By John Fund
The spin doctors who deny the existence of voter fraud have no boundaries.
“Plans to fight voter fraud are based on nightmares, tall tales, and paranoid fears,” says Scott Keyes of the liberal Center for American Progress. Voter fraud is so rare “you’re more likely to get hit by lightning than find a case of prosecutorial voter fraud,” asserts Judith Browne-Dianis, co-director of the liberal Advancement Project.
Kim Strach, the new director of North Carolina’s Board of Elections, disagrees. She just searched a database that comprises about half the registered voters in the U.S. and found 35,750 voters in her state whose first and last names and full date of birth match with someone in another state who also voted in the 2012 election. A smaller number (765) had exact matches on Social Security numbers, but that total is artificially low because only some states provide that number for any or all of their voters.
Remember: In 2008, Barack Obama only carried North Carolina by 14,177 votes out of 2.3 million cast.
Strach is turning over her findings to the state legislature along with recommendations on what laws would help clean up the rolls.
Nor is North Carolina the only state with voter fraud in the news. Cobby Williams, a former 2012 independent congressional candidate in Mississippi, was sentenced to five years in prison this week for knowingly registering a convicted felon.
Last month, police in Pontiac, Mich., found the mummified body of Pia Farrenkopf in the garage of her foreclosed home. She had apparently been dead since 2008, but was listed as having voted in the 2010 election for governor.
Texas Democratic state representative Lon Burnam filed suit in March claiming he was defeated by 111 votes in his Democratic primary because of an illegal vote-by-mail operation, which might have been orchestrated by his opponent.
Read more: National Review
