Voter-fraud scams

Deaths by lightning — about 30 a year — are more likely than voter fraud.

It has happened. Yes, indeed, it’s happened. On 31 different occasions, a would-be voter tried to impersonate someone else at the polling place.

We should point out that those 31 instances of possible voter fraud occurred over a period of 14 years, out of more than one BILLION votes cast nationwide. That’s according to a 2014 study by Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola University Law School.

Ari Berman, author of a recently published voting rights history called “Give Us the Ballot,” notes that deaths by lightning — about 30 a year — are more likely than voter fraud. Writing in the Washington Post, Berman quotes Rick Hasen, an election-law expert at the University of California at Irvine: “I could not find a single example from the 1980s onward where voter impersonation could have swung one election or that there was any kind of conspiracy to do so.”

Those facts about voter fraud have not prevented conspiracy monger Donald Trump from warning Republican voters that the November election will be “rigged” against him, and that he might lose as a result. He alluded to several court cases nationwide, including Texas, that have thrown out restrictive laws requiring voters to show identification.

Nor have those facts about voter fraud persuaded Gov. Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton. They continue to perpetuate the fantasy that voter fraud is widespread and that voter ID, various registration requirements and other restrictive measures are necessary.

Trump’s motives are blatantly obvious (beyond his decades-long penchant for National Enquirerstyle conspiracy notions). He’s preparing his true believers — and perhaps himself — for a likely loss in November.

Abbott, Paxton and their fellow vote-suppressors in Republicanled legislatures across the country may actually believe their own propaganda, although it’s just as likely that restrictions offer a convenient way to discourage voters who weren’t inclined to vote Republican. That’s what a federal appeals court found in North Carolina recently, noting that the measures the state Legislature imposed were designed precisely to limit the influence of African-American voters.

North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory accused judges of “undermining the integrity of our elections.” Abbott has called voter fraud “rampant” and Paxton has vowed to appeal the court decision that went against Texas, a crusade that’s already cost more than $3.5 million.

With confidence in the political system already worrisomely low, these voter-fraud scams perpetuated by Trump, Republican elected officials and talk-show bloviators are in essence undermining public trust in the democratic process. Without faith in the integrity of the vote, our system of governance breaks down.

We have to be vigilant, of course — about hacking into the electoral process, about the integrity of voting machines and other potential threats to our method of choosing who will lead us. Perpetuating faux facts about voter fraud and the dangers of a rigged system has nothing to do with being vigilant. It is itself a danger.

We would urge Trump’s fellow Republicans to repudiate his claims about rigging the election. We would urge Abbott and his fellow Texans to focus on the state’s real needs, instead of looking for ways to make it more difficult for their fellow Texans to participate in the democratic process. Perhaps the governor could look to the skies. He could appoint a special panel on lightning strikes, a danger more real than voter fraud.

With confidence in the political system already worrisomely low, these voter-fraud scams perpetuated by Trump, Republican elected officials and talk-show bloviators are in essence undermining public trust in the democratic process.