I think my favorite quote from the Republicans is "ballot harvesting will continue". Those boxes are appearing near me, too. I dropped my votes off in front of the county courthouse, at what I really hope is an official box, but since the GOP boxes also say "Official Ballot Box" it's impossible to tell.
Details on this: it was recently made legal for anyone, regardless of their relationship to the voter, to return votes to the county -- provided that the voter signs that they give access to that specific person to deliver the ballot on their behalf. These extra ballot boxes have no specific person associated with them known to the voter, and thus are in violation of state law. People will go to prison over this.
As SilverFang said, the ballots could be filtered based on who sent them, if a political party had access to them. The back of the ballot includes the voter's name, address, and signature -- all things that must be verified and sorted before counting begins. But this is more than enough information to look up the voter on PDI, find out that voter's partisan registration, and decide whether to keep it or toss it -- all without opening the envelope.
The Republicans are saying, "Democrats are doing it, why can't we do ballot harvesting?" But we do it on a person-to-person basis, where the voter signs the ballot to the person who delivers it. A mystery box is not the same thing. Also, in Ventura County, a Republican runs the county elections and he decides where the drop-off boxes go. So it's not like they've been shut out of that process, either. So like, seriously Republicans, please stop running your voter fraud ring.
Meanwhile, in Virginia, voter registration website goes down on deadline because the cable was cut. Wow, what a coincidence.
Details on this: it was recently made legal for anyone, regardless of their relationship to the voter, to return votes to the county -- provided that the voter signs that they give access to that specific person to deliver the ballot on their behalf. These extra ballot boxes have no specific person associated with them known to the voter, and thus are in violation of state law. People will go to prison over this.
As SilverFang said, the ballots could be filtered based on who sent them, if a political party had access to them. The back of the ballot includes the voter's name, address, and signature -- all things that must be verified and sorted before counting begins. But this is more than enough information to look up the voter on PDI, find out that voter's partisan registration, and decide whether to keep it or toss it -- all without opening the envelope.
The Republicans are saying, "Democrats are doing it, why can't we do ballot harvesting?" But we do it on a person-to-person basis, where the voter signs the ballot to the person who delivers it. A mystery box is not the same thing. Also, in Ventura County, a Republican runs the county elections and he decides where the drop-off boxes go. So it's not like they've been shut out of that process, either. So like, seriously Republicans, please stop running your voter fraud ring.
Meanwhile, in Virginia, voter registration website goes down on deadline because the cable was cut. Wow, what a coincidence.
"Kitto daijoubu da yo." - Sakura Kinomoto