OPINION:
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin used his executive powers to require all votes that are cast this November come by way of paper balloting and that no machine connected to the Internet could be used in the counting process.
It’s high time all states required the same.
Paper balloting with hand counting that goes forth on Election Day, and Election Day alone, is a nightmare scenario to Democrats, which is to say it’s the method that’s most resistant to fraud. This is how elections used to commonly be conducted in this country.
Over the years, mail-in balloting has become more popular; Election Day has stretched into Election Week, followed by Election Month, followed by court challenges; and computerized systems have taken the place of hand counts and paper tallies. All are open doors to cheaters.
“How America lost trust in elections — and why that matters,” The Christian Science Monitor wrote in April.
From the story: “To some degree, distrust in U.S. election outcomes has been part of the nation’s political culture for centuries. It was fed in the late 1800s by the blatant fraud schemes of Democratic urban machines, which included stuffing vote boxes with reams of ballots pre-printed with approved slates of candidates. ‘I don’t think there was ever an honest election in the city of New York,’ the notorious Tammany Hall leader William ‘Boss’ Tweed once testified before the Board of Aldermen.”
That’s what makes it so maddening the Democrats of today, along with their fawners in the media, slam Republicans — particularly Donald Trump — as conspiracy theorists for suggesting recent elections have been compromised and fraud has occurred. It’s not as if history doesn’t show fraud occurring in America’s elections. It’s a fact. But the left gaslights on this point because it’s leftists who largely commit election fraud.
As The Heritage Foundation records in its “sampling of recent proven instances of election fraud from across the country,” there have been 1,546 fraud cases, 1,313 of which have resulted in criminal convictions. That’s substantial. It’s not conspiratorial.
“As the U.S. Supreme Court said in 2008 in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board, ‘flagrant examples of such fraud … have been documented throughout this nation’s history by respected historians and journalists … [that] demonstrate that not only is the risk of voter fraud real but that it could affect the outcome of a close election,” Heritage wrote.
Fact.
As such, it only makes sense to control the variables that contribute to fraud as best possible.
Fraud can never be completely eradicated. But when cheaters are handed chance after chance and tool after tool and opportunity after opportunity — well then, that only makes the fraud so much easier to achieve. That only makes the fraudsters happy.
“Youngkin mandates all paper ballots for presidential elections in Virginia,” Fox 5 wrote in a headline.
Bold moves like this are necessary to win back trust of voters who watched the 2020 presidential election as it unfolded; who saw the curious turn of events in the counting process in the middle of the night — in the wee morning hours; who wondered at all the anomalies that said Joe Biden won and Donald Trump lost — and at the sheer outrage that occurred in the Trump Derangement Syndrome camp when even the slightest of questions about the election was raised (methinks thou dost protest too much!); and who still, to this day, see election integrity as cause for major concern in America.
“This isn’t a Democrat or Republican issue,” Youngkin said, after signing his executive order requiring paper ballots with a traceable chain of custody.
No. It’s not. Nor should it be.
Both Democrat and Republican voters should want every legally cast ballot counted accurately.
But they don’t.
Democrats don’t care so much about voter will as they do about achieving personal political goals, that are often rooted in tyrannical means and ends.
And if you don’t believe that — consider the case of Kamala Harris.
“Dems are running a de facto coup: Even if Biden wins, Kamala will be prez,” the New York Post wrote in a headline in early July.
When things don’t go Democrats’ way, they’re only too willing to cast aside principles for politics.
Well, at least in Virginia in November, they’ll have a harder time sidestepping principles.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Lockdown: The Socialist Plan To Take Away Your Freedom,” is available by clicking HERE or clicking HERE or CLICKING HERE.
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