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posted by on Tuesday March 28 2017, @12:01PM   Printer-friendly
from the Takes-One-to-Know-One dept.

The former chairman of the Colorado Republican Party is charged with forgery and voter fraud for allegedly forging his wife’s[*] mail-in ballot from last year’s election, according to court records and sources.

Steven Curtis was the chairman of the state party from 1997 to 1999. He was charged Feb. 1 with one count of forgery of a public record, a fifth-degree felony, and an elections mail-in ballot offense, a misdemeanor.

Curtis spoke about voter fraud ahead of last year’s election.

"It seems to be, and correct me if I’m wrong here, but virtually every case of voter fraud I can remember in my lifetime was committed by Democrats,"

[* Note that she is described as his "former spouse" elsewhere, such as ...]

Also covered in more depth, and perhaps more accurately, at Salon.

1 down, 2,999,999 illegal votes to go!


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 28 2017, @12:55PM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 28 2017, @12:55PM (#485107)

    What's the reason why voter ballots are send to people by mail? Seems like that is inherently sensitive for fraud.

    In most countries you'll have to go the voting location first, there you can get the ballot after verifying ID and such, and than you can vote. Ballot stays there during the whole voting process.

  • (Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday March 28 2017, @01:39PM

    by sjames (2882) on Tuesday March 28 2017, @01:39PM (#485134) Journal

    Because they have a right to vote even if they won't be able to get to the polling place. In this case, it sounds like she had recently moved to another state but her voter registration couldn't be updated in time. An absentee ballot was to only way she could have her right to vote.

  • (Score: 2) by bradley13 on Tuesday March 28 2017, @02:57PM (5 children)

    by bradley13 (3053) on Tuesday March 28 2017, @02:57PM (#485175) Homepage Journal

    Mail is not necessarily a problem...

    Here (Switzerland) most people vote by mail. It's a lot more convenient, and - important point - you get a detailed set of documents with your ballot, written by the people for it and against it respectively. Obviously, you can inform yourself in other ways, but it's very convenient having the (presumably best) pro and con arguments sent to you along with the ballot. So you can sit down over a cup of coffee, read those arguments, and make your decision.

    What would constitute voter fraud? Consider:

    - Ballot theft? If I don't get my ballot, I'll go to the town hall and ask what happened. You would have to carefully steal ballots only from people who don't plan to vote. Unlikely to succeed on any sort of large scale.

    - Submitting forged ballots? You get or create "extra" ballots, and fill the in for someone else. But: the ballots are organized so that the town knows who voted, without knowing who cast which vote. So again, you have to carefully only forge ballots for people who aren't going to vote, because duplicate names will be noticed.

    - Voting the graveyard, etc. - doesn't work here, because towns here know who their residents are, and only residents get ballots.

    Anything else is going to require collusion of the vote counters, or fraud at a higher level than individual ballots. Seems to me that voting by mail is actually pretty secure.

    --
    Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by NewNic on Tuesday March 28 2017, @04:47PM (4 children)

      by NewNic (6420) on Tuesday March 28 2017, @04:47PM (#485292) Journal

      The real problem with mail-in ballots is that you don't know whose views are represented by the votes cast.

      I would be willing to bet that there are many, many households where the patriarch or matriarch of the family collects all the ballots and either fills them in, or instructs the family members how to fill them in and then they are returned. Effectively, the patriarch or matriarch votes multiple times, while the family members are disenfranchised.

      IMHO, postal votes should not be available on demand: they should only be available to people who have a good reason to vote by mail. My father made it to the polls to vote in person when he was in his '90s.

      As for the voter information: there is no reason why this cannot be sent in advance to every voter. In fact, this is how it works where I live in CA.

      --
      lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
      • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday March 28 2017, @06:27PM

        by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 28 2017, @06:27PM (#485374) Homepage Journal

        Here in Quebec, the election officials hold polls in senior's residences to make sure they can vote.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @01:09AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 29 2017, @01:09AM (#485593)

        Yeah, because it's so important that we prevent a few cases of fraud that we must make voting less easy and available.

        My father made it to the polls to vote in person when he was in his '90s.

        Cool, but there are many who can't.

        • (Score: 2) by number6x on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:30PM

          by number6x (903) on Wednesday March 29 2017, @04:30PM (#486001)

          My wife's grandfather voted in his 90's. He slipped on the ice on the way out of the polling place and cracked his neck.

          He was recovering well in the local hospital he was sent to originally. The doctors said he would recover with very few problems.

          he was then transfered to a VA hospital. He was a WWI vet. He got a staph infection at the VA and died shortly afterwards.

          Making it easier to vote is a good thing for citizens. Making it difficult to vote is a good thing for politicians.

      • (Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Wednesday March 29 2017, @08:54AM

        by Joe Desertrat (2454) on Wednesday March 29 2017, @08:54AM (#485778)

        The real problem with mail-in ballots is that you don't know whose views are represented by the votes cast.

        Do you know this to be a problem or are you just assuming this? I used a mail-in absentee ballot when I lived and worked in a desert national park which was over 100 miles from the actual polling place. So did others who worked there and had established residency. None of us to my knowledge had our ballots filled in by anyone other than ourselves.