elections, yet their sheer numbers guarantee a heavy influence. For example, residents could be saddled with a tax-and-spend governor because students who will never feel the impact voted for that candidate.

This has been further facilitated by same day registration/voting.

SAME DAY REGISTRATION/VOTING

Same day voting allows a person to register to vote, and then vote on the same day. Leftists love it because it simplifies the task of getting out the vote and makes verification difficult. Some states require photo ID and other supporting documentation to prove the registrant's residence, but many do not. Some states check registrations later; many don't bother.

Cloward and Piven wrote an exemption into the NVRA for states that allow same day voter/registration. This is a big incentive to avoid the NVRA's arduous voter registration requirements, and is yet more proof of the law's subversive goals....

STUDENTS RECRUITED TO SUPPORT LOCAL POLITICAL MACHINES

In April, 2013, the Pasquotank County, North Carolina Board of Elections sustained 57 of 60 voter registration challenges. All voters listed Elizabeth City State University (ECSU) as their residence. None of the sustained challenges were current students. One was not a U.S. citizen. One admitted she lived in California but voted absentee in NC. One lived in Virginia but admitted voting in NC. Another was a recent graduate who registered in Florida and North Carolina on the same day. He made his NC registration online, a violation of state law. However, in 2012, the (then) Democratic SBOE flouted the law and allowed online voting.

Former Pasquotank County Board of Elections official Betsy Meads asserts that ECSU students are regularly told to register and vote in local elections, even if domiciled elsewhere. ECSU students told Deputy Elections Director Bonnie Godfrey that they were promised perfect grades for voting. Some students said voting was "mandatory." In another case, the ECSU cheerleading squad was ordered to register and vote, despite out-of-town domiciles. When one refused, the cheerleading coach yelled, "Get in there and vote." Almost all did.

[The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact] would bias the election in favor of large population centers—which are usually 80 percent or more Democratic—that could dictate the outcome of presidential elections.

VOTER ID

Eric Holder's DOJ [Department of Justice] has moved mountains to forestall or prevent legislatures from enacting voter ID, but things have been slowly changing. In 2013 the Supreme Court struck down key parts of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which required certain states to obtain approval, or preclearance, to change voting laws. As of February 2014, 34 states have voter I.D., but only eight states have strict photo voter ID laws.

NATIONAL POPULAR VOTE INTERSTATE COMPACT (NPV)

NPV is an unconstitutional nationwide movement wherein states agree to award all presidential electors to the popular vote winner, regardless of how the state voted. Direct elections become universal when enough state legislatures have joined to make up a majority of the electoral vote (270 of 538). As of April 15, 2014, 10 states plus DC have joined, totaling 165 electoral votes, 61 percent of the 270 needed. Bills have also been passed by one House in Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina and Oregon.

NPV would bias the election in favor of large population centers—which are usually 80 percent or more Democratic—that could dictate the outcome of presidential elections. The Electoral College was enshrined in the Constitution to guarantee less populous states influence in federal elections. Political analyst Dick Morris also predicts much more voter fraud if the NPV goes through. Because large cities will be more important, Democrats will pull out all the stops to pad the vote.

UNIVERSAL VOTER REGISTRATION

UVR calls for automatically registering voters listed on various state and federal databases. Cloward and Piven's goal has always been UVR. They described NVRA as an intermediate step, but UVR will create even more problems:

1. UVR undermines the Constitution
2. UVR facilitates illegal alien voting
3. State and federal lists create duplicates
4. Duplicates are likely to go uncorrected

Leftists chant the UVR mantra. Nation Magazine editor Katrina vanden Heuvel even cited UVR's great success in Russia and Venezuela! However, under our noses the Obama administration has achieved a form of UVR with passage of Obamacare. The law provides for online voter registration. DEMOS has projected that this will register 68 million new voters.

FELON VOTING

Eric Holder has added his voice to the chorus of demands to allow for felon voting, another reliable Democratic demographic.

Voter fraud, and the corrupt political infrastructure that facilitates, or at best ignores it, is an existential threat to our American Republic. The only answer is to elect principled conservative leaders willing to recognize and confront this threat.

From the Opposing Viewpoints Database

Simpson, J. (2016). Voter Fraud Is a Legitimate Threat. In S. Armstrong (Ed.), At Issue. Voter Fraud. Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press. (Reprinted from Voter Fraud: An Existential Threat to America, 2014, May 8) Retrieved from https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010620215/OVIC?u=lincclin_sjrcc&sid=OVIC&xid=5e8e4cfd

Sources: PBS NewsHour; NPR; Marist Poll

Survey by: Marist Poll

Published by: NPR

Source link: Majority Of Americans Believe Trump Encourages Election Interference, page 11

Release date: January 2020