Brace yourself. For the next eight months, expect to be bombarded with lurid stories of widespread voter fraud across the country.
Hordes of noncitizens swarming to the polls to destroy our democracy. Voting machines programmed to cheat. Leftist lunatics rigging the system.
Gather your birth certificates, your marriage licenses, your passports. If you want to vote, you’re going to need documents. Lots of documents.
It’s all a con job. And it’s working.
The coordinated propaganda campaign on the nonissue of voter fraud is designed to undermine our confidence in elections and create an opportunity for the federal government to trample voters’ rights and the constitutionally protected right of states to manage elections.
A recent poll found 57% of Republicans (33% of adults overall) say voter fraud is a serious threat despite mountains of evidence to the contrary. Some, mostly Republicans, believe that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent and no matter how many investigations or court rulings are presented to the contrary, nothing will change their minds.
It’s the big lie technique that Trump admits to using to great effect on his gullible followers. Former White House Press Secretary Stephanie Gresham said Trump instructed her on how to do it in her job. She said he told her, “As long as you keep repeating something, it doesn’t matter what you say.”
The birther lies about Obama, the immigrants-are-all-criminals lies, the Mexico-will-pay-for-the-wall lies, the 2020 election fraud lies — lies are the very foundation of Trump’s political success, so let’s not act surprised when he continues his war on truth.
Free and fair elections could be the biggest casualty of this war, though, so let’s look more closely at the facts about voter fraud — which, in fairness, does exist.
The conservative Heritage Foundation has assembled a database of 1,620 documented cases of voter fraud nationally since 1982.
Most of these cases resulted in fines, probation or jail time. A small percentage of them involved noncitizens casting ballots.
More common voter fraud crimes involved convicted felons casting ballots in states like Texas where laws prohibit them from voting, or people (like the former Republican Party chair in Colorado) who forged the names of others on ballots so they could vote multiple times.
And as should be obvious, 1,620 cases involving hundreds of millions of votes cast in more than 40 years of elections can hardly be considered an emergency. Instead, it’s dramatic evidence that the system is working.
Which is what Deputy District Attorney David Bosner said last week when Judge Ryan J. Stuart sentenced Elizabeth Ann Davis to three years in prison. A jury had found her guilty of two counts of forgery and one count of “personating an elector” after submitting fraudulent ballots in the 2022 election.
The sentence shows “that our elections can be trusted,” Bosner said.
Davis, it turns out, participated in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, a protest over perceived election fraud. Bosner noted that it was ironic that if she was so concerned about election integrity, she would come back to Colorado and commit voter fraud.
Then again, maybe it’s not ironic at all.
Participating in a violent protest over an obviously fraudulent claim of an unfair election and then committing voter fraud seems entirely consistent.
The same thing can be said about the case of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters.
I mean, at least she’s consistent.
Peters is serving a nine-year sentence for attempting to tamper with election results by providing unauthorized access to secure voting equipment. She was a vocal proponent of the big lie about election fraud in 2020, so it only makes sense that she would try to use her access to voting equipment to manipulate the results in service to that lie.
Then, when she got caught, of course she showed no remorse.
Realistically, how can she? Her best shot at getting out of prison is to remain a loyal Trump foot soldier in the war on truth. Once she admits she committed a crime and accepts responsibility, she’ll be dubbed a loser and unceremoniously canceled. (See Marjorie Taylor Greene, et al.)
And up until last week, it seemed to be working.
Trump kept the pressure on Gov. Jared Polis to commute her sentence or transfer her to a federal prison where he could release her. Polis started to waffle in his support of her successful prosecution.
Our lame-duck governor said he considered her sentence “harsh.” Given that Davis got three years for a couple of forged ballots and Peters was trying to mess with the whole county’s results, a nine-year sentence seems just about right. But Polis was contemplating clemency anyway.
Then last week he received a letter signed by all 66 Democrats in the state legislature arguing against reducing her prison sentence.
“This is about the security and assuredness of our elections,” it said. “This is about the future of our democracy, and of free and fair elections in our nation. We ask you to stand with us in safeguarding the future.”
Well, since you put it that way …
Suddenly, Polis had a change of heart.
He let the legislators know he will wait for a ruling from the Court of Appeals, which is reviewing her sentence, before making a decision on clemency. Peters will stay put, at least for now.
When it comes to protecting the integrity of our elections, it’s going to take a lot more than keeping Tina Peters in the slammer. But it’s a start.
Diane Carman is a Denver communications consultant.
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