WASHINGTON - Last night, Committee on House Administration Ranking Member Rodney Davis (R-Ill.) appeared on NewsmaxTV's Spicer & Co. to expose potentially the greatest threat to ballot integrity in our nation's elections: ballot harvesting. Last week, the Committee Republicans introduced a report highlighting the political weaponization of ballot harvesting in California and dropped the Election Fraud Prevention Act to eliminate this dangerous election practice that is ripe for manipulation and fraud. This comes after House Democrats passed their political wishlist, the HEROES Act, which requires every state to adopt unlimited ballot harvesting, overriding states' constitutions and opening up their elections for fraud.

Remarks as Delivered by Ranking Member Rodney Davis:

House Democrats Use Ballot Harvesting to Weaponize Elections:
"They saw it that their own political operatives in California and 2018 Congressional elections could weaponize the process, and it could be used to defeat Republican Members of Congress. I was… I was in Congress at the time, and… and I saw some of my best friends have election leads on the night of election night and one of them, David Valadao, was up by six points. Three weeks later because of harvested ballots that came in overwhelmingly for Democrats, he was defeated. This is a process that's been corrupted, and even Republicans corrupted the process in North Carolina in a state that it's illegal and we did not seat the Member of Congress who that Republican operative worked for."

Ballot Harvesting Has Already Been Corrupted in North Carolina in 2018:
"It's a process that's already been corrupted, and that's exactly what happened in North Carolina. A gentleman went around, and if he thought that ballot was going to be a vote for the Democrat Member of Congress or the Democrat candidate, that ballot wouldn't be turned in. You cannot tell me where California had millions more ballots that were harvested that there weren't political operatives going around committing acts just like that. The difference is it's legal in California, and the only reason why Speaker Pelosi and the Democrats want to do this is because they really believe that the federal government should take over control of our elections not follow the Constitution, Sean."

Our Observers Studied Ballot Harvesting & Elections in California:
"I agree wholeheartedly, which is why I sent observers from the House Administration Committee out to view the presidential primary in California, and we just released a report that showed that there were many chain of custody issues that were very concerning to me and should be
Concerning to anyone who reads that report. If you go to the LA County Registrar, they have a ballot… a ballot bin that was overflowing with ballots sitting outside. Somebody could have easily gone in there and taken ballots away without anybody watching that on a regular basis. In the registrar's office they [computer glitch]… that's just… City… individuals could have come in and tampered with them. That's the chain of custody issue that we trust the post office to take care of, but I don't trust operatives to, Sean and Lindsay."

Ballot Harvesters Could Influence How or Pressure People to Vote:
"You know that could easily happen, and you've got to understand you're gonna have people that are familiar to the community, knocking on doors, in a way that goes against the social distancing requirements that Democrats are using to push a vote by mail system that would be nationally run. But this just is a process that has been corrupted. I think it's going to continue to be corrupted if they're successful. But I do see light in this process because we won an election in Los Angeles just last week, and I think because we've put a lot of scrutiny on this process that they were afraid to send their normal operatives out and we were able to make sure that Mike Garcia will get sworn in as a Member of Congress tomorrow."

What We're Doing to Stop Ballot Harvesting:
"Well, I think we follow what… a process that I always like to say, if you want transparency in Washington, you want to stop corruption, shine the light on it, and we shined the light on ballot harvesting over the last year and a half, and that's going to continue. But what we can really do is continue to talk about it on shows like yours. Election law and election reforms, it's usually not the sexy topic of the day, and I'm glad you're covering it because it matters. It matters because we can lose the majority or win the majority in the House of Representatives and the Senate by processes that will be corrupted by political operatives."


Background:
The Committee on House Administration and its Subcommittee on Elections are responsible for all matters related to election law and are charged with investigating election irregularities. The Committee Republicans have worked over the last 18 months to bring awareness to potentially the greatest threat to ballot integrity in this country: ballot harvesting. Our goal remains to prevent this practice, which jeopardizes the integrity of our electoral process and disenfranchises voters.

House Administration Committee Republicans introduced a report exposing the political weaponization of ballot harvesting in California. The committee examines the use of ballot harvesting in the 2018 Midterm Congressional Elections. Specifically, the report looks at two states: North Carolina, which overturned an election because of the fraud associated with ballot harvesting, and California, which maximized and politically weaponized its use in 2018. The report highlights the fraud and abuse associated with ballot harvesting.

Click here to view the report.
Click here for a document summarizing the report.

Also, Ranking Member Rodney Davis introduced the Election Fraud Prevention Act to eliminate the practice of ballot harvesting – when any individual can pick up any voter's ballot for any reason and deliver it to the polling location completely unchecked. H.R. 6882 will amend the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) to prohibit funds disbursed through the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) from going to states that allow ballot harvesting by any individual and in unlimited amounts while allowing for common-sense exceptions such as election officials, employees of the U.S. Postal Service, family members of the voter, household members of the voter, and caregivers of the voter to deliver the ballots of those truly in need.

Visit the Committee on House Administration Republicans Website for more information.

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