Watchdog Group: Despite Trump’s Claims, No Evidence of Voter Fraud

Editor’s Note: With a flurry of news related to voter fraud, we wanted to share these resources from watchdog group the Brennan Center.

President-elect Donald Trump claimed on Twitter Sunday that millions of people voted illegally and “serious voter fraud” occurred in three states. His comments follow news that Wisconsin will conduct a recount, initiated amid concerns that voting system infrastructure in the state wasn’t secure.

Much has been reported by the nonpartisan nonprofit about the issue of voter fraud. Here are some resources to consider if you’re concerned alleged voter fraud:

• Debunking the Voter Fraud Myth. There is no basis to the claims of pervasive voter fraud. Every major investigation, study, and court decision has found little evidence of fraud. Instead, these claims lead to significant disenfranchisement since they are used to falsely justify restrictive laws that block legitimate voters from having their voice heard at the polls.
• Voting Machines and Recount Procedures: There is a legal process that allows recounts to happen if elections are exceptionally close, or if a party or candidate pays for them. There is little evidence to suggest anything will be found in Wisconsin to change the results of the election, but a recount can illuminate small problems we can work to avoid next time. One thing that was clear even before the recount was initiated is America’s voting machines and election administration infrastructure is old, which increases the risk of crashes and failures. A comprehensive Brennan Center study in 2015 examined America’s voting machines and found 42 states use ones that are at least 10 years old.

Click here for more on the Brennan Center’s voting rights and elections work.

New Paper: How to Protect Election Integrity Without Disenfranchising Voters

As America heads into another presidential election year in the midst of pitched battles over the right to vote, the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law has released a six-part agenda to secure our elections from misconduct while maintaining fair access to the ballot.

Since the 2010 election, 21 states have new voting restrictions — and 15 will have them in effect for the first time in a presidential election in 2016. Yet many of these rules address only one form of misconduct, in-person voter impersonation, which is vanishingly rare.

The clamor over voting laws should not obscure a fundamental shared truth: American elections should be secure and free of misconduct, the Center argues in Election Integrity: A Pro-Voter Agenda. Throughout our nation’s history, however, most fraud has been committed by insiders, not individuals.

And, in recent years, states have gone too far by passing voting rules that make it harder for many Americans to participate.

The Brennan Center’s paper outlines a six-part agenda to target fraud risks as they actually exist — without unduly disenfranchising eligible citizens. Proposals include plans to modernize voter registration, increase security of voting machines, and adopt only common-sense voter ID laws.

“We don’t have to choose between election integrity and election access. In fact, free and fair access is necessary for an election to have integrity,” wrote report author Myrna Pérez, deputy director of the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program. “It is vital that we protect voters from the real threats to the integrity of elections. Fortunately, it is possible to protect election integrity without disenfranchising eligible voters.”

Here is the six-part plan:

1. Modernize Voter Registration to Improve Voter Rolls
2. Ensure Security and Reliability of Our Voting Machines
3. Do Not Implement Internet Voting Systems Until Security is Proven
4. Adopt Only Common-Sense Voter Identification Proposals
5. Increase Security of Mail-In Ballots
6. Protect Against Insider Wrongdoing

The paper examines genuine risks to the security of elections, highlights current and future vulnerabilities, and recommends ways to reduce each risk.

Read the full report.

 

Kansas Unveils Updated Website to Report, Combat Voter Fraud

Photo of: Kris W. Kobach, Kansas Secretary of State
Photo by: Walt Whitaker

Kansas Secretary of State Kris W. Kobach this week unveiled an updated website to report voting fraud in the state.

With passage of SB 34 earlier this year, the Kobach became one of thttps://pffedotorg.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post-new.phphe first secretaries of state in the nation with authority to prosecute election crimes. This authority is shared with the Attorney General and local district

and county attorneys.

The updated website allows a person to report election violations to the Secretary of State’s office for review and possible investigation. Types of violations may include advance voting irregularities, corrupt political advertising, election bribery, election forgery, disorderly election conduct, intimidation of voters, voting without being qualified, voting twice in the same election, and poll site violations, among others.

