Michigan Senate Republicans Report on 2020 Election Issues

[Wandering Monk]

For your perusal:

https://misenategopcdn.s3.us-east-1...uments/20210623/SMPO_2020ElectionReport_2.pdf

 

[sun rise]

ConclusionThe Committee can confidently assert that it has been thorough in examination of numerous allegations of unlawful actions, improper procedures, fraud, vote theft, or any other description which would cause citizens to doubt the integrity of Michigan’s 2020 election results. Our clear finding is that citizens should be confident the results represent the true results of the ballots cast by the people of Michigan. The Committee strongly recommends citizens use a critical eye and ear toward those who have pushed demonstrably false theories for their own personal gain. We also conclude citizens should demand reasonable updates and reforms to close real vulnerabilities and unlawful activities that caused much of the doubt and questionability to flourish and could, if unchecked, be responsible for serious and disastrous fraud or confusion in the future

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Michigan Senate Republicans Report on 2020 Election Issues

Where?

The Committee researched these claims and concluded that most were false. There were two claims of deceased individuals casting votes that were found to be true; one was a clerical error while the other was a timing issue. The Committee concluded that none of these constituted fraudulent election activities or manipulations.
...
There was no evidence presented to the Committee indicating that hundreds of thousands of absentee voter ballotswere mailed to Michigan voters without previously being requested.
...
The Committee concludes this demonstrates a clear vulnerability for fraud that may be undetected, if the actual voter does not vote at all. If the actual voter does vote, it will create turmoil and draw attention from state and local officials. However, the lack of any such incidents or turmoil in the November 2020 election creates a clear probability that no such efforts were committed to any significant extent. The chance of encountering the attempted double vote scenario is so statistically unlikely as to make impossible even a small effort to do so.
...
These issues were clearly reflected in the activities that occurred at the absentee counting board at the TCF Center. At one point, an audio recording was released of an apparent election training session in the city of Detroit where workers were instructed to maintain six feet between challengers and poll workers, due to COVID-19 precautions. Prior to the election, a court settlement ensured poll challengers could monitor election activities within six feet when necessary. After the settlement, clerk staff, like other election staff across the state, were to be informed of the ruling and how it would affect their activities on Election Day. Testimony was received by the Committee indicating that the settlement, which was reached after many workers completed their training, was not well known among the workers at the TCF Center. It is easy to see how this led to significant confusion and conflict, particularly as many workers had genuine fear and concern over their proximity to persons during the pandemic.
...
It is apparent that the environment at the TCF Center became intolerable and the reactions to it must be understood in this light. While mistakes were clearly made by officials on all sides, it must be acknowledged that many of them were attempting to simply do their job during a time of increasing confusion and distrust. It is impossible for the Committee, or any legal entity, to sort through all the events or persons at fault. However, it appears obvious and reasonable to conclude that confusion, fear, misunderstanding, and even chaos occurred at the TCF Center to varying degrees on Nov. 3 and 4. The environment and those emotions were compounded by a lack of proper recruitment and/or training of election workers on the part of the clerk, as well as a failure of the Republican party to verify recruitment and training, supply an adequate number of election attorneys, and to properly train and counsel some of their volunteers and challengers. Republican officials, along with some ostensibly Independent challengers, furthered the crisis by putting out the call to other members and citizens to descend on the location to stop what was described and presented as a stealing of the election. The descent into disorder with so many extremely concerned citizens elicited responses from poll workers that seemed necessary to them at the time, such as covering windows, calling police, denying lawful challenges, and removing challengers. Those actions by both sides were not always lawful or wise, and increased the angst and fears of the untrained challengers and observers, as well as the many in the public who t did not understand what was shown to them by the media. Despite these mistakes and, potentially, illegal actions, the Committee found no evidence fraudulent activities were undertaken or that such actions led to irreparable harm to ballots or vote counting. Numerous safeguards, particularly the partisan make up of the election boards themselves, were not lost, despite these actions
...
Multiple checks were easily able to rectify the situation and later, a complete hand recount validated the original, official results as accurate.
...
Developing best practices and training election workers on how to maintain balanced precincts is recommended. There is much discussion on allowing some out-of-balance precincts to be eligible for recount but testimony the Committee heard from several clerks indicated they did not support this. Therefore, the Committee makes no recommendations on this issue.
...
The Committee was made aware of claims that election workers at the TCF Center in downtown Detroit were instructed to not match signatures on envelopes and furthermore were instructed to “pre-date” the received date of absentee ballots. To the contrary, these processing steps — signature matching and verification of the date received — occurred at another location and were completed by other employees prior to the time the ballots were sent to the TCF Center for counting. Workers at the AVCBs are to check for the clerk’s signature and time stamp as well as making sure the voter signature is present. However, the validation of the voter signature by the clerk’s office is indicated by the clerk’s signature and stamp. As for the “pre-dating” allegation, Detroit Senior Election Advisor Chris Thomas explained this date field is necessary for processing the ballot. Without the voter present, there is no way to have that date, which was recorded into the QVF by the official who took the same day registration at another location. Since the poll books at the AVCB are not connected to the QVF during Election Day, there is no way to check what was entered at the site where the voter registered. Therefore, a “placeholder” date is entered, and the poll worker assumes the official accepting the registration did their due diligence
...
The Committee can confidently assert that it has been thorough in examination of numerous allegations of unlawful actions, improper procedures, fraud, vote theft, or any other description which would cause citizens to doubt the integrity of Michigan’s 2020 election results. Our clear finding is that citizens should be confident the results represent the true results of the ballots cast by the people of Michigan. The Committee strongly recommends citizens use a critical eye and ear toward those who have pushed demonstrably false theories for their own personal gain. We also conclude citizens should demand reasonable updates and reforms to close real vulnerabilities and unlawful activities that caused much of the doubt and questionability to flourish and could, if unchecked, be responsible for serious and disastrous fraud or confusion in the future. Further, we commend the innumerable clerks, canvassers, staff, workers, and volunteers across Michigan that make the enormous complexity of elections operate so smoothly, so often. The complexity of the work and the dedication we discovered are astounding and worthy of our sincerest appreciation. We also commend the diligent citizens that took time to report problems and concerns they saw because they want and value fair and free elections above party or personal gain. If all citizens remain vigilant and involved, we will emerge stronger after any challenging time

