Excerpt:
With less than a week to go until the California recall election, some Republicans are falsely claiming that votes are rigged in favor of Democrats and suggesting, without evidence, that Gov. Gavin Newsom can only win with fraudulent votes.
The claims are unsubstantiated, and echo similar false messages promoted by Republicans last year following the election of President Joe Biden.
Larry Elder, the top-polling Republican candidate seeking to replace Newsom, is already preparing to challenge the recall results if Newsom survives.
Elder told reporters in Los Angeles on Wednesday that he believes “there might very well be shenanigans” in the recall election, but that he expects to win anyway because “so many Californians are angry about what’s going on,” according to CNN.
Elder said his campaign nevertheless is ready to file lawsuits and encouraged people to report any issues.
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The California GOP has representation in all 58 counties. Patterson said the party has recruited more than 2,000 poll observers and has more than 115 attorneys to monitor county election officials as they administer the recall election.
When asked if the GOP would accept the results if the recall is defeated, Patterson said she did not want to speculate.
“This is why we’re doing the election integrity project. We want to make sure that we have the confidence in our election,” she said. “I can’t speculate to the future, but we are keeping an eye on everything.”
Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization working to improve the voting process, said no voting system is perfect, but California has the “most robust election security requirements” in the nation.
“It’s disappointing that there’s this narrative out there that is, unfortunately, undermining some people’s confidence in elections,” she said.
Former President Donald Trump has joined the conversation, telling Newsmax this week that he believes the California recall election is “rigged” and repeating complaints he made about mail-in ballots last year.
“It’s probably rigged,” he said. “The ballots... are mail-in ballots.... The one thing they are good at is rigging elections, so I predict it’s a rigged election.”
There is no evidence that the ballots are rigged for Newsom.
Alexander said Trump’s claims lack credibility because he’s raising doubts about hand-marked paper ballots, which have long been seen as one of the most reliable voting methods.
“The hand-marked paper ballot is considered the gold standard by election security advocates when it comes to having confidence in the election results,” Alexander said. “Now it’s been mischaracterized as something we can’t trust.” (Full Story)