by Tabitha Walter, Eagle Forum Political Director.
There is one thing that Michelle Obama and I agree on: We must vote in-person this November. Despite Democrats making universal vote-by-mail a policy initiative of their party platform, the former First Lady plead, “We have got to grab our comfortable shoes, put on our masks, pack a brown bag dinner and maybe breakfast, too, because we’ve got to be willing to stand in line all night if we have to.” Why? Because she knows the stakes are high and voting by mail is not safe.
With sweeping changes due to the current pandemic, only six states require an excuse to vote by mail now and eight states, along with Washington, D.C., are automatically sending ballots to all voters. With cluttered voter rolls and mismanaged election offices, this lays fertile ground for abuse of our election system.
The United States Postal Service (USPS) simply cannot promise that your ballot will be kept private or that it will arrive on time. In fact, the post office has failed to meet basic standards for years now. USPS has accumulated almost $161 billion in debt and even lost almost $9 billion last year alone. New technology and methods of delivery have evolved over the last decade, but the post office has not, rendering their business model unsustainable.
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi saw this as an opportunity to push her agenda and further divide Americans. She brought Congress back into session on a Saturday to pass the Delivering for America Act which provided a $25 billion bailout for the USPS. This was in addition to the $10 billion bailout that came in a previous Coronavirus stimulus bill. It is no surprise that the bill passed due to the Democrat majority in the House, however, 26 Republicans voted in favor. The Left’s delusional messaging is slowly creeping into the Republican party.
Liberals labeled those who opposed these bailouts as fascists and election interrupters. The same people pushing out memes painting the post office in a flawless light were the same ones complaining about their missing package weeks prior. Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky put it this way, “If you won the PowerBall, would you be willing to send your winning ticket through the mail?” I think not.
Some states allow ballot harvesting during elections where someone goes house-to-house to collect ballots. In California, campaign workers can do just that. Imagine handing over your ballot to the candidate you oppose or to a political organization like Planned Parenthood or Black Lives Matter. The allure for voter fraud is real and attainable.
Ballot harvesting has actually overturned elections. In North Carolina’s 2018 congressional primary, a political contractor collected ballots and filled out ones that were left blank. When election officials were made aware, the whole race was thrown out and a new one conducted. The last thing we need to experience in 2020 is a whole new election.
On a positive note, Wisconsin successfully kept the spread of COVID-19 down while allowing voters to cast their ballots in-person during their April primary. Based on the Wisconsin Department of Health Services’ data, out of 400,000 voters, 71 tested positive for the virus afterward. Out of those cases, many were infected somewhere other than their polling place. The study deemed voting in-person a low-risk activity. When asked if Americans should vote in-person, Dr. Anthony Fauci said, “I think if carefully done, according to the guidelines, there’s no reason that I can see why that not be the case.” We have the science and the data to back it up.
New York City’s June primary is a perfect case against mail-in voting. Election officials rejected 84,000 mail ballots due to minor errors. Out of the hundreds of thousands of ballots received, one in five were thrown away. This isn’t a rare situation though. Election offices in various states have seen tens of thousands of errors in their mailed ballots as well.
These are errors that could have easily been avoided. When voting in-person, questions about a confusing ballot or fields accidentally left blank can be easily caught and highlighted by a poll worker before leaving your polling place. In past election years, officials’ efforts to “improve” ballots have at times caused more confusion than clarity. Unclear instructions, missing information, or formatting issues can immediately be addressed by those trained to remedy these situations.
With the current divisive political climate and a culture rapidly embracing oppressive regimes, the 2020 election is the most important one in history. Now is the time to make your vote count and to do that, you must vote in-person.