Mail-in ballots have been sent across the nation. Democrats have been waiting for the ballots to be released to voters, and why not? The opportunities for intercepting them and casting fraudulent votes are high. Democratic operatives are waiting at vacant lots, shopping malls, gas stations, and apartment complexes to claim thousands of blank ballots they sent to fake locations nationwide. The recent endorsement of Kamala Harris by the American Postal Workers Union provides yet another chance for Democrats to intercept mail-in ballots.
What could go wrong?
Harris’s running mate, “Tom Walz,” may have a few opinions. According to The New York Times, Hundreds of electronic ballots emailed last week from Palm Beach County in Florida mistakenly listed “Tom Walz” as the Democratic nominee for vice president. His correct name is Tim Walz, but that was not how it appeared on 257 ballots sent to service members and voters overseas, as explained by Wendy Sartory Link, the county elections supervisor.
Link, a Democrat running for reelection on the same ballot, said the office realized the mistake 18 hours after sending the ballots. Voters were informed and given the option to download an updated ballot. Link said the error happened because a vendor made a “manual typed change” to what had been an accurate ballot.
She also mentioned that whether the ballot says “Tom Walz” or “Tim Walz,” any vote intended for the Democratic ticket would still be counted correctly.
It’s nothing new for Florida. In 2000, a type of ballot called a butterfly ballot caused many Democratic voters who supported Al Gore to vote for Reform candidate Pat Buchanan instead. Republican George W. Bush narrowly won the election. In 2018, the voting machines in Palm Beach County had problems during a recount and missed the deadline to submit the results.
Montana’s election season has also had a shaky start. Absentee voters noticed that Kamala Harris was not listed as a candidate on their ballots. The state had to shut down its electronic absentee voting system after it went live on September 20 because there was no option to vote for Harris.
Max Himsl, a Montana voter in the UK, noticed the problem while trying to fill out his ballot online. He reported it to the Flathead County Election Department, and the Secretary of State’s office, led by Republican Christi Jacobson, took down the Electronic Absentee System to troubleshoot the issue. They said that very few voters were affected.
They also assured voters that the problem was only with electronic absentee ballots, which are for members of the armed forces living abroad, their spouses or dependents, U.S. citizens living abroad, and others who fit the definitions of “absent uniformed services voter” and “overseas voter” according to Montana law.
This isn’t the first time Jacobson has been involved in an election issue, and she has faced criticism online for this recent mistake.
Max Croes, the former vice chair of the Montana Democratic Party, said on X, “This is criminal… The Montana Secretary of State is part of the corrupt Montana GOP.”
Casey was talking about a recent controversy involving a group called Montanans Securing Reproductive Rights, which advocates for abortion rights. In July 2024, this group threatened to sue Jacobson for taking names off a petition to add abortion as a right in the Montana Constitution.
The group said that Jacobson removed the names of registered but “inactive” voters from their petition. However, the Secretary of State’s office explained that they could disregard inactive voters as “qualified electors,” so their signatures didn’t count on the petition.
The group took the lawsuit to court on July 10, and the court ruled that Jacobson must add the removed signatures back to the petition while the case is ongoing.
Jacobson recently asked the United States Supreme Court to consider appealing voter laws that the Montana Supreme Court found unconstitutional. These laws had stopped 17-year-olds from getting a ballot, even if they turned 18 by election day. They also eliminated same-day registration, did not accept university IDs as valid identification, and banned ballot collectors who received payment for their services.
With the election just over forty days away, worries are mounting over the integrity of mail-in ballots. But now that the issues affect Democrats, the concerns have finally hit the mainstream media. Still, with Harris hiding throughout her campaign, it’s possible that Florida election officials forgot she was in the race. An honest mistake? Tom Walz probably disagrees.
