On Monday, RNLA’s Co-Chair Harmeet Dhillon published an op-ed in USA TODAY about the risks that widespread vote-by-mail poses in the upcoming election. Currently, she is representing Republicans in California suing to prevent absentee ballots from being sent to inactive voters. Absentee voting plays an important role in the electoral process for those who are unable to vote in person. However, Democrats are pushing for universal vote-by-mail despite the warnings of election experts on both sides of the aisle.

While House Speaker Nancy Pelosi continues to push a federal power grab for elections with the HEROES Act, the problems with her attempted election administration dictates have been exposed. Just yesterday in Pelosi’s birthplace of Baltimore, Maryland, a story came out about how one of her top priorities, vote by mail, disenfranchises people:

Nearly 1 in 10 ballots could not be delivered to Baltimore City voters during the special election in April, raising concerns for the June 2 primary, which is also being conducted by mail.

The data, released by the Maryland Board of Elections late Tuesday, shows that 20,367 of the more than 230,500 ballots sent to Baltimore City voters could not be delivered before the April 28 special election. An additional 4,355 ballots were undeliverable to Baltimore County voters, while 3,886 were not delivered to Howard County voters — about 3% of all ballots in those two jurisdictions. . . .

An additional 660 were not counted because they lacked a signature.

While reasonable people can disagree about how elections should be changed in response to the unique challenges of COVID-19, there should be universal agreement not to make them more dangerous and less effective.  Yet that is what the left and California are trying to do.

Hillary Clinton's 2016 lawyer and Steele dossier funder Marc Elias has made ballot harvesting one of his four pillars for election reform.  As Logan Churchwell explains in an op-ed entitled, All-mail ballot harvesters could be the next COVID-19 superspreaders:

Picture a harvester in a densely-populated city visiting dozens of houses and apartments each day — often crossing thresholds into living rooms to promote a particular candidate, cause or party. Think of the air they breathe, the touched surfaces and the collected ballot envelopes sealed with human saliva from each home. It only takes one untested, asymptomatic COVID-19 carrier’s ballot being harvested to risk exposure for the rest of the neighborhood as that political operative continues door-to-door.

Proponents have a tough sell in credibly convincing the public that all-mail ballot elections are actually safer with respect to sanitary concerns. 

RNLA Executive Director Michael Thielen states: “In my 25 years in Washington, DC, Rep. Rodney Davis is the best leader of the House Administration Committee. And it is a good thing, as the Committee’s work has never been more important.”

Rep. Davis understands that election law changes should be bipartisan and we need to stop partisan attacks such as claims that Russia stole the election. As Davis explains in an op-ed entitled "Pelosi’s partisanship (and misinformation) threaten America's elections":

The right and honest brokers on the left agree that vote by mail by itself is a flawed voting system.  It has problems with voter error, delivery issues, chain of custody, fraud and more.  In-person voting is the best option for most voters (though some additional absentee voting may be needed to respond to the unique challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic). 

However, we never expected to see support for in-person voting over vote by mail come from liberal stalwart Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez:

It is completely wrong for the BOE to cancel New York’s Presidential Primary.

This decision is not informed by public health: the state is still holding elections for every other seat that day, & so far the only way your ballot will 100% be counted in NY is to vote in person! https://t.co/l8iT7mxm9c

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) April 27, 2020

At the same time Democrats are pushing federal support of vote by mail or even bills calling for nationwide vote by mail, an interesting thing happened in Nevada.  As RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel points out in an excellent op-ed that discussed Democrat Party lawyer Marc Elias' tactics:

Democrats demand in-person voting be expanded in Nevada, after just claiming it was too dangerous to go to the polls in Wisconsin. Last week, Elias called in-person voting a “national disgrace.” Now, Elias says “converting to an all-mail election in a matter of weeks” is impossible, and voting must be expanded “safely in person.” Nice of them to catch up to the fact that one-size-fits-all nationalized mail-in voting is a bad idea.

Shame on you, Speaker Pelosi.  At a time when Americans were coming together, she blew up the bipartisan coronavirus relief package for her legislative desires. 

Senate spends all weekend negotiating a bipartisan deal. Agreement reached. Pelosi flies in from California, whips out her unrelated “wishlist,” and says no. Senate Democrats then vote against proceeding on a bill they negotiated.

Jaw dropping.

— Ben Williamson (@_WilliamsonBen) March 22, 2020

As states likely expand the use of mail ballots in response to the COVID-19 breakout, they need to also protect the integrity of mail ballots to prevent both the appearance of impropriety and actual fraud this November.  Lawyers Democracy Fund published a study last year by current Republican federal Election Assistance Commission(EAC) Commissioner Don Palmer (before he joined the EAC), describing some of the steps needed to protect the integrity of mail ballots and improve voter confidence in mail voting:

Many residents in California are voting twice and it’s time for Secretary of State Alex Padilla to stop ignoring the problem. This flaw in their system has been an issue for years and the integrity of our elections is at stake.

Yesterday was an emotional hearing of the North Carolina election board that generated a fair result, a new election for North Carolina’s ninth Congressional District as a result of ballot harvesting. “Ballot harvesting” is a practice in which paid or organized political operatives collect absentee ballots from voters to whom they have no familial connection and drop them off at a polling place or election office. As happened in North Carolina, critics complain that such actions leave open opportunities for tampering and taking advantage of society’s most vulnerable and those who have no interest in voting.