Congressional Special Election (last call! unstickied after NY-27 final results)

[Brittain33]

And the people of the 9th chose Harris.

These disingenuous posts, with their repetition, are crossing the line into trolling. I suggest you reconsider.

If people see trolling behavior on these threads, please report to the mods.

[Brittain33]

And the people of the 9th chose Harris.

These disingenuous posts, with their repetition, are crossing the line into trolling. I suggest you reconsider.

If people see trolling behavior on these threads, please report to the mods.

Since when is stating a fact trolling. Even if you invalidate every single absentee ballot from Bladen County Harris still wins. The people of the ninth clearly chose Harris lol, that’s not trolling.

Of course, this should still be investigated and if someone committed fraud they should be thrown in jail. But the county is just too small to have had an impact on this race’s outcome.

When it’s false AND it’s posted disingenuously ignoring the facts posted and quoted AND it’s posted multiple times in a row. That’s when it crosses the line into trolling. Bagel knows what he’s doing.

[Brittain33]

Can someone provide the Cliffs Notes version of jim's post? It looks like the explanation for fraud that caused incredible and atypical Republican results is "Democrats did something bad" but that is so confusing that I won't believe it.

[Brittain33]

Can someone provide the Cliffs Notes version of jim's post? It looks like the explanation for fraud that caused incredible and atypical Republican results is "Democrats did something bad" but that is so confusing that I won't believe it.

Pretty much.   A black Democrat goes door to door with sample ballots, take the people's ballots to the poll.   Democrats have been harvesting votes for decades, Republicans never do anything wrong....yadda yadda yadda.

Thank you for summarizing.

[Brittain33]

Democrats are...

Blah blah blah. I know you're reading this thread and understand what's happening in NC-9. As FLOTUS would say, when you're tempted to post things like this, remember to be best instead.

[Brittain33]

Harris supposedly got 96% of the absentee vote by mail in Bladen County. What is the precedent for scoring in the high 90s in absentee vote in a county that is roughly evenly split in a race that is roughly evenly split?

I'll take my answer off the air.

"There are people who are registered Democrats in the South who don't always vote for Democrats" is not a meaningful reply.

The envelopes of the absentee ballots are a rich source of information because they require not only the signature of the voter but the signature of two witnesses. Pending an investigation by the North Carolina State Board of Elections, which voted unanimously against certifying the election, these envelopes have been impounded.

Under normal circumstances, however, these envelopes are available at the local election board for review as public information. Before the Board of Election's action, 162 of the absentee ballot envelopes were photocopied. Popular Information obtained the images of these envelopes through a source.


In all, a group of just eight witnesses appear on over 130 of the 162 absentee ballot envelopes obtained by Popular Information. A summary:

    Woody Hester witnessed 45 absentee ballots

    James Singletary witnessed 43 absentee ballots

    Lisa Britt, who shares an address with Sandra Dowless, witnessed 44 absentee ballots

    Ginger Eason witnessed 31 absentee ballots

    Jessica Dowless witnessed 15 absentee ballots

    Cheryl Kinlaw witnessed 14 absentee ballots

    Deborah Edwards witnessed 11 absentee ballots

    Sandra Dowless witnessed 10 absentee ballots

In many cases, these witnesses were working in concert. James Singletary and Lisa Britt, for example, witnessed almost 30 ballots together.

Back in 2016, when it was noticed that all the "Graham Franklin" write-ins were the same handwriting, Horace Munn, leader of the Bladen County Improvement PAC, explained that whoever wrotein the names in must not have realized that they had to also sign the ballot as an assistant even though they didn't do the bubbles.

Remember, BCIPAC claimed that they simply provided a sample ballot "suggesting" how the voter should vote. My presumption is that the sample ballot would be provided when the "volunteers" who were only receiving "expense" money to witness the filling in of the ballot.

In theory, a voter should be able to to vote autonomously. If the voter has a vision disability, a person assisting them can read them the ballot. But they can't say "do you want to vote for the witch, the troll, the witch doctor, or the pot head?" or "You want to vote for that nice Miz Clinton, right?" Similarly, if a voter has a motor disability, an assistant may mark the ballot, but only at the direction of the voter. Presumably, inability to write-in a name legibly enough for it to count might be considered a motor disability.

Now think what happens when you vote in person. If a state requires picture ID, the election judges verify the voters identity, otherwise they accept that the voter is who they say they are, and the voter signs the voting roll confirming that they are that person. Pollwatchers could object. Then the voter is given a ballot and they go over to a voting station. It can be observed that they are voting, and that they took the completed ballot and dropped it in the ballot box. If a voter needs assistance, they can choose their assistant, who takes an oath that they will only act as an agent for the voter. While it may difficult to fully comply, it at least reminds the assistant of their duties.

