A person can identify their candidate on a ballot, but not be able to complete a survey well enough if they don't understand the question. Obviously things like getting paid for a vote is a serious issue, and pretty hard to misinterpret, but on the question of whether they filled out a ballot for someone- disabled, very elderly, and assisted as a spouse, they may have been interpreting the question as assistance within the legally allowed rules- spouse, parent, child, or sibling of voter. Thus, #3, 4, and 9 does not imply fraud, because states allow relatives to "assist." That could mean anything from the person too weak to fill out the bubble, or they are blind and request the bubble to be filled out.
It's also possible that an illiterate person interpreted # 8 as an absentee ballot, rather than voting for another state.
In FL we do not require witnesses to a mail in ballot signature, and that is probably a weakness that should be corrected, but it must also be something of a minor pain to find someone who can witness your ballot signature who is not also a member of your household, which sort of defeats the purpose of having an "independent" witness. Do you need to go find (and maybe even pay for) a "professional" witness, or go to their location? Should the county hire people to provide such "witnessing services" during the election season? I kind of like that last idea, but it would only be affordable for locales where the need and justification for remote voting is low. But I presume some jurisdictions already send someone to nursing homes and other "high density" remote voter sites.
But such witnessing has two aspects to it: just confirming that the person who signed the ballot envelope was a human, etc. [the witness may not actually know the signer?]; and then having some form of ID verfication of the signer before the witness signs in turn [via drivers license or other decent but not fool proof ID], or that the witness knows the ID of the signer from past acquaintance.
Someone public and famous person (whose name escapes me) recently reemphasized that not only must the voting process be proper, fair, and legal, but that the perception that it is/was proper must also be present for the net election result and the subsequent administrations to be considered legitimate.
Expanding slightly on Sol Hando's comment, we have the technology to do remote voting, etc., but the perception aspect may still make that approach problematical. But a subset for improved voter ID verification might also be worthwhile. I am thinking of something like providing a fingerprint or retina scan when you register to vote. Then have equipment (and trained staff) at the polling site to confirm ID's using those metrics with even less ambiguity than provided by comparing signatures. [My signature has deteriorated with age and the acquisition of arthritis in my fingers, but I have not yet gone back to have my current signature replace my previous one. I think they are close enough for now, but might not be in the future.]
And any legitimate and responsible state legislature and state agencies should be able to set up a scheme for reliable access to multiple public databases about names vs. addresses, etc., to rapidly and continually confirm the validity of voter registration rolls. Agreements to supply the data across county and state lines should be a no brainer. Plus the county property appraisal process should be able to tag addresses as residential and thus valid for a voter's address, vs. not residential and thus invalid for voter registration purposes. The physical address does not have to match a mailing address, but people do not live in postal boxes :-) . Oh, and federal census data sources should be available and used as well.
Going back to Hando's remote tech approach, maybe that can be more legitimately used to confirm a local but remote voter or out of country voter, even going so far as to use Zoom or Facetime or similar visual displays between a remote voter and a local elections official to confirm ID and then the voter pushes buttons (secretly from the election official) to complete the voting process. I would suggest all of this kind of voting should be completed a day or three prior to the official election day, to avoid time zone issues, etc.
Really disturbing that this survey is one that you found and believe to be largely valid in its 20% number.
What I find interesting is that (in principle) all the technology necessary to make remote voting completely secure already exists. There are multiple ID verification services online that require you to scan your face and ID for banking and other businesses that require some KYC.
Requiring a signature is probably the most lame and boring “verification” method we currently have. It’s so easy to subvert that we might as well just call it the honor system.
We could definitely implement some basic electronic verification to at least ensure the person submitting a vote is the same person voting.
I’m far more skeptical of meaningful in-person voter fraud, as the potential personal risk, and ease of discover is far higher.
Yes, I agree. Of course, we still have to be concerned about civil liberties, but I think far more secure, traceable, and transparent electoral processes are possible to implement very quickly.
Unfortunately, the current debate is paralyzed by the "Did the Dems steal the 2020 Presidential election?" and the "Are Republicans election deniers?" discussion. This issue is relevant and important, regardless of what happened in 2020.
This really should be a bipartisan issue, but alas...
There's three kinds of questions which suggest outstanding fraud but I'm not sure how reliable the questions actually are, which are (1) the filling out of of ballots, (2) state residency, and (3) signed envelopes.
(1) seems like the most obvious fraud but it's also wildly unclear to me whether if I ask my wife to fill out a ballot straight ticket R/D and I sign the ballot that we've committed electoral fraud. I suppose we have, but on the other hand I'm unable to appreciate that this is a crisis of democracy.
Regarding (2), the question about permanent residency has a huge number of gaps in it, such as persons misinterpreting if they have moved since 2020, legal military and overseas voters answering yes, legal college students answering yes, and legal transient workers voting yes.
