Rod Thomson

In a twist almost too incredible to believe, Broward County Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes late Friday mixed rejected ballots with valid ballots and no one, on either side of the races, has any idea what to do about it. Apparently, there is no controlling statute.

The numbers are not large. Apparently there are about 20 rejected provisional ballots that were mixed in with 205 valid provisional ballots. But considering the level of corruption and mistakes, one begins to wonder if any of the election results out of Broward can be trusted.

The media are calling it “accidental” and a “mistake,” and it may be in this case just gross incompetence on the part of Snipes. But she has such a long history of violating election laws while continuing to be re-elected in Broward, it’s difficult not to be suspicious of this particularly when she intended to do it in secret and this was only found out after Republican lawyers forced her to do it publicly.

Republican Manatee County Supervisor of Elections Mike Bennett has seen too much of Snipes’ shenanigans over the years. “She has never run a good election,” he diplomatically told SRQ Magazine.

The problem is Snipes’ history. The Miami Herald published a story Nov. 2 on the terrible history of Broward and Snipes, in the lead-up to the Midterm elections:

“Following a court ruling in May that Broward Elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes had illegally destroyed ballots from a 2016 congressional race, the governor’s office announced the Florida Department of State would send election experts to Snipes’ office during this year’s election “to ensure that all laws are followed” and “to observe the administration of the election.” Even beyond her own reprimand for authorizing the destruction of ballots, Snipes cannot deny the department’s patchy track record. In 2016, early voting results for Broward were posted a half hour before polls closed, in violation of election law. Her office was sued unsuccessfully because a constitutional amendment was missing from some mail-in ballots…On multiple occasions, there have been problems with printing mail ballots. And in the August primaries, Broward was the last county to post election results. The department cited reasons from unexpected recounts, delayed jump drive delivery — rumor was they were temporarily lost — to a late influx of mail-in ballots that were still being counted the next day, leaving the results of several races unclear.”

Further, as Marc Caputo reported in Politico in August, just before the Florida primaries, that a court handed down an injunction that “prevents Broward County Election Supervisor Brenda Snipes from opening the mail-in ballots in secret or before the county’s three-member Canvassing Board meets to determine the ballots’ validity. The board can begin meeting Monday to handle absentee ballots, more than 75,000 of which have been cast in Broward ahead of the Aug. 28 primaries.”[emphasis added]

More Truth On Patreon

Now in this election, four days after polls closed, it is not clear Broward or Snipes have any idea what is going on. She does not know know how many ballots are left to be counted; she did not report hourly or regularly as required; she has several times since the election dumped thousands of additional votes late at night that benefited Democrats.

As Sen. Marco Rubio tweeted: “A U.S. Senate seat & a statewide cabinet officer are now potentially in the hands of an elections supervisor with a history of incompetence & of blatant violations of state & federal laws.”

That is a factual statement. So this last “mistake” could be just the rampant incompetence that is part of Snipes’ office. Or it could be more of the illegalities that also are part of Snipes’ office.

The mixing of the ballots was discovered after Snipes was forced to present 205 provisional ballots to the Broward County canvassing board for inspection. She had originally planned to handle the ballots administratively (presumably, in secret again) but agreed to present them to the canvassing board after Republican attorneys objected.

“We have found no clear authority controlling the situation faced by the board,” said Broward County Attorney Andrew Meyers.

Broward County received more than 600 provisional ballots by the end of Nov. 6. The vast majority were declared invalid by the county’s canvassing board for causes such as registering to vote too late, previously voting, voting at the wrong precinct and so on.

More Truth On Facebook

But a couple hundred provisional ballots were held in limbo because of what appeared to be technical snafus in the precinct ID system. On Election Day, Broward opened and removed those 205 anonymous ballots from their signed envelopes and counted them. Snipes was not originally going to have the canvassing board review those. But challenges from lawyers for the Republican Party forced her to give them to the board. Of course, they had already been opened, which makes their legitimacy more questionable.

About 20 of those ballots were declared illegal (that is the correct term by law) because they had mismatched signatures. But then they were mixed into the anonymous pile of 205 that had been declared valid.

“The ballots cannot be identified,” Snipes said after a Republican Party lawyer asked.

Republican Party lawyers immediately pressed Snipes about what she intended to do with those 205 votes, and if they’d be counted, which she refused to answer. Lawyers on neither side can find a controlling statute for this situation.

Rod Thomson is an author, TV talking head and former journalist, and is Founder of The Revolutionary Act. Rod is co-host of Right Talk America With Julio and Rod on the Salem Radio Network.

Drudge Got You Down? / Try WHATFINGER NEWS