The election judges in effect witness hundreds of voters casting their ballots.

The absentee voting experience is, in theory, equivalent.

A voter makes an application for an absentee ballot. The blank ballot is sent to the address they are registered at. In theory, this is equivalent to handing a voter a ballot at the polling place. They will sign the ballot envelope when they complete voting.

If a runner helps the voter make an application for an absentee ballot, it is not much different from a volunteer driving a voter to the polls. Likely as not, the person is being politically selective in who they assist.

When the absentee ballot is sent out, the runner(s) reappear. They may even be so helpful as pulling the ballot out of the mailbox and walking it to the door. That is only being neighborly.

The runners/witnesses make sure that it is the actual voter voting the ballot. They hand the voter a sample ballot ("only a suggestion, but Mr. Munn thought you might appreciate it"). The witnesses are supposed to make sure that it is the voter who is filling out the ballot, but also to protect the secrecy of the ballot. "I don't know how she voted, she may have glanced over at the sample ballot, and she might have voted for someone else. I was sitting across from the table and so the ballot was upside to me and I couldn't be sure"

After the voter marks the ballot, she puts it in the ballot envelope (equivalent to putting the ballot into the ballot box), fills out an affidavit on the envelope (the equivalent to signing the voting roll), and the witnesses sign it. If anyone provided assistance, such as writing in "Franklin Graham" or filling in the bubbles, they are also supposed to sign as an assistant. According to Horace Munn the witnesses who also assisted by writing in "Franklin Graham" should also have signed as an assistant. If the witnesses who had handed the sample ballot to the voter, had also assisted a voter who had misplaced her eyeglasses, they should have signed as an assistant who was neutral.

Because North Carolina requires two witnesses, the runners work in pairs. The "expert" Gerry Cohen is naive/disingenuous if he thinks that it works where the witnesses are family members, neighbors, are work mates.

If we look at NC-7 in Bladen County we observe:

Election Day: Horton(D) 55%, Rouzer(R) 44%, (L) 1%.
Early Voting: Horton(D) 61%, Rouzer(R) 36%, (L) 1%.
Absentee: Horton(D) 87%, Rouzer(R) 13%, (L) 0%.

Horton did approximately 30% better among absentee voters, vs. in person voters.

And just for fun:

P30: Horton(D) 81%, Rouzer(R) 18%, (L) 1%.

P30 is Carver's Creek township in far southeastern Bladen County. The township is 60% Black, 18% White, and 18% AIAN (Waccamaw Siouan). So the least white township in the county was less strong for the Democratic candidate than the absentee votes.

It appears that news stories have been conflating countywide absentee votes by party, with absentee votes received in NC-9, ignoring those in NC-7.

The NCSBE has ordered Bladen County not to certify the results of the county commission race in District 3, which was apparently won by the Democrat, but had stronger support by absentee ballots.

[Brittain33]

For all of those saying Harris should be certified because he would've won with or without fraud (from the NYT)

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Now across the district the average was 23% not returned while 3400 weren't returned in those two counties and I think the number was something like 60% among native americans. The nyt needs to report those percentage difference as not returned ballots are relatively common but that high a percentage is not normal.

I think the New York Times reporting serves to counter the notion we have much certainty about how many votes are "in play" one way or another. There were simply too many opportunities to disrupt the chain of voting in ways that leave different impacts on the totals (filling in votes for candidates vs. throwing away ballots) that it's a fool's game to believe you know with any precision what the votes should be. That's why it's best to focus on the actual crimes committed by Harris's campaign and its local stooges.

In theory, someone well-informed could do modeling and statistical analysis about what could have happened but in practice people are responding to individual data points and making badly-informed guesses.

[Brittain33]

Pat McCrory won Bladen county by 6 points. Roy Cooper won absentees by 23. Looks like there needs to be another investigation....into the governor.

Cool. What was the discrepancy statewide and in neighboring counties? What stands out with Harris’s fraud is how insane the numbers are compared to every other county in the state. He won absentees with 96% of the vote! Was Cooper in the 90s in Bladen?

[Brittain33]

It's weird to see the name Joe Bruno show up as the reporter on this story when I associate that name with NY Senate Republicans in the past.

[Brittain33]

I'm sure Jesus told him to rig the election.

We're two weeks away from hearing he was banned from the mall.

[Brittain33]

Why do you keep bringing up different data and not responding to the data I and others bring up? You implied Harris’ 61% in absentee was in line with his ED vote in Bladen. Do you now see it’s a red flag?