A description of the violation, along with any supporting documentation is requested. Citizens desiring to report unlawful election activities may do so by filling out the Stop Voter Fraud form at http://www.sos.ks.govor call the Stop

Voter Fraud hotline at (800) 262-8683.

Interested to learn more about voter fraud by nationally and in Pennsylvania? Click here.

Three Philly Officials Charged With Voter Fraud-Related Offenses

Three Philadelphia election officials last week were charged with election fraud-related offenses that stemmed from both the 2014 and 2015 primary elections, according to various media reports.

According to Philadelphia Magazine:

Robin Trainor and Laura Murtaugh are both charged in a 2015 incident in which Trainor allegedly guided her husband’s vote, voted in her son’s place, and received Murtaugh’s help doing so.

Online court records show that Trainor has been charged with repeat voting, forgery, tampering with public records, fraud by election officers, interference with primary elections, conspiracy, unlawful assistance in voting, and failure to perform duties.

Murtaugh has been charged with fraud by election officers, interference with primaries and failure to perform duties, online court records indicate.

A third official, Cheryl Ali was charged with voting in place of a relative in 2014.

According to Philadelphia Magazine, District Attorney Seth William issued the following statement:

“I continue to be outraged that our election officials, after they clearly know the rules, think that they can just walk into the voting booth and vote multiple times or vote as someone else. What these three have done is clearly a crime and will be prosecuted. I hope that their wrongdoing reminds everyone who is entrusted with putting on and protecting our elections that my Election Fraud Task Force is real and will continue to find and arrest people who break our election laws.”

In May, four other Philadelphia election officials were charged with election-fraud related offenses. To read more about that, click here.

These aren’t the only alleged instances of voter fraud in Pennsylvania.

Just this past January, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported that as many as 731 Pennsylvania voters may have cast two ballots in recent elections, and quoted the secretary of state as saying that “there’s potential voter fraud in Pennsylvania.”

In February, for example, a Philadelphia Election board worker was charged with voter fraud for allegedly attempting to tamper with voting machines, among other things.

The Pennsylvania Independent also reports that first-term state Rep. Jason Ortitay, a Republican serving portions of Washington and Allegheny counties, is facing an investigation by the state attorney general over allegations of voter fraud.

In 2013, two Democratic officials from Fayette County were also charged with voter fraud, according to a story in PennLive.

New Paper Explores Media Attention of Voter Fraud

A recent paper published by Research & Politics explores the media attention given to voter fraud during the 2008 election versus 2012 election.

The paper, titled, “News Attention to Voter Fraud in the 2008 and 2012 U.S. Elections” was written by Brian J Fogarty, Jessica Curtis, Patricia Frances Gouzien, David C Kimball, and Eric C Vorst. Here is the authors’ explanatory abstract:

The nature and frequency of voter fraud figure prominently in many ongoing policy debates about election laws in the United States. Policy makers frequently cite allegations of voter fraud reported in the press during these debates. While recent studies find that voter fraud is a rare event, a substantial segment of the public believes that voter fraud is a rampant problem in the United States.

It stands to reason that public beliefs are shaped by news coverage of voter fraud. However, there is very little extant academic research on how the news media, at any level, covers allegations or documented cases of voter fraud. This paper examines local newspaper attention to voter fraud in each of the 50 states during the 2008 and 2012 US elections.

The results show that local coverage of voter fraud during the 2012 elections was greatest in presidential swing states and states that passed restrictive voting laws prior to the 2012 election. No evidence that newspaper attention is related to the rate of actual voter fraud cases in each state was found. The findings are consistent with other studies indicating that parties and campaigns sought to place voter fraud on the political agenda in strategically important states to motivate their voting base ahead of the election.

The conclusion?

This paper has examined how the press covers voter fraud. Numerous polls show that a majority of Americans believe that voter fraud is common and is a serious threat to the integrity of American elections. While this belief is stronger among conservatives and Republicans, this general notion crosses the political spectrum. While some Americans may be predisposed to voter fraud beliefs, it is believed, given the agenda-setting function of the press, that media coverage of voter fraud may influence public opinion on the issue. This paper seeks to assess the role of the media in Americans’ beliefs about voter fraud.