 

[SomeRandom]

Omg, are your Republicans still going on about this?
This isn’t beating a dead horse anymore. It’s since turned to bones and now crumbled into dust. They’re beating the dust of a dead horse

 

[Wandering Monk]

Omg, are your Republicans still going on about this?
This isn’t beating a dead horse anymore. It’s since turned to bones and now crumbled into dust. They’re beating the dust of a dead horse

I think you need to read this. It debunks the conspiracy theories floating out there about Michigan being stolen from Trump.

 

[Twilight Hue]

Omg, are your Republicans still going on about this?
This isn’t beating a dead horse anymore. It’s since turned to bones and now crumbled into dust. They’re beating the dust of a dead horse

Make a deal. Stop harping on Trump's tax returns and go nowhere 'criminal' investigating in exchange for the never ending voter fraud.

Just a thought, fantastically unrealistic as it may be.

 

[fantome profane]

Make a deal. Stop harping on Trump's tax returns and go nowhere 'criminal' investigating in exchange for the never ending voter fraud.

Just a thought, fantastically unrealistic as it may be.

Sounds like extortion.

 

[SomeRandom]

Make a deal. Stop harping on Trump's tax returns and go nowhere 'criminal' investigating in exchange for the never ending voter fraud.

Just a thought, fantastically unrealistic as it may be.

I haven’t heard anything about that, whereas the Republicans (or just Trumpers, I don’t think this is all Republicans doing this, right?) throwing a temper tantrum has been clogging up even our news feed. Making anyone remotely conservative feel second hand embarrassment.
At least the other side is crying about a criminal not being held accountable. Whiny to be sure. But a bit more noble than being a sore loser, wouldn’t you say?

 

[Twilight Hue]

I haven’t heard anything about that, whereas the Republicans (or just Trumpers, I don’t think this is all Republicans doing this, right?) throwing a temper tantrum has been clogging up even our news feed. Making anyone remotely conservative feel second hand embarrassment.
At least the other side is crying about a criminal not being held accountable. Whiny to be sure. But a bit more noble than being a sore loser, wouldn’t you say?

Well, since tax return disclosure is a tradition and not a requirement, it comes across as being a bit hypocritical that whining is exclusively a Republican issue.

Voter fraud? Yea agree, Republicans ought to drop the issue and work towards a bipartisan solution in making voting as transparent and fair as humanly possible.

 

[SomeRandom]

Well, since tax return disclosure is a tradition and not a requirement, it comes across as being a bit hypocritical that whining is exclusively a Republican issue.

Whiny sure. But since it’s the Donald I find it hard to disagree with such whiners. But I agree that both sides are full of whingers. It’s just that in this particular instance one looks a bit worse than the other.

