Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

New local election ordered in N.J. after evidence of fraud

mailbox

The discovery of hundreds of ballots stuffed in a mailbox has prompted a do-over election.

Hill Street Studios/Getty Images

A city council election in New Jersey's third biggest city was so tainted that it requires a do-over, a state judge has decided.

More than 3,000 ballots, or nearly 20 percent of all votes cast in Paterson's entirely vote-by-mail municipal election in May, were thrown out after evidence of tampering. Judge Ernest Caposela said Wednesday that means the contest "was not the fair, free and full expression of the intent of the voters" and must to be held anew in November

President Trump, who has repeatedly claimed without evidence that mail-in elections guarantee election rigging, has seized on the Paterson case — by far the most credible example of cheating this year — to sow further distrust in the way more people than ever will vote this year because of the pandemic. But election officials say that, on the contrary, the case actually shows how rare fraud is and how effectively the system catches the few perpetrators.


Following the state's first exclusively mail-in election in May, postal workers informed law enforcement officials that hundreds of ballots were stuffed inside a Paterson mailbox, prompting an investigation by Democratic state Attorney General Gurbir Grewal.

"We will not allow a small number of criminals to undermine the public's confidence in our democratic process," said Grewal, who charged four men, including two candidates, with fraud.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

New Jersey officials also say Trump has mischaracterized what happened. The vast majority of the votes were rejected because they were improperly filled out, not because they were illegally cast.

Local news outlets reported problems with the vote as early as primary day, which election experts said speaks to the capability of the system to spot fraud.

"Even on this small scale, what you see is that having a conspiracy like this to try to affect the outcome of an election is very difficult to do without detection," Rick Hasen, an election law professor at the University of California, Irvine, told NPR.

The ruling comes a week after Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy announced that all 6.3 million registered voters would be sent a ballot so the November election can be conducted mainly by mail. The Trump campaign on Tuesday sued in federal court to stop the plan, claiming the governor has unconstitutionally altered election procedures that are the purview of the Legislature. The campaign has also sued Nevada, one of the four other states (plus D.C.) that like New Jersey have decided to switch to vote-by-mail for the first time because of Covid-19.

Murphy quickly fired back on Twitter, arguing that the Trump campaign was trying "to delegitimize our elections and cast doubt on our democratic process."

Read More

Defining the Democracy Movement: Karissa Raskin
- YouTube

Defining the Democracy Movement: Karissa Raskin

The Fulcrum presents The Path Forward: Defining the Democracy Reform Movement. Scott Warren's interview series engages diverse thought leaders to elevate the conversation about building a thriving and healthy democratic republic that fulfills its potential as a national social and political game-changer. This initiative is the start of focused collaborations and dialogue led by The Bridge Alliance and The Fulcrum teams to help the movement find a path forward.

Karissa Raskin is the new CEO of the Listen First Project, a coalition of over 500 nationwide organizations dedicated to bridging differences. The coalition aims to increase social cohesion across American society and serves as a way for bridging organizations to compare notes, share resources, and collaborate broadly. Karissa, who is based in Jacksonville, served as the Director of Coalition Engagement for a number of years before assuming the CEO role this February.

Keep ReadingShow less
Business professional watching stocks go down.
Getty Images, Bartolome Ozonas

The White House Is Booming, the Boardroom Is Panicking

The Confidence Collapse

Consumer confidence is plummeting—and that was before the latest Wall Street selloffs.

Keep ReadingShow less
Drain—More Than Fight—Authoritarianism and Censorship
Getty Images, Mykyta Ivanov

Drain—More Than Fight—Authoritarianism and Censorship

The current approaches to proactively counteracting authoritarianism and censorship fall into two main categories, which we call “fighting” and “Constitution-defending.” While Constitution-defending in particular has some value, this article advocates for a third major method: draining interest in authoritarianism and censorship.

“Draining” refers to sapping interest in these extreme possibilities of authoritarianism and censorship. In practical terms, it comes from reducing an overblown sense of threat of fellow Americans across the political spectrum. When there is less to fear about each other, there is less desire for authoritarianism or censorship.

Keep ReadingShow less
"Vote" pin.
Getty Images, William Whitehurst

Most Americans’ Votes Don’t Matter in Deciding Elections

New research from the Unite America Institute confirms a stark reality: Most ballots cast in American elections don’t matter in deciding the outcome. In 2024, just 14% of eligible voters cast a meaningful vote that actually influenced the outcome of a U.S. House race. For state house races, on average across all 50 states, just 13% cast meaningful votes.

“Too many Americans have no real say in their democracy,” said Unite America Executive Director Nick Troiano. “Every voter deserves a ballot that not only counts, but that truly matters. We should demand better than ‘elections in name only.’”

Keep ReadingShow less