Watching Vote Counting Fraud Occur

In 2004, in the state of Washington, Republican Dino Rossi won the race as governor with 261 votes. An automatic recount was triggered by the small margin, and the second recount, led to a smaller victory of 42 votes. A second recount was triggered, and in the end, Christine Gregoire won by 129 votes.

I followed that recount through SoundPolitics, and was surprised at the callous way that election officials treated the electoral process. It was clear to every observer that the election process was tainted. Large numbers of votes were "found" throughout the recounts, and once Gregoire took the lead, the legal process simply wasn't up to restoring Rossi's lead. Vote fraud is very hard to prove, and judges err on the side of caution, even when a number of voters registered in empty buildings, or the social security office, or other shady areas cast doubt over their validity.

The truth is that unless someone comes forward and admits it, it's very difficult, bordering on impossible, to win a legal judgement and overturn an election. Which means that whoever counts the votes, for all intents and purposes, determines the winner, who immediately begins to act as if they've won. And the loser, looks like a loser for complaining, ruining their chances at running again.

Democrats like to claim that there's no such thing as vote fraud because the courts can't legally prove it. Prosecutors don't chase it, because it's not sexy, and is very bad for your career, as the press and the Democrats love to claim that vote fraud investigations are veiled attempts at voter intimidation. But soon, we may have another example of how the Democrat's Secretary of State project is yielding ill-gotten gains.

Minnesota Senator Norm Coleman finished in tight race with Al Franken, ahead 721 votes. A recount is scheduled, but the race is not certified. In typical fashion, new votes have started coming in. Over 500 voters have appeared, some from "miscounts," others from ballots that were never counted because they were left in a car, and a series of statistically improbable events always seem to benefit the Franken, at the expense of Coleman. We've seen this before, and it underscores the need for non-partisan, truly effective leadership from the Minnesota Secretary of State.

Of course, no vote fraud story would be complete without an ACORN angle, and so we find the MN SoS, Mark Ritchie is, a former ACORN community organizer. We don't know if the Democrats will be able to beg, borrow, and steal enough votes to put Franken into office. We do know that if Republicans specifically, and the public in general, needs to pay closer attention to whose in charge of the ballots. 8 years of conspiracy theories about the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections have poisoned our political process and shaken our trust in free and fair elections. Democrats joke about their dogs voting, or voting twice, but the truth is that partisans in this election were caught in voter fraud, specifically those Ohio Obama campaign workers who "withdrew" their ballot rather than face prosecution. It's very likely that throughout the country, fraudulent votes were cast and counted by local Democrats who sought "payback" for alleged vote rigging by Republicans. Luckily, Obama's victory was large enough that claims that he stole the election would be ludicrous. Sadly, in Minnesota, we might not be able to say the same thing.

For more on the Minnesota siutation, follow PowerlineBlog.com and MinnesotaDemocratsExposed.

Comments

[Minnesota Central]

Please be informed that the final determination will be by two Minnesota Supreme Court Justices, two Appellate Justices and the Minnesota Secretary of State. The party affiliation of the SOS is Democratic, but who the judges will be, has not even been determined. Since most judges have been nominated by Republicans for 13 of the past 17 years (with Independence Party Governor Ventura in the middle who would have not had a party preference), so there is a likelihood that Republican interests will be represented. That said, I believe that each of these individuals would put their personal integrity before their party affiliation. Also, I don't know if there have been any major procedural changes from when a Republican was SOS in 2006.

What this fiasco illustrates is that these types of instances happen in every election ... leaving ballots in a car is not the first occurrence in Minnesota. The difference is that the margin is so close and the office being contested. But that's why they initially announce the preliminary results on Election night, but then redo everything with a due date weeks later. In most instances, the margin is large enough that no one notices the slight difference in the final tally.

What is not being discussed is that Coleman performed so poorly. With 58% of the voters selecting someone else indicates that people are unhappy with him. In 2002, he won by 61,000 votes garnering 49% ... now he's down to 42% and at the State Nominating Convention there were a large contingent that vocally opposed Coleman.

In the end, a Senator will be elected but he will have more detractors than supporters.

[Jim Durbin]

Ladies and Gentleman - this is what is known as misdirection.

What are good friend from Minnesota is saying is that once the election is certified, the recounts will be done through the process he/she claims.

But 500 votes appearing for Franken (or disappearing for Coleman) prior to the certification is wildly improbable. "Found" votes may be valid, but there's no way to tell whether or not they were.

The standard becomes "count every vote," but is a ballot that was left in a car for three days really a ballot? Would they have appeared if Coleman were behind but close?

As in King County in Washington, all of the "found" votes, magically help the Democrat, and only districts that are heavily Democrat seem to have these problems.

In past years, in places like Chicago, ward leaders held votes back until other votes were counted, so they knew how many they had to add.

As long as Democratic-controlled polling stations continue to "find" votes in close elections, the rest of the country has no choice but to believe that a deliberate assault on the fairness of our elections is being conducted.