Lawyers ask for look at ballot signatures

Teams of lawyers for President Donald Trump and Joe Biden got a rare look Friday at Broward voter signatures, at an event staged to clear up Republicans’ questions about election accuracy.

Lawyers for Trump had asked to periodically check signed Broward ballots to see if signatures really did match those on file, internal elections office emails and letters say. That request— amounting to unprecedented access to what is typically held private— was rejected.

Broward elections supervisor Pete Antonacci instead allowed a one-time look

on Friday at 15 randomly selected ballot signatures, from recent mail-in ballots. Each voter’s official signature on file was copied and laid alongside the signed ballot. The matches were nearly perfect.

Antonacci said the Republicans’ request to view signature verifying came after the St. Lucie County elections office allowed the process to be viewed there during the August primary.

In a Sept. 30 letter to Republican attorney Joseph Van de Bogart, Antonacci told him that his request to periodically review random Broward mail-in ballots in order to compare signatures “represents an unacceptable disruption.”

Both political parties, the public and the media were invited. The Democratic Party sent representatives, but objected to the event and declined to select ballots for the presentation.

“We’re hopeful this is the end of it today,” said Fort Lauderdale attorney Charles Lichtman, leader of the Democrats’ statewide legal team. “Everyone should be at ease that there is not an issue with signature matches.”

“Theywanted to come in and goon over it,” Antonacci said, describing Trump campaign/Republican attorney Van de Bogart’s request to observe signature verifying. “This is what I came up with.”

The ballot signatures randomly selected Friday matched almost exactly the signatures kept on file inthe office.

Antonacci said he hop edit dispelled the idea that evaluating signatures involves any “weird” analysis. He said “99 percent of them” are near exact matches.

Van de Bogart, a Fort

Lauderdale-based attorney, declined comment, referring a reporter to the Trump campaign. Trump campaign representatives did not respond to an email for comment.

Tens of thousands of ballots are being processed and fed into computer vote-counters, ahead of Nov. 3ElectionDay.

Mismatched or missing signatures have not been a rampant problem, though.

In Broward, more than 200,000 ballots have been returned with votes. Of those, only 142 lacked signatures, 34 had signatures thatwere significantly mismatched with what’s on file, 68were signed by some one other than the voter, and 82were from voters who no longer live in Broward and thus aren’t eligible to vote here, according to Mary Hall, chief deputy supervisor of elections in Broward.

Voters are notified and have until 5p.m. Nov. 5 tofix it so their votes count.

In Palm Beach County, 207,185 ballots are back. Of those, only 179were missing signatures, and 123 signatures differed from what’s on file, according to Palm Beach County elections supervisor Wendy Sartory Link.

Of Miami-Dade’s 149,682 returned ballots, 169 have been rejected for wrong signatures, voting twice, or voting by mail without having requested a mail-in ballot.

State law says the ballot can only be invalidated for a bad signature if the mismatch is “beyond a reasonable doubt.”