Peach Tree Times

Officials in Georgia and Wisconsin are investigating allegations that mail ballots were collected by third-party political activists and placed in drop boxes (ballot harvesting) in the 2020 general election, and in Georgia’s two special elections that gave control of the U.S. Senate to the Democrats. 

Georgia election law forbids the practice while Wisconsin law is silent on the matter.

In Georgia, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office is investigating allegations first made by a Texas-based voter group, True the Vote, that alleges it has cellphone location records showing ballot harvesting and the word of a whistleblower who claims to have been a part of a group of activists paid per ballot placed in drop boxes.

Last fall the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) rebuffed the group’s arguments, citing lack of evidence, but in January investigators with Raffensperger’s office asked the Georgia Elections Board for a subpoena, which was granted just last week.

Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to carry Georgia since 1992. 

Walter Jones, a spokesman for Raffensperger, told the Peach Tree Times that he could only verify that the subpoena was authorized, but was not permitted to discuss details of the investigation.

In True the Vote’s complaint to Raffensperger’s office, filed after GBI declined to investigate its allegations, it said a John Doe claimed that he and others were paid $10 for each delivered ballot.

"John Doe described a network of non-governmental organizations that worked together to facilitate a ballot trafficking scheme in Georgia," True the Vote alleges in its complaint. "John Doe claimed to have been one of many individuals paid to collect and deliver absentee ballots during the early voting periods of the November 2020 general election and the January 2021 runoff [Senate] election."

In early March, Raffensperger told Just the News that “his investigators want to secure the identity and cooperation of the whistleblower and to follow the money to who funded the operation.”

Back in 2019, Raffensperger led the effort ban ballot harvesting. The law excludes only the collection and delivery of the mail votes of immediate relatives.

In Wisconsin, True the Vote appeared last week before the Assembly’s Committee on Campaign and Elections last week with allegations that cellphone location records in the Dairy State likewise showed ballot harvesting in the 2020 election.

The president of the group, Catherine Engelbrecht, recommended to lawmakers that they update their voter registration files, ban private funding of election management and place restrictions on ballot harvesting.

In August Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat, vetoed legislation that restricted ballot harvesting.

In February, the Wisconsin Supreme Court allowed a ban on drop boxes, following a ruling by a county court in January, to go into effect for the April primary elections. The Supreme Court is expected to make a final ruling on the case in early June.