California Republicans Set Up Fake Ballot Drop Boxes Marked as 'Official'
California Republicans acknowledged setting up unofficial, fake ballot drop boxes for the November election on Monday.
A cease-and-desist letter was given to the California Republicans for setting up the fake ballot boxes. The state's election officials demanded that they stop privately collecting ballots in containers marked as "official" drop boxes, Los Angeles Times reported.
The state's officials said the California Republicans' effort in putting several fake ballot boxes across the state was illegal, Associated Press said in a report.
Atty. General Xavier Becerra and Secretary of State Alex Padilla said the group's officials has to provide a list of all voters whose ballots they collected by Thursday. They wanted to make sure the collection of all documents was done with permission.
Reports of the fake ballot boxes alerted Padilla to release a memo explaining why the practice was illegal. In his memo, he said the ballots had to be mailed or brought to official drop-off locations.
"In short, providing unauthorized, non-official vote-by-mail ballot drop boxes is prohibited by state law," the memo said.
A representative of the party rejected the allegation, saying the practice is allowed under a 2016 law.
What was violated?
As said in a fact check by Snopes, ballot harvesting or ballot collection is a legal practice in California, among many other states. This was the law insisted upon by the California GOP when they were defending their case.
It is a practice where a voter lets a third party deliver their ballot to the proper election officials. But it wasn't this aspect that made the action unlawful.
The office of the secretary of state clarified that posing as an election officer made setting up the unofficial drop boxes illegal. It is also against the law to handle, count or canvass any ballot if you are not an election officer.
Setting up the unofficial ballot boxes counts as this violation and can result in two to four years in prison if a person is convicted.
"If you participate in those activities, you are knowingly engaging in activity that is against the law," Becerra said.
GOP Refuses Removal
State GOP spokesman Hector Barajas said the party has no plans to remove the boxes. He did not say how many of those exist and where they were located.
The GOP insisted on ballot harvesting, saying they were merely providing the boxes to help people vote conveniently.
The unofficial drop boxes were reported in Fresno, Los Angeles and Orange counties. All of these regions had very competitive House races.
It sparked angry exchanges between leaders and candidates. Accusations ranged from tampering of votes to discrimination against informal ballot collection.
Democrats are fearful that, by setting up the unofficial boxes, Republicans they can gather and dispose of ballots.
"Voters who want to return their ballot at a drop box should only use official county drop boxes," Orange County Registrar Neal Kelley reminded voters. He added that official drop boxes are easy to spot.
Official ballot drop boxes are listed by location on the secretary of state's website. They are bright-yellow, secured, locked and monitored round the clock. They were designed to meet the state's security standards.
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