An Unfortunate But Necessary Decision

Yesterday One America News posted an article about President Trump’s shutting down of the Voter Integrity Commission. There is no question that we do have a problem with voter fraud–it is a problem we have traditionally had (Chicago?). The question is how much voter fraud is there and what can we do to combat it. One of the problems is the fact that all states are not updating their voter registration lists on a regular basis. Last year a friend of mine checked the voter rolls and found that there were three voters registered at her address who did not live there. When she approached the Board of Elections, she was told that she did not have the authority to remove those people from the voter rolls. Hopefully there is a procedure to verify the information and remove them, but her word was not enough.

The article reports:

Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky says that members received an email only shortly before the president signed the Executive Order to end the commission.

Mr. von Spakovsky explains the problems with the commission:

Von Spakovsky says that he understands why the president made the decision to do so, despite his disappointment and frustration.  Von Spakovsky validated the president’s explanation for the decision.  Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a statement that “rather than engage in endless legal battles at taxpayer expense.”

Von Spakovsky says the demise of the commission can be attributed to two reasons– the refusal of some states to share voter registration information and litigation.  “We’ve had almost a dozen lawsuits filed against the commission, all of them frivolous. And those lawsuits were intended to keep us from being able to work and unfortunately they were successful,” said the former commission member.

According to von Spakovsky, commission members spent nearly 100% of their time fighting litigation rather than investigating voter integrity.  “It basically became impossible for us to do the work we were intended to do,” added Von Spakovsky.

Members of the panel also suffered personal attacks. Von Spakovsky was accused of sending an email to the Department of Justice requesting that “democrats” not be allowed to serve on the panel.  However, the Heritage Foundation fellow refutes that claim saying that he had expressed concerns about democrats joining the panel in a private email months before he himself joined the panel. That individual forwarded the email to the DOJ.  Von Spakovsky said that his concern was that democrats would join the panel to sabotage its work–a prediction that proved true according to von Spakovsky.

“One of the democratic members, Matt Dunlap- he’s the Secretary of State of Maine- actually filed a lawsuit against the commission as a member.  Again, making all kinds of frivolous claims.  And it was lawsuits like that that made it practically impossible for us to work,” said von Spakovsky.

One wonders why anyone would want to block a commission to ensure the integrity of America’s elections.

The article concludes:

Trump signed an executive order abolishing the panel and turning the matter over to the Department of Homeland Security. However, von Spakovsky is concerned DHS will focus solely on cyber security attacks rather than addressing illegal immigrants that may be voting and those people are registered and voting in more than one state.

The ending of this commission illustrates the difference in how the government works and how a businessman thinks. As Ronald Reagan said, “A government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.” A businessman ends a program if it isn’t working. Obviously we need more businessmen in our government.

Voter Fraud Is Real

The Daily Signal posted an article today about voter fraud.

The article reports:

On Thursday, The Heritage Foundation is releasing a new edition of its voter fraud database. Featuring well over 100 new cases, the database documents 1,071 instances of voter fraud spanning 47 states, including 938 criminal convictions.

This revamped edition of the database separates cases by type of disposition, allowing readers to easily distinguish not only what type of fraud occurred but the outcome of the case—criminal convictions, pre-trial diversion programs, and other types of adjudication used in various states and counties across the United States.

The article reports specific incidents in a few states. Elections, even federal elections, are controlled by the individual states. However, it is time for all the states to take action to limit voter fraud. One way to limit voter fraud would be to institute voter identification. That would be a really good place to start.