A court briefing in California alleges tens of thousands of dead registered voters could receive mail-in ballots in the 2020 presidential election.
Amicus briefs filed by the Public Interest Legal Foundation in California allege 23,000 dead people have not been removed from voter rolls in the state.
“California has a history of demonstrating that automation in voting processes will cause errors. Auto-mailings to active registrants won’t protect the state from sending ballots to dead and duplicated registrants — especially those who’ve shown an acknowledged willingness to take advantage of extra votes,” PILF President J. Christian Adams said in a statement.
The group also notes “quick facts” about “active” voter rolls, including 280 people who voted in two different counties in 2016 and 1,525 people who voted twice from the same addresses since 2016.
The briefs were filed in two federal lawsuits in relation to California’s expanded use of mail ballots in 2020, PILF said.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation this month that will automatically send an unsolicited mail-in ballot to everyone registered in the state and will also allow election officials to count ballots received within 17 days of the election.
The Democrat was sued by Republican groups over the move, which argued that there were serious questions about the security of mail-in voting.
“’CA’s election system is already burdened with serious issues,” the California GOP tweeted at the time. “The disastrous Motor Voter program arbitrarily changed voter registration for thousands casting doubt on the integrity and accuracy of our voter rolls,’ said @millanpatterson.”
“CA’s election system is already burdened with serious issues. The disastrous Motor Voter program arbitrarily changed voter registration for thousands casting doubt on the integrity and accuracy of our voter rolls,” said @millanpatterson. https://t.co/wcrW2JNp8S
— CAGOP (@CAGOP) May 25, 2020
Democrats across the country have pushed for increased, and in some cases, universal mail-in voting, citing coronavirus fears related to traveling to polling places. Republicans have raised concerns about documented cases of voter fraud as well as concerns about mail-in ballots ending up in the wrong hands.
An analysis by PILF found that more than 28 million mail-in ballots were unaccounted for over the last decade.
President Trump has been a vocal critic of mail-in voting, saying this week that he believes it poses the “biggest risk” to a fair election in November.
