January 1, 2022: Arizona and Texas Investigations Turn Up Zero Significant Voter Fraud

January 1, 2022: The New Year starts on another bum note for ex-president and current Citizen Whiner Donald J. Trump. Having asked for a recount of the vote in the four largest counties in Texas, in an effort to turn up evidence of rampant voter fraud, he gains zippo for his efforts. That continues a pronounced trend. (See: 12/28/21.) 

As Newsweek reported: 

Remi Garza, president of the Texas Association of Election Administrators, told the [Texas] Tribune nothing in the report [on the recount] concerned him.

 

“There doesn’t seem to be anything too far out of the ordinary with respect to the information that’s provided,” he told the newspaper.

 

Cowboys are easy to find in Texas. Voter fraud, not so much.

To be fair, the audit isn’t 100% complete – but we’ve seen the same malarky out of Texas before. We know there might have been 509 cross-state, duplicate votes. There might have been 67 votes cast for dead people. And the biggest number of all: 11,737 possible non-citizens may be registered to vote. 

There will need to be follow-up on these matters. 

Still, we know what happened the last time a big number like that flashed across the right-wing news. In 2019, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said he had proof that 95,000 non-citizens were registered to vote. 

Or, as Fox News told the tale: 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Friday that the state has discovered 95,000 non-citizens on the voter rolls going back to 1996, 58,000 of whom have voted in at least one Texas election – an announcement likely to raise fresh concerns about the prospect of voter fraud.

 

Trump jumped that story like a friend of Jeffrey Epstein jumping an underage girl, not that Trump ever did (as far as we know). 

He fired up his Twitter thumbs: 

“58,000 non-citizens voted in Texas, with 95,000 non-citizens registered to vote. These numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. All over the country, especially in California, voter fraud is rampant. Must be stopped. Strong voter ID! @foxandfriends”

 

Right-wing numbskulls, too lazy to read anything longer than 280-character tweets, were up in arms, ready to buy more guns, shoot a few “Fake News” reporters, and “take America back.” The story of massive voter fraud spread like kudzu and couldn’t be stopped. Down in Texas, however, the tale was falling apart. 

Notified by David Whitley, Texas Secretary of State, to start checking voter rolls, officials in 254 counties set to work. It was immediately clear that the lists of 95,000 non-citizens registered to vote were so riddled with errors as to be useless. When a coalition of 13 civil rights groups challenged Whitley’s numbers he beat a retreat. He said he’d get back to them “within the next week.” 

Meanwhile, clerks across the state went to work checking lists of naughty voters and nice. Within days, Dallas County found that 1,715 people on the Whitley list were in fact real citizens. Harris County quickly knocked 18,000 of 30,000 “illegals” off its list. That gave the State of Texas an error rate of at least 60%; and Harris officials weren’t even close to done.

 

As the Dallas News reported, “Williamson County’s Chris Davis, president of the Association of Texas Elections Administrators, said more than half of the 2,033 voters on his county’s list were being removed after the state’s revision.” 

Travis County officials told reporters they had knocked 634 names off their list and had barely started. Bruce Elfant, registrar for the county, probably spoke for registrars across Texas when he told reporters he had been removing a lot of names, which had been tedious. “It would have been nice if they would have vetted this more carefully before they sent it out to election administrators.” 

Let’s use results for McClennan County to make the final point. Voter fraud on any massive scale is a myth – unless you can prove it in court. (If you can, you certainly should.) When McClennan officials began checking the list from the state, they found that of 366 “non-citizens” in the county who were registered to vote…um…366 just so happened to be U.S. citizens.

 

Now, here we are again. Big stories of fraud. Big stories Trump supporters are eager to believe. 

Teeny weeny proof. 

If Texas Attorney General Paxton can prove 67 persons cast ballots for dead people, he should ferret them out. 

Ferret them out – out of the 11.3 million votes in his state. 

Or shut up. 

(Donald that goes quadruple for you, you chunky twit.) 

 

FUN FACT: AG Paxton is still awaiting trial on three felony charges – despite having been indicted six years ago. 

Paxton has also been accused by seven top aides and members of his staff of abuse of office and bribery. 

So you could make a compelling argument that Paxton would be more of a legal threat to democracy than any single individual who cast a ballot in the name of a dead relative. Maybe all 67 (even if proven) combined.