Absentee ballots like this one cast by a soldier stationed in Guantanamo Bay were being inspected to assure integrity in the voting process. | By Gretel Sharpee
Absentee ballots like this one cast by a soldier stationed in Guantanamo Bay were being inspected to assure integrity in the voting process. | By Gretel Sharpee
New details from the Fulton County ballot inspection show that 25% of absentee ballots were not documented with chain of custody documents, which are the forms that track how absentee ballots arrive at the county registrar’s office.
Fulton County only documented 1,180 absentee ballot transfer forms when state voting numbers indicate there should’ve been 1,565 absentee transfer forms, Georgia Star News reported.
"Chain of custody for election results and election records is absolutely critical for integrity, Garland Favorito, the cofounder of Voter GA, told the Peach Tree Times.
The Associated Press reported that on May 21, a judge in Georgia’s Fulton County ruled that prosecutors could investigate 147,000 ballots submitted by mail as part of an ongoing fraud investigation in the county.
"It confirms our suspicions and it corroborates the evidence that we have collected so far," Favorito said.
Favorito, the lead plaintiff in the Fulton County investigation, said that the inspection’s purpose is to, "find the truth about the Fulton mail-in ballots" and to provide "assurance of elections transparency" for the people of Georgia, PolitiFact.com reported.
Records in Fulton County show that 385 missing absentee ballot transfer forms were necessary to provide mandatory chain of custody documentation for a total of 18,901 absentee ballots and that those documents are still missing more than seven months after the election, Georgia Star News reported.
This issue isn't just going on in Georgia. Similar investigations going on in Maricopa County, the largest county in Arizona. It isn the midst of a full recount and audit, the Grand Canyon Times said.
"An apparent break-in occurred [on Saturday, May 29] at the ballot-holding warehouse where the ballots for the pending Fulton County, Georgia audit were housed. According to reports, security guards hired by Fulton County left the facility. About 20 minutes later, the facility’s alarm was set off. A security detail hired by the plaintiffs’ attorney, Bob Cheeley, relayed to reporters that the facility door was wide open," the Star News said.
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