Washington State moved to all mail in or Dropbox ballots many years ago. I have met some who remember when Washington voted like most states at the time by in person voting. I don’t know what the statistics are but I imagine most of the voting takes place in most of the states now with mail in or what it is supposed to be, absentee ballots. Even when we lived in Kalifornia, my wife and I started voting absentee. It started once we were actually going to be absent and then it just became more convenient. Oregon is another state that has has mail in ballots for many years. This goes back even to the mid nineties. My father who lived in a rural area was all for it because they would have to travel to vote. Even then it bothered him that there was nobody there to check your ID.
Voting, at least how you vote has just become a political issue for both parties. What’s missing is the purpose of voting, the duty of voting and the consequences of voting, or not. Our country was established based on the rights of the people. This is clearly set in the constitution and the Bill of Rights. The writers of those documents did their best to protect the majority which I mean as citizens from the politicians. Every article of the constitution is limiting the government. The problem is that “the government” has grown into a bunch of people and is overrun with non elected officials given powers that are opposed to the constitution. Look at the current ruling by the Supreme Court with regards to the EPA. They rectified and limited the powers of an agency that has run amok. Personal note, the EPA was formed during Nixion’s presidency and for many, including myself the absolute worst decision he ever made. CAL EPA is even worse that the federal. This was one of the departments that was weaponized by the Obama administration. Waters of the US was a tool they used to push regulation, even to the point of claiming some cattle ponds were governed by this decree. The IRS was also used by him, yes Obama personally to target people who opposed his amoral governing. He should be in jail for many causes.
But I didn’t start this with the intention of taking on all the ills of our government and it’s passed participants. I wanted to discuss specifically elections in Washington, though my thoughts may be relevant in other states as well. The state of Washington went to all vote by mail in 2005. This was law passed by the legislature. All ballots are intended to be submitted by drop box or by mail. You can however vote in person or drop off your ballot at certain government offices, such as the county auditors office for Snohomish County in Everett. Are the drop boxes monitored, nope. Should they be? Yes, in my opinion.
I have worked several elections in my county. The outline that you can find on the Washington state site is accurate as to the path that the ballots are supposed to take from vote to election. I have worked in several of the sections during the elections, including opening ballots and scanning them. I can say that I found little area in most of the activities for the ability to engage in election fraud. There are two areas on the floor (which I refer to as the area where vote counting takes place). In Washington this is performed by each county. If you go back a few steps you need to start with where does the voter register to vote. Here it is mostly handled by the DMV or department of licensing. When you apply for a drivers license, you are asked if you want to register to vote. That seems safe enough however, Washington grants real driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants. There is NO indication or mark on them showing their immigration status. It will only say Federal Limits Apply whis is on every license that is not enhanced. In other words, no different than most. A question you might ask is who insurers them? This one of the first areas I would identify as something that has a potential for fraud. Wishing the election work area are groups handling various tasks. You can refer to the chart provided by the state for the general flow of the ballots. What the flow chart doesn’t mention is adjudication, which is a specific area within the voting center. Like the scanner area, it is a secure area which is behind a fence from the rest of the space. Workers in pairs review ballots that were deemed by either the people who opened the ballots or the scanners to be illegible as to the voters intention. There is a whole article on judging these and I won’t go into what constitutes a ballot needing adjudication. However, this is an area where some dubious activity could be possible but it would take both members of the team to effectively commit a fraud here. Since Washington does not use voting machines, we’re really left with one big area where the vote could be manipulated. That is after the votes have been scanned into the servers on site. The Washington voting website says that the servers are not hooked up to the internet or any other network. That is really hard to verify because while the servers are behind the same fence the scanners and the adjudication personnel are, there is at least one laptop that is out of the cage. I can only speak of Snohomish County. I know that it is possible to delete batches of ballots there. If a fraudulent ballot batch could be introduced, it could be manipulated. Let me say this though. From the time the ballots come in to the work area, they are tracked with a batch number and sequence. The votes are not counted until they are scanned. It is at that point that candidate A or B votes are counted. They may not be tabulated but the scanning software has recorded the vote for each ballot.
Let’s go back to the ballot boxes. In the 2020 elections there was every indication that they were stuffed with multiple batches of ballots by individuals who had no legal rights to be handling other’s ballots. In many instances the boxes themselves were illegal according to their own state voting laws. Washington along with only a few states have no mention of vote harvesting or who can turn in votes for other voters. This is according to Ballot Pedia. Therefore, can Washington enforce any laws with regards to stuffing ballot boxes? It doesn’t look like it to me. Is there mass harvesting of ballots from facilities like rest homes or other care facilities. I believe so. Are ballots collected or stolen in the mail. Yes, I personally know of two cases of third party friends having it happen. Washington has a huge majority of liberals, many who would do anything to thwart conservatism in any form.
we should all be wary of voting fraud in our state. Should Washington return to voting in person? Absolutely. Should Washington have one day for the elections, absolutely. Should Washington get rid of mail in ballots, absolutely with the exception of specific conditions. Outside of an emergency, what stops a voter who knows they are not going to be available to vote on that designated day to vote in person early? By law voters are given the time to vote. Voters need to present their identification for multiple reasons and there is no reason why it cannot be presented to vote. The people of Washington must demand voter integrity. Washingtonians must demand fraud free elections.