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Last week, 27 European nations voted for their representatives in the European Parliament.
If you were aware of this, did you happen to notice that there were no allegations of cheating in any European country? If you are on the Left, you might respond that there were no such allegations because the Right did better than the Left, and it’s the Right that makes these allegations.
But that response has little merit. For one thing, there were no such allegations, let alone demonstrations, during all the years left-wing parties won European parliamentary elections or national elections. For another, in America, it is not only the Right that has charged election fraud: Hillary Clinton, for example, still claims the 2016 election was stolen from her.
The fact is that, among democracies, America is essentially alone in having nearly half its population mistrust election results. So, either America is cursed with a paranoid population, or there are valid reasons for Americans to mistrust their elections’ results.
There is no question it is the latter. America is unique among democracies in having half its people mistrust election results because America is unique among democracies in the way it conducts its elections.
America is almost alone among democracies in not demanding that voters provide any identification when they vote. For some reason, the American Left vehemently opposes voter ID. It claims voter ID is racist and that those who favor it are engaged in “voter suppression.” This is prima facie absurd: Are airports racist for demanding passenger identification? Does passenger ID result in “passenger suppression”?
The most plausible reason the Left opposes voter ID is to enable some degree of voter fraud. If that is not the reason, isn’t it enormously irresponsible to cultivate doubts about election integrity among half its country’s citizens—for no valid reason? Moreover, in no other country does its Left oppose voter ID.
America is almost alone among democratic countries in not requiring paper ballots. As of 2023, only Brazil counts all its ballots in national elections through electronic voting. According to Pew Research Center, votes are cast by manually marking paper ballots in 209 of the 227 countries. In France, as reported by The Associated Press, voters “use the same system that’s been used for generations: paper ballots that are cast in person and counted by hand.” In 2009, Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court ruled that voting machines could no longer be used. In 2017, the Dutch government announced that all ballots in the 2017 general election would be counted by hand.
Moreover, among those countries that use electronic voting, only in America are the source codes of the voting machines kept secret. Three companies—Dominion, Election Systems & Software, and Hart InterCivic—control about 90% of the U.S. voting technology market. Each is privately held, and each is committed to keeping its source code from becoming fully public. Wherever else in the world electronic voting is allowed, the source codes are available to all political parties.
America is almost alone among democratic countries in not confining voting to one day. All through American history, Americans voted on Election Day (unless they had previously requested an absentee ballot). The Left has obliterated Election Day; we now have Election Month.
Various American states are alone among democratic countries in mailing ballots to all their citizens—that is, even to those who never requested a ballot be sent to them.
America is almost alone among democratic countries in the length of time it takes to learn election results. In other countries, people continue to learn the results within hours. Throughout American history, Americans knew the outcome of virtually every election the night of Election Day. No longer.
All too often, tragically, there are valid reasons for Americans to mistrust election results. Add elections to the long list of institutions the Left has ruined.
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The post Why Americans Mistrust Election Results More Than the Citizens of Any Other Democracy appeared first on The Daily Signal.
A new study has revealed that roughly 10% to 27% of noncitizens living in the U.S. are illicitly registered to vote, which could result in up to 2.7 million illegal votes being cast in the November elections.
Experts say the significant amount of potential illegal votes could be enough to alter election results.
The study, released last week by the research institute Just Facts, notes that the 2022 U.S. census recorded approximately 19 million adult noncitizens living in the country. “Given their voter registration rates, this means that about 2 million to 5 million of them are illegally registered to vote,” the report observes. “These figures are potentially high enough to overturn the will of the American people in major elections, including congressional seats and the presidency.”
On Tuesday, James Agresti, president of Just Facts, joined “Washington Watch” to discuss the scope of noncitizens casting ballots and the implications of the study’s findings.
“[T]here are very broad openings for noncitizens to vote,” he explained, adding:
In no state in the nation are they required to provide proof of U.S. citizenship in order to register to vote. Now, a couple of states like Arizona tried to enact that requirement, but they were blocked by a court ruling supported by the Obama administration.
And if you look at the federal voter-registration form, it says you can submit all different forms of ID to register. That could be a Social Security number; it could be a driver’s license number; or it could just be a utility bill.
I mean, these are things that anyone can get by living here. They do not prove you’re a U.S. citizen.
And more than that, a lot of noncitizens have faked Social Security numbers, especially illegal immigrants. That’s what they do to work. A recent estimate by the Social Security Administration tallied 2.5 million noncitizens who had Social Security numbers gained by using fake birth certificates or stealing those numbers from somebody else.
Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation and board member of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, concurred. (Heritage founded The Daily Signal in 2014.)
“[T]he problem is, states aren’t doing very much to verify citizenship, so it’s extremely easy for someone who’s not a citizen to register to vote and to vote in elections,” he remarked during Monday’s edition of “Washington Watch.”
“And when that is discovered, oftentimes nothing is done about it.”
Agresti went on to point out the effect that lax enforcement of citizen verification could have in November. “[B]ased on the latest available data, approximately 1 million to 2.7 million noncitizens are going to vote in the upcoming presidential election unless something changes. And that is more than enough to tip the results of congressional races, Senate races, and yes, the U.S. presidency.”
Von Spakovsky echoed Agresti’s concerns. “[I]t doesn’t matter whether they’re black or white, Asian or Hispanic. It doesn’t matter which political party they support. Every time an alien illegally votes, that alien is voiding, negating the vote of a citizen, no matter which political party they support,” he contended. “And the Democrats just don’t seem to want to understand that or to basically ignore it.”
Agresti further reflected on the motivations behind the Democrats’ opposition to efforts to improve election integrity.
“[I]t’s always hard to read people’s minds, but I can tell you this: The vast bulk of these noncitizens are voting for Democrats. According to the best data we have, about 80% of them will vote for Democrats when they vote illegally. And Democrats are fighting tooth and nail to prevent any kind of checking of people’s citizenship. It does benefit them. Is that their reasoning? It’s an obvious incentive, but I can’t read their minds.”
Earlier this month, House Republicans attempted to address the issue by introducing a bill that would require proof of citizenship to register to vote and would remove noncitizens from existing voter rolls. But Agresti expressed doubt about the bill’s chances of passage. “My guess is it will move in the House and die in the Senate, but that’s just an educated guess. And again, even if somehow it got through the Senate, there’s no way [President] Joe Biden’s signing that bill.”
“However,” he added, “I do think in the aftermath of the election, and we hate to have a repeat of 2020, that there should be some accountability, some lawsuits that demand proof that people are who they say they are in tight races. None of that was secured in the last round of election lawsuits, and it needs to be there.”
Agresti concluded by urging candidates involved in tight elections to demand verification that only citizens voted. “A candidate has to make a plea and say, ‘Hey, I want this data to prove that these people who are registered and voted actually are citizens.’”
Originally published at WashingtonStand.com
The post Up to 2.7 Million Noncitizens Could Vote Illegally in November, Study Warns appeared first on The Daily Signal.
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