Reports of voter intimidation, voter fraud scarce on election day

Minnesota media is reporting several instances of overzealous election challengers in polling places as the Republican Party of Minnesota ramps up its allegations of voter fraud. In several Minnesota precincts, reporters confirmed that GOP poll challengers have overstepped their bounds. Meanwhile, the GOP claims that ballot scanners were not working properly in some jurisdictions and that group home assistants have been telling people how to vote.

Most election experts have indicated that there haven’t been widespread reports of voter intimidation or voter fraud. As Secretary of State Mark Ritchie tweeted today, “Voter intimidation reports in MPLS but mostly it is a smooth as silk voting day”

The Associated Press reports that in Hennepin County there have been some tense conversations between election judges and GOP challengers who don’t seem to understand the rules.

Hennepin County Elections Manager Rachel Smith said that the poll challengers were entering restricted areas and making challenges that are against the rules. She told TPM, “I think we were very firm, we had to be very firm with some of the polling place challengers who wanted to have more range in the polling place than the law permitted them to.”

The Minnesota Independent received a report this morning that a poll challenger at the Emerson school in the Loring Park area of Minneapolis was challenging Somali voters. That report could not be immediately verified, however.

The Star Tribune reports that in Shakopee a GOP challenger questioned the registration of a voter because he was “too young.”

In Bloomington, the Star Tribune reports, an African American woman was asked by an election judge if she was a felon after she had already affirmed her oath. “I am an African American woman and I do believe this old Caucasian biddy was targeting me,” she told the Minneapolis paper. “Things are getting out of hand!”

Election Integrity Watch, a conservative group offering a $500 bounty for reports of voter fraud, has been bringing their “Voter Fraud. It’s a Felony,” banner to neighborhoods in St. Paul on a trailer behind a pickup truck, according to a number of Twitter reports.

Rep. Keith Ellison called the billboard “voter intimidation.”

“Minnesota residents have reported sightings of a mobile billboard driving through Minneapolis affixed with Election Integrity Watch’s poster of an individual in handcuffs, which is designed to suppress and intimidate voters,” he said. “If this proves to be true, it threatens Minnesota’s tradition of expanding the electorate and making it easy for people to participate in our voting process.”

He added, “I urge voters to stand up to Election Integrity Watch’s intimidation efforts, go to the polls, and cast your vote. There is nothing to be afraid of. If you are an eligible voter, you will be welcomed at the polls. Our state has a proud tradition of voting, and we need you to be part of it.”

On the flip side, the Minnesota GOP has been alleging voter fraud and voting machine problems.

The Star Tribune looked at one such case and found that a premarked ballot in Blaine was a simple error.

The GOP said that last week, absentee voters from an assisted living community in Crow Wing County were told how to vote by employees. Montgomery Jensen, a resident who filed an affidavit, challenged the voters’ mental disabilities and said the disability should disqualify them from voting.

The story was amplified by Fox News on Tuesday.

The GOP also alleges that “voting machines” in areas of the state have been malfunctioning. Minnesota uses scanning machines to tabulate paper ballots.

“The Republican Party of Minnesota has already received multiple reports of scanning machines failing to work in Duluth, Olmsted County, Lakeville, Faribault, Mendota Heights and Eagan,” said party chair Tony Sutton in a statement. “This is completely unacceptable. These machines should have been tested thoroughly before the election. The fact that we are seeing such failures around the state again demonstrates that Mark Ritchie has failed to properly prepare for the election, meaning Minnesotans could be disenfranchised because of Ritchie’s incompetence.”