Regarding (3), some states have mechanisms in which you may legally sign a ballot envelope which is not yours: many states have provisions for witnesses and assisters to sign ballot envelopes, and in fact, Virginia in 2020 required that absentee ballot envelopes be signed by witnesses. So positive answers to this question also do not necessarily indicate fraud.
I do think someone should "get to the bottom of this" but I'm also quite skeptical that this poll reveals that 20% of absentee ballots were cast fraudulently.
Thanks for the comment. Let me go through each point separately:
1) I never claimed that this is a crisis in democracy. I do think that it is a very real concern if a person who is not very interested in politics has their spouse who is interested in politics filling out their vote for them. That is double voting, and it should be ballot fraud. Parents doing it for their adult children is also very concerning and from statements that I have heard is quite common.
2) I can see your point about the ambiguity of the question, but I think this captures alot of true fraud. The biggest concern is double voting in your current state and former state, which used to be very easy to do. Not sure now.
Overseas voters and overseas military voting would answer No so it should not apply because they are not in another state.
I am not sure if there is such a thing as legal transient voters in federal elections if you mean immigrants. It is illegal for legal immigrants to vote in federal elections, though I know for a fact that it regularly happens in state and local elections. I know people who have done that.
3) I agree with you on this and mentioned it in my post. I would really like to know more about this. Unfortunately, much of what is now considered legal in many states was very recently considered ballot fraud, which is a very worrying trend. We are running the risk of normalizing ballot fraud at scale.
I am glad that we agree that someone should "get to the bottom of this" I am also not sure what to make of the 20% number from the poll.
I am confident that the percentage of fraudulent ballots is large enough to be bigger than the vote margin in competitive elections. I am also confident that if we do not seriously reform the rules, deliberate fraud is only going to grow bigger and bigger.
In Illinois,
"A voter may authorize any person to return their ballot
to the election authority, as long as the voter has signed
the affidavit on the ballot envelope affirming that
authorization was given to deliver the ballot.
• If available, a voter may return their vote by mail ballot
to a collection site (drop box) postage free before the
close of the polls on Election Day.
• Voting by mail includes the same obligations as those
who vote in the polling place on Election Day.
• The affidavits on the application and the ballot
envelope must be signed. These affidavits attest to the
accuracy of the information provided on the
application. The affidavit on the envelope also attests
to the fact that the voter is voting their own ballot in
secret.
• If the voter receives assistance in voting their ballot, the
name and address of the individual providing the
assistance must be placed on the ballot certification
envelope. Remember that a candidate is NOT allowed
to assist a voter unless the candidate is a spouse,
parent, child, or sibling of that voter."
https://elections.il.gov/electionoperations/votingbymail.aspx
Also, has the Rasmussen poll accounted for the fact that the adult literacy rate is 79%?
https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2019/2019179/index.asp
A person can identify their candidate on a ballot, but not be able to complete a survey well enough if they don't understand the question. Obviously things like getting paid for a vote is a serious issue, and pretty hard to misinterpret, but on the question of whether they filled out a ballot for someone- disabled, very elderly, and assisted as a spouse, they may have been interpreting the question as assistance within the legally allowed rules- spouse, parent, child, or sibling of voter. Thus, #3, 4, and 9 does not imply fraud, because states allow relatives to "assist." That could mean anything from the person too weak to fill out the bubble, or they are blind and request the bubble to be filled out.
It's also possible that an illiterate person interpreted # 8 as an absentee ballot, rather than voting for another state.
In FL we do not require witnesses to a mail in ballot signature, and that is probably a weakness that should be corrected, but it must also be something of a minor pain to find someone who can witness your ballot signature who is not also a member of your household, which sort of defeats the purpose of having an "independent" witness. Do you need to go find (and maybe even pay for) a "professional" witness, or go to their location? Should the county hire people to provide such "witnessing services" during the election season? I kind of like that last idea, but it would only be affordable for locales where the need and justification for remote voting is low. But I presume some jurisdictions already send someone to nursing homes and other "high density" remote voter sites.
But such witnessing has two aspects to it: just confirming that the person who signed the ballot envelope was a human, etc. [the witness may not actually know the signer?]; and then having some form of ID verfication of the signer before the witness signs in turn [via drivers license or other decent but not fool proof ID], or that the witness knows the ID of the signer from past acquaintance.
Someone public and famous person (whose name escapes me) recently reemphasized that not only must the voting process be proper, fair, and legal, but that the perception that it is/was proper must also be present for the net election result and the subsequent administrations to be considered legitimate.
