On Thursday, CBS4 in Denver posted an article about an investigation of voter fraud that they did in Colorado.
The article reports:
“We do believe there were several instances of potential vote fraud that occurred,” said Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams after reviewing the CBS4 findings. “It shows there is the potential for fraud.”
The cases of dead men and women casting ballots ranged from El Paso County in southern Colorado to Denver and Jefferson County. CBS4 discovered the fraudulent voting by comparing databases of voting histories in Colorado against a federal death database.
The CBS4 investigation has triggered criminal investigations in El Paso and Jefferson counties along with a broad investigation by the Colorado Secretary of State’s office.
State voting officials have explained that they can only remove people from the voting lists if the name, address, etc., are a perfect match.
The article illustrates the problem of voter fraud:
Out of approximately 2 million votes cast in Colorado’s last election cycle, 8,000 ballots were not counted when signatures did not match. The importance of finding and weeding out fraudulent votes is underlined by the 2002 election in Colorado’s 7th Congressional district. That race was decided by 121 votes out of more than 175,000 that were cast. In Ohio in 2010, a tax measure passed by just two votes.
Following the CBS4 investigation, the Colorado Secretary of State’s office reviewed the CBS4 findings and confirmed at least 78 dead voters remained eligible to vote. Lynn Bartels, a spokesperson for the Secretary of State’s office, said county clerks were notified and told to immediately remove those 78 names from voter rolls. Bartels said “It’s not clear why” those dead citizens were still being listed as eligible voters.
Chuck Broerman said what CBS4 found “undermines our system. It does dilute your vote in a small way.”
Williams said measures implemented in 2015 should reduce the number of dead voters casting ballots in Colorado, but he noted that the CBS4 investigation indicates further measures might be necessary.
“It’s not a perfect system,” said Williams, “It is impossible to vote from the grave legally.”
Voter ID is necessary to prevent this sort of voter fraud. We live in a society where identification is required for many basic activities–cashing a check, opening a bank account, buying cigarettes or alcohol, filling some prescriptions, entering federal buildings, boarding an airplane, and others. It is time to require a picture ID to vote. That is the only way the votes of honest Americans will count.