• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Events
  • Civic Ed
  • Campaign Finance
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • Independent Voter News
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Voting>
  3. voter fraud>

Iowa elections official becomes latest Republican to claim voter fraud

Bill Theobald
January 02, 2020
Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate

Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate alleges nine people voted in Iowa after voting in another state in 2018 and 27 people voted in Iowa before doing so elsewhere.

Courtesy Paul Pate

Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate has joined the chorus of Republican officials who claim to have found evidence of voter fraud.

Pate announced late last week that he had referred nine voters to county attorneys for allegedly voting twice in the 2018 election. They are suspected of voting in Iowa after having voted in another state. Another 27 were identified, Pate said in a news release, of voting in Iowa first and then in another state.

The information was discovered through Iowa's involvement in the multi-state Electronic Registration Information Center, which shares data in order to improve the accuracy of voter rolls.


That is the same method Ohio's Republican secretary of state, Frank LaRose, used to identify 10 people who appear to have cast ballots in Ohio and another state in the 2018 election. In mid-December, LaRose announced he was referring the names to the state's attorney general.

He said then that "allowing one voter to cast multiple ballots diminishes the value of the legally cast ballot of each voter."

Iowa's Pate used similar language: "One fraudulent vote is too many. It nullifies a legally cast vote."

LaRose had earlier caused a stir when he said he found 354 people who are not U.S. citizens but were registered in the state. Of those, 77 voted in the midterm, he said.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Voting rights advocates had criticized LaRose for that report, saying what he found may have been simple mistakes, people confused about the system or people who got naturalized later than the records he was looking at.

They cited the debacle that occurred in Texas earlier in 2019, when the acting secretary of state claimed nearly 100,000 non-citizens had been found on the voter rolls. Subsequent checks revealed many of those were incorrectly identified as non-citizens and the controversy that ensued ended Republican David Whitely's chance of winning confirmation as secretary of state.

Claims of voter fraud have recently been a mostly Republican cause, starting with President Donald Trump, who claimed "millions and millions of people" voted illegally in the 2016 election and thereby cost him the popular vote. None of those claims have been verified and the commission Trump established to investigate voter fraud disbanded without issuing a report.

This past fall, Republican incumbent Matt Bevin initially claimed voter fraud when he lost a close gubernatorial race to Democrat Andy Beshear. He later dropped those claims.

Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida referred to "rampant voter fraud" in his successful bid to unseat Democrat Sen. Bill Nelson in 2018 but none was found.

Advocates say the constant claims of fraud erode voter confidence in elections. But raising concerns about improper voting is a running theme when Republicans justify removing people from voter registration rolls in the name of keeping them up to date. Federal law does require states to properly maintain voter lists by eliminating people who have moved or died.

GOP voter fraud concerns, which Democrats say are overblown, are also regularly cited when Republicans propose new laws, such as requiring voters to have an ID.

Democrats see these laws as bald attempts to reduce turnout, especially among minorities, who are more likely to vote for Democrats.

From Your Site Articles
  • N.C. elections board to wrap up fraud hearings Wednesday - The ... ›
  • Ohio's elections chief in aggressive effort to find voters who shouldn't ... ›
  • Flawed multistate voter database turned off to settle civil rights suit ›
  • Marion Republicans hit with election fraud charges - The Fulcrum ›
  • Eight myths that could destroy the election - The Fulcrum ›
  • No charges in Florida voter fraud probe - The Fulcrum ›
  • Republican Rep. Steve Watkins charged with election fraud - The Fulcrum ›
  • Text-to-vote scam from 2016 brings fraud charges - The Fulcrum ›
  • Search finds a couple dozen N.C. voter fraud crimes in 2016 - The Fulcrum ›
  • Simple microeconomics shows the fallacy of most voter fraud - The Fulcrum ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud - The New York Times ›
  • Voter Fraud Map Page | The Heritage Foundation ›
  • The Myth of Voter Fraud | Brennan Center for Justice ›
voter fraud

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

Reform in 2023: Leadership worth celebrating

Layla Zaidane

Two technology balancing acts

Dave Anderson

Reform in 2023: It’s time for the civil rights community to embrace independent voters

Jeremy Gruber

Congress’ fix to presidential votes lights the way for broader election reform

Kevin Johnson

Democrats and Republicans want the status quo, but we need to move Forward

Christine Todd Whitman

Reform in 2023: Building a beacon of hope in Boston

Henry Santana
Jerren Chang
latest News

It’s the institutional design, stupid! With a parliamentary system, America could avoid gridlock and instability

Milind Thakar
18h

Poll: Americans’ legislative wish list for new congress shows frustration with political systems

Benjamin Clary
18h

Podcast: Why Democrats fail with rural voters

Our Staff
18h

Your Take: Religious beliefs

Our Staff
03 February

Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Rabbi Charles Savenor
03 February

Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Our Staff
03 February
Videos

Video: What does it mean to be Black?

Our Staff

Video: The dignity index

Our Staff

Video: The Supreme Court and originalism

Our Staff

Video: How the baby boom changed American politics

Our Staff

Video: What the speakership election tells us about the 118th Congress webinar

Our Staff

Video: We need more bipartisan commitment to democracy: Pennsylvania governor

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Why Democrats fail with rural voters

Our Staff
18h

Podcast: Anti-racism: The pro-human approach

Our Staff
03 February

Podcast: 2024 Senate: Democrats have a lot of defending to do

Our Staff
02 February

Podcast: Collage: The promise of Black History Month

Our Staff
01 February
Recommended
Video: What does it mean to be Black?

Video: What does it mean to be Black?

It’s the institutional design, stupid! With a parliamentary system, America could avoid gridlock and instability

It’s the institutional design, stupid! With a parliamentary system, America could avoid gridlock and instability

Government
Poll: Americans’ legislative wish list for new congress shows frustration with political systems

Poll: Americans’ legislative wish list for new congress shows frustration with political systems

Government
Podcast: Why Democrats fail with rural voters

Podcast: Why Democrats fail with rural voters

Podcasts
Your Take: Religious beliefs

Your Take: Religious beliefs

Your Take
Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Remembering the four chaplains eighty years later

Civic Ed