Numerous bills are being introduced this Legislative session that would inject chaos into our election day calendar. Each bill as a separate issue, but it’s hard to get the big picture without talking about the overall effect.

After Election day, we already have a two week period to ‘cure’ ballots that were rejected for bad signatures or no signature at all. Maybe we should go back to in person voting so we can make sure their signature matches in the first place.

Representative Rayfield, Senator Dembrow introduced HJR 11 that would allow same day voter registration. Do you want bus loads of people showing up to register to vote on election day? Its happened before.

Harney County Clerk, Dag Robinson sent in testimony for HJR 11 objecting to the bill. He cited two different instances where there were real threats to our Oregon election system from same day voter registration.

Now, we are considering letting ballots come in by mail up to 10 days after the election. What is the big push to do these things? After all, we have automatic voter registration.

Senator Knopp introduced SB 694 which requires ballots for general and primary elections that are received after election to be counted if postmarked no later than Saturday before date of election and received no later than seven calendar days after election. Prohibits individual from collecting and returning ballot of other individual, subject to specified exceptions. Requires Secretary of State to submit biennial report to Legislative Assembly identifying name, address and birthdate of each individual who cast more than one ballot in single election during previous two years. Declares an emergency so it would be effective upon passage.

Representative Marty Wilde (D-Eugene) introduced HB 2226. This bill requires ballots returned by mail to be postmarked not later than date of election. Requires county clerks to announce status of tally of ballots received after election date on third and eighth calendar days after date of election. Prohibits individual from collecting and returning ballot of other individual except on date of election. Applies to elections held on or after January 1, 2022.

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

Representative Dan Rayfield (D-Corvallis) also introduced HB 2687 which requires ballots returned by mail to be postmarked not later than date of election. Requires county clerks to announce status of tally of ballots received after election date on third and eighth calendar days after date of election. Applies to elections held on or after January 1, 2022.

We already have early voting, nearly three weeks We don’t need to extend the time to get a ballot to the elections office so we have late voting too. There are drop boxes all over the county people can access in those last days.

Delays in election counting and reporting erode confidence and create opportunities for fraud. Besides, people want the results on election evening. Once results are known then there is knowledge of how many ballots are needed to change close races. Extending the time only gives opportunity to for clandestine ballots to manipulate the count.

It doesn’t make sense for good governance to inject opportunities to commit fraud.


--Janice Dysinger

Post Date: 2021-03-28 12:29:48

Last Update: 2021-03-28 12:39:14