Election fraud is always a concern – but especially in 2020. Why? Democrats are pushing “universal mail-in ballots,” saying COVID-19 discourages in-person voting. Truth is universal mail-in voting is a greater threat to election integrity.
Let us start with basics. Absentee ballots are available on request – so anyone who feels they need one can get one. Meantime, Democrats are selling more panic, knowing mail-in irregularities will either benefit their candidates or cast doubt on a Trump win.
Empirically, mail-in ballots present a host of problems – problems not found when voters cast their ballots in person. While marginal in most elections, taken to a national level, they would promptly undermine public trust, integrity in the process and legitimacy of outcomes. That is why universal mail-in voting is a non-starter.
Historically, election irregularities jump with mail-in ballots. Reasons are obvious. First, voter identity is often suspect or uncheckable. Forgery is virtually impossible to detect. Second, like confirming a will-writer’s capacity, the voter’s state of mind is hard to find. Was the vote cast with over-the-shoulder direction, adverse influences, coerced, bought? No way to know.
Third, while electioneering bans around polling places keep campaign staff, heavy-handed volunteers, unlawful assistance, and subtle intimidation at bay, they do not work at home.
Fourth, detecting irregularities – even with fancy software, algorithms to surface oddities like double votes, dead voters, fake people, and brilliant pets – is extremely hard. Unlike facing a voter eye-to-eye for identification, universal mail-in often skirts credible validation
Fifth, the process of counting votes, transcribing from ballot to tally is fraught with risk – chances for error, negligence, recklessness (moving too fast), or intentional intrusion. Sixth, the biggest part of election integrity is assuring access and accuracy. But another part is speedy returns. Universal mail-in ballots – even miraculously devoid of irregularities – would take weeks to count. Those would be – as the tight 2000 race showed – tense, untrusting weeks. They would undermine trust in the outcome.
Data reinforces logic – and the importance of avoiding chaos from “universal mail-in” voting. While valid reasons support self-requested absentee ballots, from travel and disability to illness and allowance for life’s exigencies, “universal mail-in” is a different animal.
As deep-dive studies show, the notion of “changing the U.S. election system to no-fault absentee balloting, in which anyone can vote with a mail-in ballot without a reason, or to mail-only elections, in which voters no longer have the ability to vote in person, is an unwise and dangerous policy,” one that “would disenfranchise voters and make fraud far easier.” See, https://amac.us/newsline/society/four-stolen-elections-the-vulnerabilities-of-absentee-and-mail-in-ballots/
More to the point, history shows fraud jumps with mail-in voting, plain and simple. “Mail-in ballots are susceptible to being stolen, altered, forged, and forced,” so much so that a 1998 Florida report found absence of “in-person, at-the-polls” accountability … “makes absentee ballots the ‘tool of choice’ for those inclined to commit voter fraud.” In short, mail-in invites fraud.
Another proof is the tendency of fraud tied to “vote harvesting,” where a “third party” gathers up absentee ballots for election officials. Protections are hard to implement, opening the door to fraud. Moreover, “harvesters” are sometimes paid by campaigns to collect ballots. What could go wrong there?
If mail-in ballots facilitate errors in voting, transit, collection, and tallying, they also incentivize illegal vote buying and make it easier, since the vote buyer can see the vote cast. New Jersey, for example, has seen convictions for orchestrated, widespread schemes to target and buy votes of low-income voters.
Question: In a time when individuals are unemployed, getting evicted, businesses straining, Congress arguing over more unemployment benefits, student loans paused – what are chances some campaigns would try to target and buy votes? Probably better than even.
Absent accurate results, timely reporting, validated at polling stations by non-partisans, legally confirmed, public trust falls. The outcome – indeed, outcomes at every level – would be suspect, or worse, denied, decried, and dismissed.
So, while adequate provisions should be made for safe in-person voting, with on-request absentee ballots, Democrats are all-in for universal mail-in. Latest sign is an “emergency” House vote to ramp up Post Office funding – to support sending and getting back 150 million ballots. If some elections are decided by single digits, can you imagine the chances of error and fraud? Odds of election miscarriage are staggering.
Nevertheless, with something in mind, Democrat House Speaker Pelosi last week declared: “Alarmingly, across the nation, we see the devastating effects of the President’s campaign to sabotage the election by manipulating the Postal Service to disenfranchise voters” – presumably by not allowing mass fraud and error.
