I moved, within the same Utah zip code, last April. No “mail-in” ballot was sent to me at my current address despite timely reregistration. A new ballot was issued to me in person at my polling station. Would that ballot have been issued if someone submitted the unsolicited ballot linked to me in a dated voter role?
Of course. Did you see any indication on the voter role in respect of those who'd already voted with mail in votes? I didn't. When you consider that those voter logs are maintained in thousands of separate hard copies, it's certainly possible that no one is adequately checking them to discard votes by the same voter already received in the mail. Is it really possible that no one voted twice or even that there was not any case of an error in recording a vote that made it appear so?
I mean think about, you can't even verify whether a voter voted until after the in-person voting records are compiled and available, which means any mail-in vote separated from it's envelope prior to a point hours after close of polls almost certainly could not have been properly verified. Any ballot opened without observers able to see the signature match (which is virtually all of them) is a fraud risk.
I read in some states you should shred your mailed ballot if you decide to vote in person, but very little about which vote counts if you vote in person and a mail in ballot is located. Do they just discard the mailed ballot? Those ballots would be evidence of potential voter fraud. Seen any reports on the number of mail in ballots rejected because the voter voted in person (as some were advised where there was a risk their mailed ballot wouldn't be received in time). Pretty sure I read in NJ the governor was advocating to discard the in-person vote in that situation.
I'm puzzled by this assertion that printing out extra ballots would skip the database. Any duplicates, if not flagged immediately, would get rejected or resolved as part of the final canvass before the final certification, right? Voter rolls and votes are not paper based. Each ballot and / or voter is bar coded, which I would expect to be the same as a ticket to a concert or game. You could print out a hundred, but the system is going to automatically be aware of a duplicate and could automatically reject any duplicate, or at least immediately flag the vote for determination of which is the correct vote. I am holding a Utah ballot and envelope. Each has a matching code and electronic scannable marker. If you're saying you could show up to vote in person while your paper ballot is in the mail, or a drop box, then of course that's possible, but I can't how see how the duplication won't be automatically noted and flagged as soon as it hits the database.
At that point you'd follow rules - if one vote was fraudulent, the actual vote would count, and if both were submitted by the actual voter then there would be a rule [i.e. reasonable result could be having your vote cancelled for voting twice]. If they believe the signature doesn't matc, Utah (for instance) is supposed to contact the voter for clarification or to cure before rejecting the ballot. So they could / should obviously be doing the same and flagging for possible fraud if there are 2 votes for the same voter.
[I don't mean this as partisan bickering - I'm not following how voters, linked to a database could successfully submit multiple votes. ]
The signature, or the ability to forge one, is the only fail-safe in submitting a found ballot, but signatures have actually worked pretty well for a few hundred years. If you're trying a commit voter fraud with people you know, knowing the signature you're trying to forge would at least give you a leg up, but trying to submit a ballot you've received at a dead address by guessing the signature probably isn't going to work.
The questions about the envelopes seem to answer themselves --- discarding the envelopes would be a problem, but since the envelope is bar coded and bears the signature, we could assume competence and that the envelopes are retained as are the ballots, at least until after final certification.
So, if you vote in person, you will immediately be electronically logged. If multiple paper ballots are submitted, either all votes for a voter will be rejected, or the voter will affirm which vote is actual and which one is fraudulent,
So I would only see being able to submit a fraudulent vote through the mail if the actual voter doesn't submit a vote, and you're able to successfully forge the match the signature which the election commission has on file.
Am I missing something?
