Ohio Election Official: Law Doesn’t Require Me To Actually Check For Voter Registration Fraud

The law only requires that such checks be possible.

It is impossible to cross-check nearly 700,000 new or revised voter registrations filed this year without crashing Ohio’s registration system, Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner said Thursday. She added that the entire system will have to be rebuilt after next week’s election so that fraud can be more easily detected.
Brunner said she discovered the system was too fragile to double-check the names, which her staff began trying to do earlier this month after the Ohio Republican Party sued the Democratic secretary to force her to check the registrations. At the time, even as she fought the lawsuit and eventually won at the U.S. Supreme Court, Brunner said she was making an effort to cross-check the registrations against state driver’s license and federal social security records.
“I spoke too soon,” Brunner said during a press briefing on election day procedures for Ohio, again expected to be a closely watched state in the presidential election.
Earlier this month, Brunner told The Plain Dealer that a cursory review by her staff had found about 200,000 discrepancies in the newly filed or revised registrations since Jan. 1. That does not mean each was a case of fraud, but could mean someone incorrectly jotted down a driver’s license or Social Security digit on the applications.
But the Ohio Republican Party suggested that some of those cases could amount to voter fraud and that Brunner, as the state’s top elections officer, was obligated to double-check the information. Brunner argued that federal rules only require the state to have a system in place for double-checking registrations but do not require her to make the checks.

That’s not exactly a winning argument, to my mind. Why should the taxpayers foot the bill for the resources that allow the detection of voter registration fraud if election officials have no intention of using them? Heck, if we’re going to let the voter registration rolls fill up with fraudulent registrations, why are the taxpayers funding voter registration in the first place?
Oh, and by the way, Brunner has extensive connections to both ACORN and the Obama campaign.

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  • http://Array Harry

    Ahuh. But the law must allow you to sit on your thumbs and rotate.

  • http://www.bikebubba.blogspot.com/ Bike Bubba

    I don’t know about our gracious host, but reality is that yes, double-checking voter registrations to put fraud organizations out of business would be one area where yes, bigger government might be appropriate, especially as it’s coming out that ACORN has submitted hundreds of thousands of fraudulent registrations, if not over a million.

    Romans 13. Government has a legitimate role in punishing the wicked and commending the just, and if it takes a few more employees and a few more dollars to punish election fraud, so bet it.

  • http://www.indymedia.org/en/index.shtml Angry Vertebrate

    I read there were only 26 cases of voter registration fraud in the 2006 elections. Why bother checking? I don’t think it’s gonna come down to 26 votes.

    Rob, are you advocating bigger govt so it can check, re-check, and keep checking until somehow, miraculously, Republicans happen to win?

  • http://sayanythingblog.com/ likwidshoe

    Lestat – I don’t remember you complaining when the Ohio Secretary of State (or the Florida Secretary of State) was actually the head of the Bush campaign in the state.

    I had no idea that you knew Rob from back when he was a Gore voter.

    Remember another time you made erroneous assertions about Rob? You’ve got so many nails in the coffin of your dishonesty and yet you still go on. Your behavior is a bit shameless, Lestat. One would think that a professed educated man such as yourself would learn when to zip it up, but I guess not. You just keep on opening that mouth of yours to insert your foot.

  • can franchiser

    ohio may want to upgrade their commodore computer system, to avoid the crash.

  • http://www.valleydeals.com/cgi-bin/board2/YaBB.pl Kevin
  • deadrody

    Wow, just started looking and can’t possibly get the job done in a week, eh ?

    hhhmmm… You know, if I’m not mistaken, the date of this election has been roughly known for, at a MINIMUM, 4 years. It isn’t like this just snuck up on us and we’re like, “What ? There’s an election next week ? How did THAT happen ?”

    What an utter tonload of bullshit. Does anyone know if this corrupt nitwit is appointed or elected ? I’m just curious if there is a politician in Ohio that’s functionally brain dead, or if it is a majority of the population.

  • 2Hotel9

    Her job is to verify that those registered to vote are, in fact, eligible to vote. Period. Full stop. Any other task isw secondary to that.