This paper has presented a first attempt at answering this question, and its findings indicate heavier news coverage of voter fraud in battleground states and in states that have recently enacted restrictive election laws. These findings indicate that supply-side factors affect the creation of voter fraud news, and are consistent with a theory positing that media coverage responds to elite debates. Furthermore, no demand-side audience effects on voter fraud coverage have been found. Instead, this study’s findings suggest parties and campaigns sought to place voter fraud on the political agenda through the media in strategically important states to motivate their voting base ahead of the election. This situation may change as more Americans become informed about voter fraud and demand news about the issue.

Want to read the entire paper? It is available in its entirety here.

Did Voter ID Laws, Voter Fraud Effect Nov. 4 Elections? Two Op-Ed Pieces of Note

In the aftermath of the Nov. 4 elections – and the overwhelming defeat of many Democratic candidates, much has been written and surmised about whether voter ID laws and voter fraud played a role in the results.

Pennsylvanians for Fair Elections wanted to point out two op-ed pieces on the matter.

The first piece was written by Nancy Thorner and Bonnie O’Neil, who write for the Illinois Review, and published by Heartland.org’s blog.

Their opinion? Maybe.

The story explores voter fraud and other fair election-related issues. Here is an excerpt:

A few days before the election, a Wisconsin mailman was seen dumping hundreds of Republican postcards in the trash, all of them supporting Republican candidates.  He is now under indictment.

The above examples are just a scant sampling of voter fraud in America.  Patriots argue for an overhaul of our election security.00 processes, and laws. Every person who casts a legal vote should do so with the confidence it is not being canceled by an illegal one.  America’s electoral system should be perceived as reliable, efficient, and honest; a system that has the tools to detect fraudulent activities as well as convict perpetrators who violate our laws.  A system that is working effectively will not only detect voter abuses, but would also be a deterrent to prevent potential fraudulent activities.  Oddly, many of our government officials often seem more concerned about election irregularities in other nations than our own, and when informed of voter improprieties in the United States, they have the audacity to state such claims are grossly exaggerated.

To read the entire story, click here.

The second story is written by Nate Coen, who covers elections, polling and demographics for The Upshot, a New York Times politics and policy site.

Does he think voter ID laws swing election results? Nope.

Here’s an excerpt:

Voter ID laws might well be a cynical, anti-democratic attempt to disenfranchise voters to help Republicans, as Democrats claim. But that doesn’t mean that voter ID laws are an effective way to steal elections. They just don’t make a difference in anything but the closest contests, when anything and everything matters.

This may come as a surprise to those who have read articles hyperventilating about the laws. Dave Weigel at Slate in 2012 said a Pennsylvania voter identification law might disenfranchise 759,000 registered voters, a possibility he described as “an apocalypse.” Pennsylvania’s voter ID law was reversed before the election, but it is not hard to see why so many thought it could be decisive when Mr. Obama won the state with a 309,840 vote margin.

To read the entire story, click here.

What do you think? Tell us in the comments.

Investigation: 31 Instances of Voter Impersonation Out of 1 Billion Ballots Cast

The Washington Post recently published a guest post written by Justin Levitt, a professor at the Loyola University Law School and an expert in constitutional law/law of democracy, with a focus on election administration and redistricting.

In the post, Levitt writes about recent voter ID rulings, including Wisconsin’s, and about his experience investigating instances of voter impersonation – what he says voter ID laws are designed to prevent.

Here is an excerpt:

In 2008, when the Supreme Court weighed in on voter ID, I looked at every single allegation put before the Court. And since then, I’ve been following reports wherever they crop up.

I’ve been tracking allegations of fraudfor years now, including the fraud ID laws are designed to stop. In 2008, when the Supreme Court weighed in on voter ID, I looked at every single allegation put before the Court. And since then, I’ve been following reports wherever they crop up.

So far, I’ve found about 31 different incidents (some of which involve multiple ballots) since 2000, anywhere in the country. If you want to check my work, you can read a comprehensive list of the incidents below.

To put this in perspective, the 31 incidents below come in the context of general, primary, special, and municipal elections from 2000 through 2014. In general and primary elections alone, more than 1 billion ballots were cast in that period.

To read Levitt’s blog in its entirety, click here.