Three PC leadership campaigns are flagging problems about the upcoming vote, saying thousands of registration packages were mailed out too late and that some memberships are potentially “tainted.”

Both the Doug Ford and Caroline Mulroney camps say the use of prepaid credit cards to buy memberships is suspect, with Ford asking that all memberships purchased that way be deactivated for the vote, which begins Friday.

His campaign sent an email Wednesday to the leadership committee, saying “as the voting process has continued to unfold, we have grown increasingly concerned with the validity of a number of the currently registered members.

“We were surprised and disappointed to hear of the large-scale use of prepaid credit cards to pay for new memberships — a clear violation of the membership rules. Prepaid credit cards have long been associated with the practice of signing up fake members, and as a part of a larger effort to commit voter fraud” because they are untraceable, says the email from lawyer Stephen Thiele.

He said the campaign has “serious concerns that these memberships are tainted.”

Mulroney is asking the party to get to the bottom of the use of prepaid or “burner” cards.

“I remain concerned about the potential for fraudulent memberships,” she said via Twitter. “The party has already removed almost 500 ‘highly suspicious’ members from the list and I believe they should continue to investigate individual suspicious cases.”

Meanwhile, Christine Elliott’s campaign is worried that “thousands upon thousands of registration/verification letters had not been mailed on time” and that should give the leadership committee pause.

The packages should have been mailed about Feb. 20, and “to find out two days before the deadline date that 10,000 registration letters were placed into the mail some six to seven days late without the campaigns being informed is patently unacceptable.

“Sadly, the delay may result in some members being disenfranchised or unable to register in time to vote,” says an email from Jeffrey Kroeker.

The party has extended the registration deadline by three days, to March 5, in order to process memberships for the vote.

The new PC leader will be revealed March 10.

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Running for PC leader are Elliott, Ford, Mulroney and Tanya Granic Allen.

Former leader Patrick Brown, who had thrown his hat in the ring, announced Monday he was dropping out of the race.

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