Originally published October 17, 2023 2:00 pm PDT
Ahead of next month’s state and local elections, concerns over election integrity are escalating due to reported issues with absentee ballots in various counties, with critics including former President Donald Trump and Arizona Senate candidate, Kari Lake.
In San Diego County, California, an administrative error resulted in approximately 7,500 voters receiving duplicate ballots for the upcoming November 7 special elections, which include races for the Board of Supervisors District 4 and the city of Chula Vista, according to a report from Just the News (JTN).
While one set of these duplicate ballots has been rendered invalid in the computer system, voters who mistakenly cast their vote using these will still have their votes counted.
Those who received both versions were instructed to use any one of the ballots and discard the other.
A similar situation arose in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, where absentee ballots carried flawed instructions for the Nov 7 municipal election.
The instructions mistakenly directed voters to place their absentee ballots inside white secrecy envelopes, instead of the required yellow ones.
Consequently, any ballots not in the yellow envelopes will be disregarded.
This isn’t Lancaster County’s first encounter with ballot discrepancies.
During the primary elections in April, nearly 19,000 ballots were issued with erroneous instructions regarding the number of candidates voters should select in a particular race.
Additionally, Mifflin County in Pennsylvania had to re-issue its absentee ballots due to faulty voting instructions for two races.
The county’s Election Director, Paula Hoffman, clarified, “If you have already returned the ballot mailed out on Oct. 5, you will need to complete this new reissued ballot to cast your vote in the election,” adding that the initial batch “will not be counted and will have no effect on the outcome of the election.”
Meanwhile, in East Baton Rouge, Louisiana, 655 ballots excluded a family court election race.
Out of these, 46 individuals voted in-person early, 13 have already returned the flawed absentee ballots, while 12 are yet to submit theirs.
Trump, who has previously criticized mail-in voting as a “corrupt system,” seems to be shifting his stance, asserting, “Our path forward is to MASTER the Democrats’ own game of harvesting ballots in every state we can,” JTN notes.
Furthermore, Kari Lake is embroiled in a public records lawsuit to scrutinize ballot affidavit envelopes from Maricopa County’s 2022 general elections.
She contends the county’s signature verification process, claiming it’s a “sham” due to the alleged swift signature verifications.
The reliability of absentee ballots has been a contentious issue for years. The 2005 bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform, led by figures like former President Jimmy Carter and ex-Secretary of State James Baker, stated: “While vote by mail appears to increase turnout for local elections, there is no evidence that it significantly expands participation in federal elections.”
The commission further warned of the potential risks, highlighting that it “raises concerns about privacy” and “increases the risk of fraud.”
Adding to the ongoing debate is a recent case in Yavapai County, Arizona, where the Superior Court ruled that the secretary of state office’s ballot signature verification guidance does “not have the force of law.”
This underlines the growing concerns, given that twenty-seven states solely rely on signature verification for mail-in ballots to ensure voter authenticity.
