The media often mock President Trump and others who have warned about ballot issues leading up to the Nov. 3 election, but in just the past month, there have been over a dozen cases of ballot harvesting, theft, dumping, and simple errors that open the election up to fraud.
Many of the problems on a back-of-the-envelope list tabulated with the help of FreedomWorks and covering just the last month are due to errors in state and county elections offices.
In one case, some 29,000 people in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, were sent the wrong ballot.
And in Washington, D.C., which should be the model for the nation, error-filled ballots have been distributed.
“Once voters lose confidence in the electoral system, there is little that leaders can do to restore it,” said Adam Brandon, president of FreedomWorks.
The list is anecdotal and not evidence of any sweeping fraud. But reports like those listed below have led most Republicans to heed Trump’s encouragement to vote in person. About half have told pollsters that they plan to vote in person on Election Day.
It’s a recommendation even made by the chairman of the Federal Election Commission.
“Without question, the safest, best way for anyone to have their vote count and assure that it counts is to vote in person,” FEC Chairman James E. “Trey” Trainor III said.
He also noted that even without the problems seen with mail-in ballots, they are the easiest for election lawyers to throw out.
Notice To: Anne Arundel County Registered Voters. pic.twitter.com/ED9H4LTsRm
— Anne Arundel BOE (@annearundelboe) October 1, 2020
And he added that with so many states and voters trying mail-in voting for the first time this year, problems should be expected, and voters are likely to be confused. In Massachusetts, for example, some 18,000 ballots were tossed out due to voter errors.
”There’s just going to be innumerable mistakes,” Trainor said.
Below is a list of some of the ballot problems reported in the last month:
- In the Richmond, Virginia, area, six mailboxes were broken into, and mail was stolen.
- Washington, D.C., has made several errors, the latest being sending ballots to long-gone residents. In another case, officials put the wrong date on ballots, and earlier this year, change-of-address forms were sent out with a design so poor that when sent back, they didn’t include the name of the sender.
- Project Veritas uncovered ballot harvesting in Minnesota.
- Some 100,000 defective ballots were sent out in New York City.
- There was a case of suspected ballot harvesting in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, near Baltimore, prompting a voter warning by the county's Board of Elections.
- Voters near Columbus, Ohio, in Franklin County, were sent the wrong ballots.
- In Los Angeles County, California, the Los Angeles Times reported, “Some 2,100 L.A. County voters got ballots missing one thing: a way to vote for president.”
- About 18,000 ballots were rejected in the Massachusetts primary because of the type of voter errors Trainor warned about.
- More than 1,600 Sussex County, New Jersey, ballots from the July primary were found last month. They were counted, however, and didn’t change any outcomes.
- Over 100 blank, undelivered Jefferson County, Kentucky, absentee ballots were found in a dumpster.
- In Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, 29,000 people were sent the wrong ballot. The county moved to fix the error.
- In Pittsylvania County, Virginia, a voter unable to put a ballot in a voting box was able to pull open the box, raising security worries.
- In Teaneck, New Jersey, nearly 7,000 voters received the wrong ballot.
- A postal worker in West Orange, New Jersey, was arrested for allegedly dumping nearly 2,000 pieces of mail, including 99 ballots and 276 campaign flyers.
