If the election in Pennsylvania is close, a new challenge to more than 3,500 voters, many of whom live overseas and send their ballots, could prove to be an important part of the effort to undermine confidence in 2024 election.
“During Friday, several bad faith mass challenges were filed in a coordinated effort in counties across the Commonwealth to question the qualifications of thousands of registered Pennsylvania voters who applied to vote by ballot,” the Pennsylvania Department of State said in a statement.
Most voters are individuals who live overseas and do not vote under the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, a federal law that has allowed certain citizens living overseas to vote since 1986. This group of voters includes active military members, people who work abroad. , and expats.
An additional challenge was raised to the question of the voter’s residency because he had a permanent mailing address with the US Postal Service.
“The challenge is based on a theory that the courts have repeatedly rejected,” the Pennsylvania Department of State said.
Josh Maxwell, chairman of the Chester County Board of Commissioners, said the elections office received hundreds of challenges from activists in the community based on USPS mail delivery data. They believe that the attempt is being made to deprive the rightful voters of their right to vote.
“It’s about disenfranchising voters in swing states and overturning the results of the election,” he said.
Many of these challenges have come from activists associated with organizations that say they are focused on electoral integrity. In Chester County, activists challenging the votes claimed affiliation with the PA Fair Elections group in a video hearing last week. PA Fair Elections is part of a broader national initiative to examine the voter list and ballots, according to the progressive watchdog group Documented.
According to a report released on CBS News by Documented, PA Fair Elections is run by Heather Honey, an activist whose organization is known for its work to change election procedures across the country.
Madu is the head of the Institute for Election Research, and is involved in a controversial petition to the Georgia State Board of Elections that would make it easier for county boards to block election certification, according to ProPublica. The rules are from now on blocked by a Fulton County judge. Honey denied any involvement in pushing Georgia’s rule.
“Heather Honey is working as part of a well-funded and nationally organized effort to create election conspiracy theories, challenge voters with thin resources and demand results when MAGA Republicans lose,” said Brendan Fisher, Documented’s deputy executive director.
PA Fair Elections denied any involvement in the voter challenge in an email to CBS News. Heather Honey did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.
Aside from activist groups, some of the challenges to individual voters came from Republican State Senator Jarrett Coleman, who posted challenges in Bucks and Lehigh Counties. The letter also said he was sending a fee of $10 per voter challenge as required. Coleman’s office did not respond to CBS News for comment.
Currently, districts with challenged voters must hold hearings before the certification deadline on November 12 regarding the status of these voters, which legal groups say is cause for concern. The ACLU sent an email to Pennsylvania’s 67 district attorneys asking officials to challenge both groups of voters.
“The District should formally dismiss or deny these challenges as soon as possible to minimize delays or disruptions in the canvassing process,” the ACLU letter said.
Both York and Chester counties have rejected all the challenges.
Concerns about overseas absentee voting have been raised by former President Donald Trump, who posted on Social Truth in September that the Democrats are “getting ready to CHEAT! They are going to use UOCAVA (Uniform Nationals and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act)
to get a ballot, a program that sends ballots overseas without checking citizenship or verifying identity, whatever.”
Overseas absentee voting has been a rallying cry for self-described “election integrity” activists who claim individuals living overseas can submit false voter information. In recent weeks, two lawsuits over out-of-state absentee voting have been dismissed in North Carolina and Michigan.
With Pennsylvania’s challenge, the board of elections is the arbiter, not the judge.