Expanding slightly on Sol Hando's comment, we have the technology to do remote voting, etc., but the perception aspect may still make that approach problematical. But a subset for improved voter ID verification might also be worthwhile. I am thinking of something like providing a fingerprint or retina scan when you register to vote. Then have equipment (and trained staff) at the polling site to confirm ID's using those metrics with even less ambiguity than provided by comparing signatures. [My signature has deteriorated with age and the acquisition of arthritis in my fingers, but I have not yet gone back to have my current signature replace my previous one. I think they are close enough for now, but might not be in the future.]
And any legitimate and responsible state legislature and state agencies should be able to set up a scheme for reliable access to multiple public databases about names vs. addresses, etc., to rapidly and continually confirm the validity of voter registration rolls. Agreements to supply the data across county and state lines should be a no brainer. Plus the county property appraisal process should be able to tag addresses as residential and thus valid for a voter's address, vs. not residential and thus invalid for voter registration purposes. The physical address does not have to match a mailing address, but people do not live in postal boxes :-) . Oh, and federal census data sources should be available and used as well.
Going back to Hando's remote tech approach, maybe that can be more legitimately used to confirm a local but remote voter or out of country voter, even going so far as to use Zoom or Facetime or similar visual displays between a remote voter and a local elections official to confirm ID and then the voter pushes buttons (secretly from the election official) to complete the voting process. I would suggest all of this kind of voting should be completed a day or three prior to the official election day, to avoid time zone issues, etc.
Really disturbing that this survey is one that you found and believe to be largely valid in its 20% number.
What I find interesting is that (in principle) all the technology necessary to make remote voting completely secure already exists. There are multiple ID verification services online that require you to scan your face and ID for banking and other businesses that require some KYC.
Requiring a signature is probably the most lame and boring “verification” method we currently have. It’s so easy to subvert that we might as well just call it the honor system.
We could definitely implement some basic electronic verification to at least ensure the person submitting a vote is the same person voting.
I’m far more skeptical of meaningful in-person voter fraud, as the potential personal risk, and ease of discover is far higher.
Yes, I agree. Of course, we still have to be concerned about civil liberties, but I think far more secure, traceable, and transparent electoral processes are possible to implement very quickly.
Unfortunately, the current debate is paralyzed by the "Did the Dems steal the 2020 Presidential election?" and the "Are Republicans election deniers?" discussion. This issue is relevant and important, regardless of what happened in 2020.
This really should be a bipartisan issue, but alas...
There's three kinds of questions which suggest outstanding fraud but I'm not sure how reliable the questions actually are, which are (1) the filling out of of ballots, (2) state residency, and (3) signed envelopes.
(1) seems like the most obvious fraud but it's also wildly unclear to me whether if I ask my wife to fill out a ballot straight ticket R/D and I sign the ballot that we've committed electoral fraud. I suppose we have, but on the other hand I'm unable to appreciate that this is a crisis of democracy.
Regarding (2), the question about permanent residency has a huge number of gaps in it, such as persons misinterpreting if they have moved since 2020, legal military and overseas voters answering yes, legal college students answering yes, and legal transient workers voting yes.
Regarding (3), some states have mechanisms in which you may legally sign a ballot envelope which is not yours: many states have provisions for witnesses and assisters to sign ballot envelopes, and in fact, Virginia in 2020 required that absentee ballot envelopes be signed by witnesses. So positive answers to this question also do not necessarily indicate fraud.
I do think someone should "get to the bottom of this" but I'm also quite skeptical that this poll reveals that 20% of absentee ballots were cast fraudulently.
Thanks for the comment. Let me go through each point separately:
1) I never claimed that this is a crisis in democracy. I do think that it is a very real concern if a person who is not very interested in politics has their spouse who is interested in politics filling out their vote for them. That is double voting, and it should be ballot fraud. Parents doing it for their adult children is also very concerning and from statements that I have heard is quite common.
2) I can see your point about the ambiguity of the question, but I think this captures alot of true fraud. The biggest concern is double voting in your current state and former state, which used to be very easy to do. Not sure now.
Overseas voters and overseas military voting would answer No so it should not apply because they are not in another state.
I am not sure if there is such a thing as legal transient voters in federal elections if you mean immigrants. It is illegal for legal immigrants to vote in federal elections, though I know for a fact that it regularly happens in state and local elections. I know people who have done that.
3) I agree with you on this and mentioned it in my post. I would really like to know more about this. Unfortunately, much of what is now considered legal in many states was very recently considered ballot fraud, which is a very worrying trend. We are running the risk of normalizing ballot fraud at scale.
I am glad that we agree that someone should "get to the bottom of this" I am also not sure what to make of the 20% number from the poll.
I am confident that the percentage of fraudulent ballots is large enough to be bigger than the vote margin in competitive elections. I am also confident that if we do not seriously reform the rules, deliberate fraud is only going to grow bigger and bigger.
Anyway, thanks for the comment.