Voter fraud? Yea agree, Republicans ought to drop the issue and work towards a bipartisan solution in making voting as transparent and fair as humanly possible.

Hopefully.
One thing I know is for sure. The Republicans have pretty much lost the right to call anyone snowflakes for a while. Like geez, if this fiasco lasted a week or two. Maybe.
But this long? Sorry, but I’ve never seen more snowflakes in all my life. Granted I live in Oz, so maybe that’s actually not saying that much

 

[fantome profane]

Well, since tax return disclosure is a tradition and not a requirement, it comes across as being a bit hypocritical that whining is exclusively a Republican issue.

It feels like you are hanging on to an issue that is no longer relevant. But let me say that since this person no longer holds any public office and is not currently running for political office, the public has no need to see any of his returns or any other financial records.

Prosecutors bringing criminal charges on the other hand ,,,

 

[Ponder This]

For your perusal:

https://misenategopcdn.s3.us-east-1...uments/20210623/SMPO_2020ElectionReport_2.pdf

Thank You for posting this document, which not only supports my statement elsewhere in RF that there were lawsuits that found problems with the election in Michigan, but, moreover, as we can plainly see, the analysis of the 2020 election that you provided results in the following recommendations:

• Place in statute the rights and duties of challengers and poll watchers, requiring they be uniformly trained and held accountable.
• Ensuring combined AVCBs can have more than one challenger per party, with the ability to replace challengers who exit the AVCB location after the sequester is lifted.
• Allow for bipartisan election inspectors for all audits and require the process be open to the public.
• Prohibit the unsolicited mailing of absentee voter ballot applications from the secretary of state to limit the potential for non-Michigan residents voting in elections.
• Establish signature verification requirements via the administrative rules process or statute in order to provide clarity and uniformity to election workers on the proper way to ensure signatures match.
• Require video security on all drop boxes and require all drop boxes be emptied and secured immediately or earlier than 8 p.m. on Election Day to help expedite the processing and tabulation of ballots.
• In order to ensure more accurate voter rolls, allow county clerks greater authority when removing deceased individuals from the Qualified Voter File.
• Allow for the continued pre-processing of absentee ballots the day before Election Day, so long as stringent security measures are kept in place. Pre-processing must occur on the site of tabulation.
• Consider allowing tabulation, which is more secure, to begin in the week preceding Election Day as long as results may not be released until polls are closed on the completion of Election Day.
• Require that best practices for maintaining a balanced precinct on Election Day be part of the necessary training for all precinct workers. Establish a public, published record of all clerks who fail to provide the appropriate training or continuing education to themselves or their employees.
• Reform the canvassing processes by requiring canvassers be present during the canvass activities, expanding certain county boards where population requires it, and provide for additional time for the process to be completed.

I hope that people will stop auto-regarding all legislation for the purpose of election integrity as attempts to steal future elections. And I hope that people will stop seeing scrutiny of elections as necessarily being an accusation of "widespread fraud", when it's clear that fraud doesn't have to be proven in order for states to enact reasonable election reforms.

I do appreciate that the report also concludes that:

The Committee can confidently assert that it has been thorough in examination of numerous allegations of unlawful actions, improper procedures, fraud, vote theft, or any other description which would cause citizens to doubt the integrity of Michigan’s 2020 election results. Our clear finding is that citizens should be confident the results represent the true results of the ballots cast by the people of Michigan. The Committee strongly recommends citizens use a critical eye and ear toward those who have pushed demonstrably false theories for their own personal gain. We also conclude citizens should demand reasonable updates and reforms to close real vulnerabilities and unlawful activities that caused much of the doubt and questionability to flourish and could, if unchecked, be responsible for serious and disastrous fraud or confusion in the future.​

There is something to be said for asserting confidence in the result even if the result is not 100% certain. Usually when I post on this topic, someone will respond to me with a meaningless statement about "widespread fraud". So let me say ahead of time: I've never claimed significant fraud has been proven to have occurred in the 2020 US Election and I still do not make that claim and either way such claims do not change the question of whether or not states should enact election reforms. Thank You.

 

[Revoltingest]

The MAGA I know doesn't buy the report.
He knows that Democrats committed massive
fraud, & that Trump won. Only time will take
the wind from their sails.

 

[ecco]

Stop harping on Trump's tax returns and go nowhere 'criminal' investigating in exchange for the never ending voter fraud. Just a thought, fantastically unrealistic as it may be.

Yes, it is fantastically unrealistic because Trump, and therefore his 35,000,000 base, will never let it go.