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OPINION

American Elections Are Hardly Fraud-Proof

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.
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AP Photo/Matt York

Elections aren’t being stolen. They are just being carried out under rules devised by one side for their benefit.

The Left loves our election system—and why wouldn’t they? It has been a boon for them. They can win elections even when all seems lost. Through legal and extra-legal means, they have learned to exploit the opportunities presented by bulk-mail voting, ballot harvesting, and lack of voter ID requirements. So they falsely insist the procedures are virtually fraud-proof and that attempts to improve election security are racially motivated “voter suppression.”

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Voter fraud is not all that rare and is easy to commit. It is hard to detect because victims are unaware that their vote has been canceled and are unlikely to complain.

According to John Fund, 63 undercover agents went to the polls in New York a few years ago, giving the names of individuals who had died, moved, or were incarcerated. Only two were given ballots, including young people impersonating voters three times their age.

On his own, a television reporter in Florida turned up 94 non-citizens who had voted. Elections have been overturned because of voter fraud in Miami, Florida; East Chicago, Indiana; Essex County, New Jersey; and Greene County, Alabama, among other locales.

And who can forget Al Franken’s 312 vote victory in Minnesota’s Senate race, when later over one thousand felons (most probably Democrat voters) were found to have voted.

In 2020, the Pacific Interest Legal Foundation published a meticulous analysis of voter databases in which 144,000 cases of potential voter fraud were documented. These included dead voters, voters who had moved, and voters who supposedly lived in vacant lots, restaurants, and gas stations.

The Foundation’s report was sent to the 42 states where fraud was uncovered. No official or prosecutor asks for the relevant information for their condition. The stunning New York undercover operation also garnered little attention from the media or law enforcement agencies. Neither did the Florida reporter’s discoveries. You see the pattern.  

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Fraud must be looked for to be detected, and most election officials aren’t enthusiastic about investigating for fraud. So why give yourself a black eye? 

Honest researchers admit no one knows how much fraud is out there. Defenders of the status quo like to point out the lack of proven fraud cases associated with mail-in voting, but unless someone confesses, the crime is essentially non-detectable.

Look at how bulk mail compares with in-person voting, long the gold standard of election security:

  1. At the voting site, voters are protected from undue influence.
  2. Only after the list of eligible voters is checked, and their ID is presented are they given a ballot.
  3. They are monitored while they vote.
  4. The secrecy of the ballot is maintained at all times.
  5. A formal chain of custody assures that ballots are handled securely until counted.

By contrast, bulk-mail voting in Arizona and other states begins with unrequested ballots being mailed to millions of names on poorly maintained voter lists, some of whom don’t care about voting. Most of these ballots are received, voted, and returned by their intended recipients. But others get lost in the mail or are delivered to people who have moved or died. Yet others go to voters, some mentally incapacitated, who are “helped” by third parties to cast their vote. Some ballots are even sold.

Many votes are returned by “ballot harvesting,” where party activists collect the ballots and then return them or place them in a Dropbox. There are no chain of custody violations because there is no chain of custody.  

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Finally, signature matching is used as a substitute for actual ID verification. But signature matching is an imprecise “art” with no objective standards, which has been repeatedly proven unreliable.

Bulk-mail voting is widespread and growing, with citizens who innocently appreciate its convenience and those who cherish the inexplicable election wins it can achieve.

 But the value of a vote in a democratic society depends on the integrity with which it is cast and counted. Unfortunately, most Americans don’t believe their elections are secure, nor will they until we reject voting processes that are so porous to fraud and deceit.

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