I wrote here about the attempt of the Presidential
Advisory Commission on Election Integrity to obtain voter data from the states
to determine whether, or to what extent, voter fraud is a problem. More than a
few states have resisted, even though many of them make the same information
available for purchase by campaigns, political parties, researchers or even the
general public.
What,
it must be asked, are these states trying to conceal?
A new study by the Government Accountability
Institute suggests the answer. It shows that thousands of votes in the 2016
election were illegal duplicate votes from people who registered and voted in
more than one state.
Our friend Hans von Spakovsky, a
member of the Commission on Election Integrity, reports:
The Government Accountability Institute was able to obtain voter
registration and voter history data from only 21 states because while some
states shared it freely, “others impose exorbitant costs or refuse to comply
with voter information requests”. . .
The institute compared the lists using an “extremely
conservative matching approach that sought only to identify two votes cast in
the same legal name.” It found that 8,471 votes in 2016 were “highly likely”
duplicates.
Extrapolating this to all 50 states would likely produce, with
“high-confidence,” around 45,000 duplicate votes.
The
Government Accountability Institute wasn’t content just to match names and
birthdays, which can be the same for different individuals. It contracted with
companies that have commercial databases to further cross-check these
individuals using their Social Security numbers and other information. When
names, birthdates and Social Security numbers are matched, there is virtually
no chance of false positives.
Notice
that the study is confined to only one type of voter fraud — cases where an
individual uses the same name to vote in more than one state. It does not
capture cases of ineligible voting by noncitizens and felons — likely the most
common type of fraud — and absentee ballot fraud.
Even
so, 45,000 fraudulent votes is not an inconsequential number. As Hans points
out, Hillary Clinton won New Hampshire by fewer than 3,000 votes out of over
700,000 cast. (New Hampshire was one of the states that refused to turn over
its data for this study. There have been allegations of Massachusetts residents
voting there).
In
addition, the 2000 presidential election was decided by 537 votes out of a
total of 105 million cast. And in 2008, Al Franken won his Minnesota Senate
race by a mere 312 votes. He ended up being the deciding vote that gave this
country Obamacare.
The
Institute’s work should prove helpful to the Commission on Election Integrity
as it overcomes obstacles thrown up by those who claim voter fraud doesn’t
exist, but are unwilling to have that claim tested.
You might also read this: Blog: Hackers in competition
breach voting machine security in minutes