  • FlyOnTheWall

    Or in other words, the left is staging a coup but without guns, and it seems they might succeed.
    … Obama is ten times worse.

    A coup of this type requires the other pillars of our society to collude or atleast play along. MSM played the good lapdog but is atleast starting to wake up.
    I was afraid of Hillary but that poor little neophyte got chewed up and spit out by the Chicago political engine. This guy is the best at what he does but what he does isn’t very pretty.

    Agree, Rob. If nothing else our govt was founded on the idea of open and fraud free elections.

    …system in place for double-checking registrations but do not require her to make the checks.

    Heh! I was hired because I COULD do a job. No one said I actually had to DO it.

  • Friend of USA

    It is impossible to cross-check nearly 700,000 new or revised voter registrations filed this year without crashing Ohio’s registration system, Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner said Thursday.

    Cloward Piven Strategy in action.

    Or in other words, the left is staging a coup but without guns, and it seems they might succeed.

    If you thought Nixon was a criminal, you have seen nothing yet.

    Obama is ten times worse.

    We have seen but the tip of the iceberg of the fraudulent activity from the Obama gang.

    I expect some rioting no matter who wins.

    Most likely from angry Obama supporters if their dear leader loses, but it is not entirely impossible some republicans might get violent if they find out their vote has not been counted by some corrupt Obama supporters.

    But this too is part of the Cloward Piven Strategy.

    The more chaos, the better for those staging a coup without guns.

  • http://magyartruth.blogspot.com/ Chief RZ

    “above her pay grade”? “Not my job” Maybe the Ohio voters should elect someone who will do their job and uphold the integrity of our votes.

  • 2Hotel9

    lestupid, exactly what does anything you said have to do with an elected official refusing to do the job she is being paid, and paid quite well, to do?

  • mplsbob

    Lestat, what a dumb argument. Change topic and blame Bush. 500,000 votes thrown out from Acorn? If you crazy dems could have found anything illegal in Ohio and Florida when Bush ran 4 and 8 years ago, I am 100% positive it would have been brought up. Nice try though.

  • Lestat

    I don’t remember you complaining when the Ohio Secretary of State (or the Florida Secretary of State) was actually the head of the Bush campaign in the state. But now because the Secretary of State knows somebody in Acorn it is obvious fraud.

  • http://sayanythingblog.com robport

    No one around here thinks Nixon was a criminal.

    I think he was a criminal.

    But don’t let that get in the way of your narrative, smart guy.

  • http://sayanythingblog.com robport

    I don’t know about our gracious host, but reality is that yes, double-checking voter registrations to put fraud organizations out of business would be one area where yes, bigger government might be appropriate

    Conservatism is all about defining what are and are not appropriate roles for government.

    Hold fraud-free elections is one of the most important, and most basic, roles of government. So if we need to spend more tax dollars to make that happen, I’m all for it.

    But, as always, we need to be smart about it. I’m not in favor of spending any more money on digital voting which, frankly, doesn’t seem to be working. I say give ‘em pens and paper.

  • http://sayanythingblog.com/readers/author/sparkiearbuckle sayanything-81

    If you thought Nixon was a criminal, you have seen nothing yet.

    No one around here thinks Nixon was a criminal. He was just an anti-communist. You’re Canadian so you’re a communist.

    Just cluing you in on the colloquial logic in use around here.

  • http://sayanythingblog.com robport

    It’s not just the partisan connection, Lestat (and ACORN is absolutely partisan, their tax status to the contrary). It’s ACORN taking money from the Obama campaign. It’s ACORN filing fraudulent voter registrations all over the country, sometimes resulting in arrests. It’s Brunner refusing to prevent voter registration fraud in Ohio.

    I know you, being a blinkered partisan twit, probably think that being a Republican is in and of itself evidence of corruption. But it’s not that Brunner is a Democrat. It’s not that ACORN is a partisan, pro-Obama outfit. It’s that both are corrupt and complicit in fraud.

  • http://sayanythingblog.com robport

    And by the way Lestat, if those Republican officials in Ohio and Florida were guilty of fraud (and I’m certainly not agreeing with you on that point), what bearing does that have on Brunner’s fraud on behalf of Obama?

    Are you thinking that two wrongs make a right?

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