To strong-arm “universal mail-in” voting, Pelosi impugned Postal Service leadership integrity. She said they aim to “degrade postal service, delay the mail, and … deny the ability of eligible Americans to cast their votes through the mail in the upcoming elections in a timely fashion.”
In a word, nonsense. Most of the nation will be able to safely vote in person. For those who cannot, absentee ballots exist – as they always have. Election fraud is always a concern – especially in 2020. Why? Because …the sniff of it is in the air.
Robert Charles is a former assistant secretary of state for President George W. Bush, former naval intelligence officer and litigator. He served in the Reagan and Bush 41 White Houses, as congressional counsel for five years, and wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003) and “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), the latter on WWII vets in a Maine town.
The Democrats see universal mail-in voting as their last “insurance policy” against Trump being re-elected. Universal mail-in voting is far different from the much more secure and reliable absentee voting process. The Democrats realize their message of hate, envy, victimhood and endlessly iterations of identity politics, all wrapped in a blanket of massive taxation, regulation and re-distribution of wealth, holds only so much attraction for the segment of society enamored of socialism. So they need a way to put a thumb, or more correctly a whole hand in this case, on the scale of the election to tilt it in favor of them. That’s where mail-in voting gives them that edge, especially in blue states like New York and New Jersey (and others) that have a long history of with manipulating the votes in urban settings to achieve the desired vote outcomes.
When coupled with the fact that the Democrats already have hired hundreds of lawyers to dispute the election outcome in any state and you’re looking at a very coordinated plan to try an insure a Biden win at any cost. Whether it be by boxes of ballots being dumped somewhere to last minute ballots magically being discovered in the trunk of some city official’s car that just happen to all be marked Democrat. The Democrat Party is well versed in how to commit voter fraud. So people need to fight this effort towards universal mail-in voting at all levels. Local, state and federal representatives need to hear from EVERYONE, that people want in person voting at the regular polling stations.
I hope that President Trump isn’t cutting off his nose to spite his face. All this talk about a rigged election and voter fraud could backfire.
There is a public misconception that those who vote by mail tend to be Democrats. However, in 2016 the President received a substantial advantage from voting by people who did not have a college degree.
If everyone received a ballot in the mail, that means everyone, including the poor or less educated, have a greater chance to vote. In the past, the poor or less educated tended to vote for Democrats, but if 2016 is any indication, those are the very voters who gave the President his victory.
Also, older voters tend to vote Republican. If they were convinced that voting by mail was bad and Covid is still hanging around on election day, they might not vote at all. That would be significant in both Florida and Arizona. If the President were to lose either of those two states, his chances for reelection would be greatly diminished.
We still occasionally get mail for a deceased family member who’s been gone 5 years. What assurance could anyone provide that millions of deceased people won’t be voting?
Mail-in voting is so so vulnerable to fraud and I’m sure the Democrats are counting on that. Mail-in voting should only be available to those citizens who are physically unable to vote in person and those citizens who will not be in their voting district on election day. If you’re too lazy to get to the polls to vote, you don’t deserve to be a citizen of this wonderful country.
Just one question. Who is the author of confusion?? The answer is Lucifer, the one who transformed into an angel of light. 2 Chron.11. Do not be confused, he is active going to and fro in this earth looking for someone to devour. He is a beautiful being but behind his disguise is a monster. Know your Master’s voice.
Rushing into universal mail-in without proper planning and testing is certain to turn out badly. “Act in haste, repent in leisure”.
This mail-in ballot scheme is just the Marxist Left’s last ditch effort to stop President Trump from being reelected. If allowed, they will have untold millions of phony votes in all the swing states to ensure President Trump loses. President Trump KNOWS THIS and we can only assume that he is somehow addressing this issue already even though the Postal Union is stupidly willing to aid the Communist Democrats in doing so. People, we all have to help in making sure that this is going to be an “honest” election as possible. But most of all, we must all encourage every adult to get out and vote to save America from being destroyed by Communism!!! And most importantly, We the People MUST SUPPORT President Trump in everything he proposes because WE ALL DO KNOW that he PUTS AMERICA FIRST!!!
I don’t feel that voting strictly by mail is the way to go as it is too easy to be fraudulent!
Democrats attempt to steal the election. There will be wide spread fraud and it will be led by the democrat party. Full scale effort to avoid the inevitable.
I recently voted in a runoff election here in Texas. I wore my mask, stayed 6 feet away from others and brought a pencil using the eraser end to operate the voting machine.
