A recent article (by Rochester Post Bulletin reporter Matthew Stolle) covered a Republican candidate forum in Rochester where several unfounded accusations of Minnesota election tampering demand to be confronted with facts.
One candidate, Mike Murphy, went so far as to say that election fraud has “been going on forever, I’ve seen it,” going on to say we need paper ballots and audits. This immediately tells me, a trained volunteer election judge, that Murphy is not familiar with even the basics of how we run things in our wards.
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First and most obvious is the fact that ours is already a paper ballot system, all ballots are kept, our roster and counting machines are not connected to the network that each county runs an open audit to ensure accuracy, and that 3% of precincts are required by statute for review.
Our election system is local, run by your neighbors, with capable bipartisan volunteer judges and officials who take the job with a solemn oath to fairness and openness. I encourage those of you with doubts to serve with me as a judge to see it for yourself.
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Most of us in rural areas have voted mail-in for years, and seeing an increase in mail-in voting is no cause for alarm — these simply require more time to count.
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An AP investigation of the 2020 election, the largest of its kind, found fewer than 474 cases of individual fraud out of 25 million votes cast in six battleground states.
Similar investigations by the conservative Heritage Foundation found that individual fraud cases were vanishingly rare and inconsequential. These irresponsible accusations are baseless and it’s a shame to see them coming from candidates who know better.
The “big lie” hucksters like Sidney Powell are going down in disgrace with their frivolous claims and too many Minnesota Republicans like Paul Gazelka and Pete Stauber are hitched to her train. I am very proud of Minnesota’s election system, recently ranked second-best run in the nation.
