Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s new stimulus bill would mandate nationwide “ballot harvesting,” allowing party operatives to return other people’s ballots to polling places without “any limit” on the number of ballots.
“Ballot harvesting” was legalized in California in 2016, and first used in the 2018 midterm elections. It allows anyone to drop off someone else’s mail-in ballot at a polling station. There is no process for vetting or verifying those delivering the ballots — no background checks or identification requirements. Democrats dropped hundreds of thousands of ballots off at polling stations in 2018, helping Democrats as they flipped seven Republican seats.
The practice is illegal in most other states, largely because it is susceptible to fraud and intimidation. Republicans were caught flat-footed in 2018; they experimented with the tactic in recent special elections, only to find that their voters adamantly refuse to give their ballots to strangers. Democrats are more open to the practice — often because the “harvester” previously registered the voter, according to Republican National Committeeman Shawn Steel.
The Left Loves ‘Land Acknowledgements’: Here’s One That Honors Our Forefathers and Actually Tells the Truth About Native Tribes
Arizona Corrections Officer Arrested for Smuggling 5,400 Rounds of Ammo for Mexican Drug Cartel
Trump gives Smithsonian days to replace ‘strange modernist sculpture’ with Founding Father
Diesel Just Hit $5.90 a Gallon with Refineries Maxed Out: Winter Won’t Get Any Better
‘History Worth Teaching’: Trump Demands Smithsonian Replace Woke Modernist Nonsense Giant Statue of Washington
GOP women sound alarm as Lindsay Clancy backlash revives calls to repeal 19th Amendment: ‘Definitely a threat’
Georgia killer who murdered two suburban real estate agents faces execution after 23-year wait for justice
Burglar Armed with Submachine Gun Raids Missouri House: The Homeowner Sent Him Home in a Body Bag
Police Called to Kamala Harris’s Malibu Mansion After Unknown Woman ‘Illegally Entered’
With ‘Choosin’ Texas,’ we’re all choosin’ Ella Langley
Deep-pocketed donors flocked to the SPLC to heal America’s divisions. Did it pay off?
Penn State frat cocaine bust blows lid off wider stimulant scourge hitting college campuses — and beyond
Vulnerable House Republicans embrace Trump as GOP bets on defying midterm history
Trump faces major test over appointing US attorneys without Senate approval
GOP rising star reveals how Republicans can lock down minority voters without Trump on ballot
California’s “ballot harvesting” law has yet to be challenged in court. It is one reason that California remains a one-party state, with little prospect for change in the foreseeable future.
Pelosi wants to take that system nationwide.
Her bill, released Monday afternoon, provides that every state:
A) shall permit a voter to designate any person to return a voted and sealed absentee ballot to the post office, a ballot drop-off location, tribally designated building, or election office so long as the person designated to return the ballot does not receive any form of compensation based on the number of ballots that the person has returned and no individual, group, or organization provides compensation on this basis; and (B) may not put any limit on how many voted and sealed absentee ballots any designated person can return to the post office, a ballot drop off location, tribally designated building, or election office.
In other words, paid party operatives can literally truck thousands and thousands of ballots to the polls, provided they earn a salary or fee, and are not paid by the ballot
The Left Loves ‘Land Acknowledgements’: Here’s One That Honors Our Forefathers and Actually Tells the Truth About Native Tribes
Arizona Corrections Officer Arrested for Smuggling 5,400 Rounds of Ammo for Mexican Drug Cartel
Trump gives Smithsonian days to replace ‘strange modernist sculpture’ with Founding Father
Diesel Just Hit $5.90 a Gallon with Refineries Maxed Out: Winter Won’t Get Any Better
‘History Worth Teaching’: Trump Demands Smithsonian Replace Woke Modernist Nonsense Giant Statue of Washington
GOP women sound alarm as Lindsay Clancy backlash revives calls to repeal 19th Amendment: ‘Definitely a threat’
Georgia killer who murdered two suburban real estate agents faces execution after 23-year wait for justice
Burglar Armed with Submachine Gun Raids Missouri House: The Homeowner Sent Him Home in a Body Bag
Police Called to Kamala Harris’s Malibu Mansion After Unknown Woman ‘Illegally Entered’
With ‘Choosin’ Texas,’ we’re all choosin’ Ella Langley
Deep-pocketed donors flocked to the SPLC to heal America’s divisions. Did it pay off?
Penn State frat cocaine bust blows lid off wider stimulant scourge hitting college campuses — and beyond
Vulnerable House Republicans embrace Trump as GOP bets on defying midterm history
Trump faces major test over appointing US attorneys without Senate approval
GOP rising star reveals how Republicans can lock down minority voters without Trump on ballot
It is a practice that is known in Third World countries as “ballot stuffing,” and is outlawed in every democracy, no matter how poor — even in countries where the physical and administrative obstacles to voting are far greater than in the world’s most developed economy.
And it is Pelosi’s condition for saving the U.S. economy from coronavirus.
Story cited here.