The reason why is that I am capable of looking at data and making an independent conclusion.

Others (perhaps including you) have certain prejudices.

You should consider a third category here besides 1) election data and 2) personal prejudices. The third category is artifacts from the reporting and incipient criminal case here which is being heavily investigated and reported on and which led the bi-partisan board of elections to refuse to certify the election.

You haven't made the argument for throwing all of that out and only considering speculative and possibly tendentious interpretations of data in order to reach a conclusion. And it looks like you're choosing not to engage with what's being reported or investigated, and that's confusing.

[Brittain33]

If the GOP is caving you know it's worse than what has been revealed.

[Brittain33]

Harris personally directed Dowless' hiring despite warnings that he may have used fraud in 2016. They interacted regularly during the primary according to a former Dowless associate, and said associate claims Dowless and Harris spoke often about the "program."

Press S to spit on political grave.

S

I bet we could use an anecdote about an unrelated Bladen county election in 2012 about now.

[Brittain33]

You’re really, really reaching here. The dems are not the ones at fault here, no matter the mental gymnastics you keep trying to pull.

It's like there's a tv tuned to Hannity in a waiting room and no one's watching it.

[Brittain33]

Harris personally directed Dowless' hiring despite warnings that he may have used fraud in 2016. They interacted regularly during the primary according to a former Dowless associate, and said associate claims Dowless and Harris spoke often about the "program."

Press S to spit on political grave.

S

I bet we could use an anecdote about an unrelated Bladen county election in 2012 about now.

The reason that Jon David, the Republican DA for the district that includes Bladen County, referred the concerns to the NCSBE, was that McCrae Dowless had been working to elect Rex Gore who defeated Jon David in 2006. In 2010, McCrae Dowless was working for Butch Pope who defeated Gore in the primary, David defeated Pope in the general election, based on overwhelming Republican support from Brunswick County.

Rex Gore was subsequently prosecuted for his role as DA, when he approved $14,000 in fraudulent travel expenses by an assistant DA between Elizabethtown and Bolivia. Gore plea bargained for a sentence that left him with his law license.

So?

To be fair, I asked for a random anecdote.

[Brittain33]

[Outgoing GOP Rep. Robert Pittenger is ruling out running if there's a do-over of the Republican primary

Todd Johnson was elected to the state senate.

Surprised that this has gone relatively unreported as he is likely connected to McCray Dowless' crimes in 2016.

Given that the Bladen County Improvement Association endorsed McCrae Dowless when he was first elected to the Soil and Water district in 2012, and he was in business with the chairman of the Democratic chairman of Bladen County, and had supported Democratic candidates against the Republican DA for the district including Bladen County, were Roy Cooper and Eric Holder protecting Dowless?

I heard that his godparents were Tip O'Neill and Eleanor Roosevelt and he wore a red diaper to his first May Day parade.

There must be SOME mistake about his rigging the election in favor of the Republican candidate in 2018.

[Brittain33]

Did he just go bad after he became a Republican?

Jim, one reason there is so much talking past each other is that people's interest is in the election mentioned in the subject of the thread, the NC-9 general election which has not been certified (and the primary which was), and shenanigans that went on around that. I have no reason to doubt there were shenanigans in the past, but why does it matter who it benefited then or could in the future? Whether it benefited Dems or Republicans, it shouldn't happen before or in the future.

It seems like you think there is some partisan divide here but you're the only one introducing it. Saying someone helped Democrats or didn't in the past for races that weren't on our radars and are already certified (for better or worse), doesn't mean people are suddenly ok with a Republican stealing an election. It doesn't work that way. Just prosecute the crimes and enforce the laws.

[Brittain33]

Did he just go bad after he became a Republican?

Jim, one reason there is so much talking past each other is that people's interest is in the election mentioned in the subject of the thread, the NC-9 general election which has not been certified (and the primary which was), and shenanigans that went on around that. I have no reason to doubt there were shenanigans in the past, but why does it matter who it benefited then or could in the future? Whether it benefited Dems or Republicans, it shouldn't happen before or in the future.

It seems like you think there is some partisan divide here but you're the only one introducing it. Saying someone helped Democrats or didn't in the past for races that weren't on our radars and are already certified (for better or worse), doesn't mean people are suddenly ok with a Republican stealing an election. It doesn't work that way. Just prosecute the crimes and enforce the laws.

Perhaps you are being manipulated?

Do you think the Billy Ward vote in the 2018 primary was due to shenanigans? Do you actually have a radar? Maybe it is defective. What about 2018 Democratic primary for sheriff?

Have you read the transcript of the 2016 NCSBE hearing?

Have you read the referral to the USDOJ made following the 2016 election?

