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NC-9 absentees: Signed unsealed & undelivered? by @BloggersRUs

Published by Tom Sullivan on February 19, 2019

NC-9 absentees: Signed unsealed & undelivered?
by Tom Sullivan


North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District stretches from Charlotte to Fayetteville along the SC border (via Wikipedia)

N.C. State Elections Director Kim Strach opened Monday’s formal hearing into election fraud allegations in the 2018 NC-9 congressional race by announcing investigators had uncovered a “coordinated, unlawful and substantially resourced absentee ballot scheme” in Bladen and Robeson counties on the eastern end of the district.

It was the first of what could be three days of testimony into the country’s last unresolved 2018 congressional race. To summarize (from a December post):

At the center of it all, a political operative named McCrae Dowless, 62, hired by Republican Mark Harris’s campaign and other candidates to assist voters with absentee ballot requests. Convicted of insurance fraud in 1992, Dowless is now a person of interest in the state’s investigation into an alleged absentee ballot “harvesting” operation.

On Election night, Harris led Democrat Dan McCready by 905 votes.

At the center of Monday’s hearing was Lisa Britt, one of the crew Dowless paid to both help rural voters request absentee ballots. Britt’s mother was married to Dowless in the early 1990s. Both were living at his home at times during 2018.

Assisting voters in requesting absentee-by-mail ballots is acceptable practice. But Dowless knew through daily public records updates whose absentee ballots had been mailed out. He then sent his team back to the homes to witness and collect them. Anyone other than a close family member collecting completed ballots for return to the Board of Elections is a felony in North Carolina.

Britt testified under oath she had turned over some ballot envelopes to Dowless with no witness signatures. She signed her mother’s name as witness in maybe seven cases because Dowless told her she had already witnessed too many. Many of the witness signatures were not signed not in the presence of the voters. She also admitted to filling in down-ballot races voters had left blank on some ballots they received unsealed. Dowless was employed by Republican Mark Harris; she selected Republican candidates. A later witness admitted she had turned over her blank ballot, signed, but unsealed for the Dowless team to fill in for her.

Britt admitted that if she had not realized at first this operation was illegal, she soon did, but continued out of loyalty to Dowless. “Mr. Dowless has been a father figure to me for 30 years,” Britt said. Others witnesses confirmed that many of the ballots collected came from relatives, friends, and neighbors impacted by Hurricane Florence.

Dowless’ ex-wife, Sandra Dowless, testified she was surprised to learn from Strach how much money changed hands since he never seemed to have any money, drawing laughs in the hearing room. Since Britt knew of only a half dozen people on the Dowless collection team, it was unclear Monday where all the money went.

The Dowless team collected “as many as 1,249 ballot request forms overall in the general election,” the Washington Post reports, adding, “It’s unclear exactly how many actual ballots Dowless and his associates turned in.” There was no direct testimony on Monday that any had been destroyed.

Britt testified Dowless asked his team to coordinate signature ink color, stamp alignment, number of ballots mailed at any time to prevent throwing up “red flags” for county Boards of Elections. But the high ratio of requests versus non-returned ballots in the small counties drew attention Dowless had hoped to avoid.

Britt testified that Dowless called team members to his home in December after the State Board refused to certify election and he coached them to “stick together” and to not admit collecting ballots, as he’d paid them to. Britt admitted she had lied in an interview with WBTV when she denied collecting absentee ballots. A convicted felon herself, Britt was ineligible to vote in 2018.

Strach displayed an image of a slip Dowless had delivered to his team last week coaching them to plead the Fifth Amendment.

Dowless when called refused to testify without a grant of immunity.

Per state law, the Board of Elections may call for a new election if:

(1) Ineligible voters sufficient in number to change the outcome of the election were allowed to vote in the election, and it is not possible from examination of the official ballots to determine how those ineligible voters voted and to
correct the totals.
(2) Eligible voters sufficient in number to change the outcome of the election were improperly prevented from voting.
(3) Other irregularities affected a sufficient number of votes to change the outcome of the election.
(4) Irregularities or improprieties occurred to such an extent that they taint the results of the entire election and cast doubt on its fairness.

After so much G.O.P. legal and rhetorical caterwauling over the need for sweeping voter law changes to fight the scourge of widespread-yet-undetected voter fraud, the party is minimizing the impacts of the Dowless operation paid for by a Republican candidate. Republicans argue Dowless’ regrettable activities were insufficient to change the outcome of the election (3). Democrats argue the entire election is tainted (4) and new election is required. Under this level of state and national media scrutiny, Republicans may have the tougher case to make.

The Washington Post sums up:

Adding to the partisan currents, the state elections board requires a supermajority of four votes to call for a new election. With three Democrats and two Republicans, the board will not have the votes to take any action if its members vote along partisan lines. That would turn attention to Congress, which also has the power to order a new election.

One seat in the hearing room bore the tag, “U.S. House counsel.” It was occupied.

The death of Congressman Walter B. Jones Jr., Republican from NC-3, ten days ago leaves two of North Carolina’s 13 U.S. House seats vacant. The fact Gov. Roy Cooper has not yet announced a special election to fill the Jones seat suggests he is waiting for the outcome of the NC-9 investigation. Running both elections on the same day would make logistical and economic sense.

The hearings continue today (Tuesday) at 9:30 a.m. EST and may be streamed again on WRAL.

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