A Michigan state senator who campaigned in 2020 on election integrity (and won re-election) signed absentee ballots issued to his daughter in 2010 and for the 2016 primary and general elections.
When confronted about the 2010 ballot, he accused his ex-wife of signing it. The signatures on the 2016 ballots matched his handwriting. By then, his daughter was living in Florida with a boyfriend and was ineligible to vote in Michigan.
A conscientious GOP county clerk contacted police after the 2016 incidents, but in 2017 a Republican prosecutor declined to file charges, claiming he “had no intent to defraud.” The Secretary of State, at the time a Republican, didn’t reply to that prosecutor’s request for their opinion.
Michigan elections are under different management now, and a criminal investigation has been opened. (Read story here).
In Texas, a state run by Republicans, Crystal Mason, a black woman with a felony record, asked a poll worker if she could vote and was given a provisional ballot that wasn’t counted. She was sentenced to 5 years in prison for election fraud. In Georgia, GOP legislators passed a law making it a felony to hand a water bottle or sandwich to a voter waiting in line. In places like Georgia and Texas, long waiting lines at polling places generally only occur in black voting precincts.
Republicans use laws like this to frighten black people away from the polls. The Supreme Court has been striking down federal laws protecting black voters, saying it’s undue interference with states. Elections are run by states and counties, even for president and other federal offices.
Meanwhile, in states like Florida and Ohio, white voters who intentionally voted twice for Trump in 2016 got probation and community service. If the Michigan GOP politician is convicted, he’ll probably get probation, too.