In 2013, a new Democratic state legislature rammed through a sweeping and highly controversial election law and convinced Democratic Governor John Hickenlooper to sign it.
The law, known as House Bill 1303, makes Colorado the only state in the country to combine two radical changes in election law:
1. Abolishing the traditional polling place and having every voter mailed a ballot.
2. Establishing same-day registration, which allows someone to appear at a government office and register and vote on the same day without showing photo ID or any other verifiable evidence that establishes identity.
If they register online a few days before, no human being ever has to show up to register or vote. A few keystrokes can create a voter and a “valid” ballot. Once a ballot cast under same-day registration is mixed in with others, there is no way to separate it out if the person who voted is later found ineligible. Other jurisdictions that have same-day registration treat the vote as a provisional ballot pending verification. Colorado immediately counts the vote.
“We have uniquely combined two bad ideas, both of which open the door to fraud and error along with creating huge administrative headaches,” warns Republican Scott Gessler, Colorado’s secretary of state.
Ballots will be mailed to people who don’t vote and no longer live in Colorado, because the law makes it very difficult to remove names from the voting rolls.
All mail-in ballots in Colorado will be ripe for abuse because “ballot harvesters” are allowed to go door-to-door and collect up to ten ballots with no effective enforcement if they collect more and deliver them at other times. Amazingly, these operatives can be paid based on the number of ballots they collect.
The potential for harvesters to pressure voters to turn over ballots, open ballot envelopes, alter ballots, or even throw them away is a potential reality and secrecy controls are so lax that election workers who receive mail-in ballots can figure out how individuals voted in many counties.
Opponents of HB 1303 worry that because the new law leaves the door wide open for fraud, it could cast a taint over the results in this November’s critical races for senator, representatives, governor, and state attorney general. They advise people to treat their mail-in ballot as if it were cash and cast it in person at their local clerk’s office or at “voter service centers” that are authorized to receive them.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote!
Michael H. Drucker
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