‘We’re seeing a partisan-oriented theft of elections across the country…’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) In North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District, partisans on the state’s Board of Elections have set in motion a complex plan to steal yet another election from the GOP.
By refusing to certify the results of a tight race in which Republican Mark Harris beat his Democratic opponent, Dan McCready, by 905 votes, the Left may either try to force a re-vote (and leverage their enormous fundraising advantage to change the outcome) or forestall the certification long enough to push it to the authority of a Democrat-controlled House of Representatives.
On Wednesday, the elections board made a surprise unanimous decision to delay the certification, following two hours in closed session. On Friday, after an additional three hours in closed session, the board conducted a 10-minute public hearing in which they approved 7-2 a measure to delay certification until no later than Dec. 21 while they investigate alleged irregularities “to ensure that election is determined without taint.”
The decision will impact not only the 9th Congressional District House race, but also other local races in Bladen County, where two voters issued affidavits stating that an unknown person had been around to collect their unsealed absentee ballots.
The county—which was only recently added to the 9th District by virtue of Democrat-led, court-forced gerrymandering efforts—was at the center of a storm of controversy in 2016, as Republican Gov. Pat McCrory charged widespread voter fraud there had helped give the winning edge to his Democrat opponent, Roy Cooper.
Democrat elections board member Joshua Malcolm, who put forth both of the motions on Wednesday and Friday, said, “At the end of that hearing, we either certify a bunch of elections … or this board will operate under some under premise to come to a resolution.”
However, Republicans expressed little confidence in either the motives or the possibility of a clean resolution from the board’s investigation.
State Sen. Dan Bishop, whose district overlaps with part of NC-09, said it was yet another among countless examples in the 2016 midterm where the Left has attempted—and often succeeded—in undermining the will of voters when the outcomes went against Democrats.
“We’re seeing a partisan-oriented theft of elections across the country,” Bishop told Liberty Headlines.
Bishop noted that the state had put forth a ballot measure in the November midterm election that would have overturned a court order striking down legislation to create a bipartisan ethics board to oversee elections, following the widespread concern about fraud in the 2016 election.
The referendum would have introduced more accountability into the current system by eliminating one of the nine seats on the board and having the legislature, rather than the two major political parties, issue appointment recommendations to the governor. However, the measure failed with 61.6 percent voting against it.
“We worked to have a bipartisan elections board to avoid exactly this kind of mischief,” Bishop said, “and I wouldn’t be surprised if more mischief is on the way.”
Bishop noted that the current elections board is statutorily set to expire before the end of the current investigation, leaving uncertainty as to what the procedure will be for certifying the election in time to seat Harris—assuming the current outcome stands. If the state board were unable to fulfill its duty, the job of filling the seat would then be pushed to Congress, which would be under Democratic control.
Another possibility is that the board may aim to expand the scope of the investigation beyond Bladen County—which alone did not generate enough absentee ballots to overturn the result—and into neighboring Robeson County, or possibly to investigate all of the state’s mail-in ballots for irregularities, with one potential outcome being a forced re-vote.
This would give a distinct advantage to McCready, whose losing bid came despite a $3 million fundraising edge when last reported in mid-October. With no other races to support, dark-money Democrats such as George Soros, Tom Steyer and Michael Bloomberg could open up their coffers, and Democratic candidates with a surplus war-chest could give even more through their national committees.
The post-election hijinks on the Left have been far from isolated in the recent election. Republicans waged high-profile battles to preserve crucial Senate seats and governorships in states like Georgia and Florida. However, in other races—including those in Arizona and California—Democrats were successfully able to reverse the election victories of GOP candidates.
“When you have candidates that win the absentee ballot vote, win the day of the vote, and then lose three weeks later because of provisionals, that’s really bizarre,” out-going House Speaker Paul Ryan said during a recent question-and-answer session at The Washington Post, specifically referring to six California congressional districts that had been flipped after GOP election-night victories. “I just think that’s a very, very strange outcome,” Ryan said.
President Donald Trump also has publicly criticized the evident election fraud on the Left.
Of course there is large scale voter fraud happening on and before election day. Why do Republican leaders deny what is going on? So naive!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 17, 2016
In response, Democrats have breathlessly condemned him for daring to make such an accusation, saying that it harmfully undermines public confidence in the institutions.