It is just so obvious that the democrats are trying to steal this election. You can tell something is wrong when one party is all-in on a scheme and the other party is totally against it. If dems were simply worried about safety at the polling place they could be putting all this effort into plans to make it safer at those locations instead of fighting so hard for more voter fraud!
Mail in voting is wrong. I’m sick and tired of the left trying to destroy this great country. They will do anything to win this election. Mail in voting is just another attempt to steal the election. All they have to offer is hate,lies,and destruction. They haven’t done anything for people in the past and will not in the future except to control all of us as cattle instead of free people. Trump has to win again or it’s goodbye to our freedom.
With the endorsement of Biden by the US Postal Workers Union, I dare say universal mail-in ballots would no doubt be tampered with one way or another. All they need do is have a list of areas/districts that are known to be conservative or liberal and whether to deliver the ballots from those districts for processing/delivery or not.
For the 1st time in my life, I voted absentee for the primary this year because of Covid-19 cautions (am 78), but delivered it to local court house personally & dropped it in box. The outside of the envelope was preprinted with”Ballot”, so no mistaking what it was. I plan to vote in person in November.
I can only surmise the Democrats have created this mail-in program for voting simply because no matter the contest results, the truth will be continually up in the air and creating more dissatisfaction over-all. They seem most determined to undermine the way our government has been operated all these years and they’re going to see to it that it’s all changed. Giving power to the government (themselves) is what their primary desire is…even if it requires civil ‘war’ which this tension between the two political powers amounts to.
Duh… Several states and several European nations have been doing mail voting for years.
I think that mail-in voting is a recipe for disaster. It could extend the time to get the election results adding to the chaos the country is already suffering. If the riots etc. can go in challenged, then in person voting should be no problem. With all the “protesting” without masks and social distancing can continue unabated, then why should there be a problem with in-person voting?
My intent is to vote in person as I do not agree with the idea of everyone voting by mail. It has occurred to me that a week before the election what would happen if there was a severe outbreak of the virus? Funny how there are outbreaks when things start moving again. I am currently debating whether to ask for an absentee ballot.
Nancy Pelosi is a POS
I sincerely hope something can be done about this. One sees the destruction of the country and is told that at least we have an option. We can vote. But I sadly fear our vote will count for nothing. It’s all so fake. If we are fine to go to the supermarket wearing a mask we are fine to stand six feet apart in a line and vote! Absentee ballots for the very at risk would have solved the problem for them.
The nonsense counter argument to these concerns is, typically, ‘There are few confirmed instances of voting fraud’. That is NOT an indication that it doesn’t occur, only that it’s hard to detect and convict. Further, removing the safeguards that in person voting and requiring an affirmative request for an absentee ballot have inherent in them undermines the integrity of the process making fraud more possible. Voting is important enough to do in person with an absentee option available for those who truly would have issues getting to the polls. There is nothing wrong with such a process.
In Michigan, I just received my application for an absentee voter ballot. It already had my information filled out. I just needed to sign and return.
For the Primary, my husband and I both received applications, and they were received in the same day’s mail. We did not return them, and voted in person at our precinct about half a mile away. Since we did not request absentee ballots for the primary, and did not request an application for the November election, why would they send us an application we did not request?
In addition, I received mine, but my husband has not received an application. If they are sending them to everyone, where did his go? Was it pilfered by someone who intended to vote instead of my husband? Since the information is pre-filled, only a signature is required to submit the application. How scrupulous will they be in verifying a signature when they have so many applications to process?
Michigan DOES have voter ID requirements, but I don’t see anything required when requesting an absentee ballot. Southeast Michigan is still very blue, because of the City of Detroit (which always has many precincts that can’t be recounted because the ballots don’t match the poll books – not suspicious at all??) and because of the Unions. There have been documented instances of improper tallies (a Southfield clerk was just indicted on 6 felony counts for changes to absentee ballots), and I have serious doubts about the trustworthiness of our system for this year’s elections. I worry about all types of voter fraud – many ballots sent to an address for people who haven’t lived there for years being voted and returned by others, people “helping” elderly nursing home residents complete and return ballots, ballots for people who died being voted and returned by others, and the old standards of paying people to vote for a candidate – but the number of absentee ballots that will be returned this year will be significantly larger and if the people at the polls can’t count the votes properly in a normal election, how can they possibly be able to handle a mass vote-by-mail process this time.
There are always numerous ways to cheat in an election. I would rather NOT give them more opportunity and an easier process for fraud.