Nope, because I’m only interested in the 2018 NC-9 general and primary elections. I have no motivation to go do other homework assignments.

And to be honest, while I trust you when you present information based on data such as your projections for Congressional apportionment, over many years I have seen how you shade stories with any partisan content to the point that I don't trust you to be an honest and accurate narrator on past events when you have an axe to grind on behalf of your team.

Where that leaves me here is that I don't believe your take on events before 2018 (although I'm sure it contains many facts) and I don't care enough to find out the full truth whether it validates your account or not. It's possible what you're writing is 100% accurate, and Eric Holder is covering for the shenanigans in Bladen County as you claim! I don't have any reason to care.

[Brittain33]

Now that the new congress is sworn in and the seat is vacant, what's stopping there from being a regular special election? This should be the procedure, right? Independent of the ongoing investigation.

The House will give the state government a chance to certify a winner before they decide whether or not to seat that person.

All that should matter is that there's currently a vacancy, right? House vacancies are resolved by special election, regardless as to why the seat is vacant. The house can't choose to not seat him because they haven't been handed a certificate.

Not precisely. The House recognizes the existence of a vacancy when a seat is filled and then becomes unfilled.  In this case, we simply have an election that has not concluded. You can't call a special election because there's already an election taking place - it simply has not concluded. NC could certify Harris right now if it so chose, but it so far has not done so, and certification is required to seat a member, except in cases where there is no question over who was elected, which is obviously not the case here.

In order to call a new election, either the house would have to take a separate and deliberate action of declaring the seat to be vacant (which would invite partisan criticisms), or NC must officially declare the election null and void. So far, neither has happened. Once either does, a special is called.

The House is going to investigate what the Republicans did, and can order a new election based on what they discover. More about their powers here.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/01/05/north-carolina-election-house-democrats-1082561

If then NC Republicans rush through an illegitimate certification, the House can move to confront and correct. After so many years of the NC Republicans thwarting democracy with only the courts to step in, it’s wonderful for democracy to see some additional checks and balances on their shenanigans.

[Brittain33]

Records show NCSBE Chair had frequent contact with figure in NC-09 investigation during ’18 election

When Jens Lutz resigned from the Bladen County Board of Elections he said that members of the Democratic Party had gone too far when they brought his family into it. Ben Snyder, the Democratic chair for the county said it was a husband and wife who were behind it.

Given that it was Democrats and this is in the rural South, could the Klan be behind it? It sounds like something the FBI should investigate.

Incidentally, Josh Malcolm's daughter, who lives at his address, was being paid by the North Carolina Democratic party out of a federal campaign fund which was in turn funded by the McCready campaign. Malcolm should have recused himself rather than involve himself in an investigation which could conceivably involve his daughter.

Sounds you like should contact your congressman and make sure this info is passed onto the House committee that will be investigating the crimes here.

[Brittain33]

henster posted more details in the general election night thread:

This comment on reddit is interesting.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Charlotte/comments/a10kqk/nc_elections_board_declines_to_certify_9th/ean1n30/?st=jp1g5esc&sh=15095a86

That's strange enough to warrant a deeper look.

If nothing else, I want a reporter to visit the precinct which doubled (!) turnout between 2016 and 2018 while the county as a whole saw turnout go down 12%. Must be a fascinating place.

Is this a rhetorical question?

Why is it OK for you to mention the 2016 election, but others are not?

Is it because you are moderator?

Bro, how many of your posts mentioning 2016 have been moderated? You are allowed to post about it; you just don’t get shielded from responses to your posts.

[Brittain33]

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1082656962217721861

Just like the flight of Mary and Jesus to Egypt to escape persecution.

[Brittain33]

So is anything happening or is this seat gonna be empty till January 2021?

In Raleigh, a judge is hearing arguments by Crooked Mark Harris that the shuffling of the state board of elections renders various decisions invalid and he should have been certified despite his campaign's involvement in fraud. Attorneys for Rep-elect McReady are making the case for this to be thrown out.

https://www.wfae.org/post/judge-weigh-harris-victory-claim-tuesday#stream/0

[Brittain33]

Is this seat the Charlotte suburbs?

Charlotte suburbs, Lumbee country, and rural areas in-between.

[Brittain33]

Is this seat the Charlotte suburbs?

Charlotte suburbs, Lumbee country, and rural areas in-between.

That is probably why McCready lost - he didn't know that Bladen County was in the district. How many times did he speak in Elizabethtown, and how many times did he fly out to Hollywood or San Francisco for a fund raising event?

Bladen County isn't in NC-9, Jim. You might be looking at an older map before they redistricted.