Voter Fraud Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

State Lawmakers Talk Election Fraud, Integrity

On this episode of The Legislature Today, 90 bills to-date have been introduced this year between the Senate and the House about election laws. Briana Heaney spoke with Del. Josh Holstein, R-Boone, and Sen. Jack Woodrum, R-Summers, to get their perspective.

On this episode of The Legislature Today, 90 bills to-date have been introduced this year between the Senate and the House about election laws.

We’ve heard a lot since the 2020 general election about potential voter fraud, although numerous courts have ruled there was no election fraud that would have changed the outcome of that election. Secretary of State Mac Warner has also said there was also no major election fraud in West Virginia. He has prosecuted a handful of people for election violations in the last few years.

Briana Heaney spoke with Del. Josh Holstein, R-Boone, and Sen. Jack Woodrum, R-Summers, to get their perspective.

In the House, eight bills advanced from third reading to the Senate. Two of the proposals help further protect the environment and one takes telehealth a step further with a proactive technological approach to medical care. Randy Yohe has the story.

In the Senate, the chamber approved five bills, sending them to the House for consideration. The Senate advanced 12 other bills. Briana Heaney has more.

Finally, advocates and recovery experts filled the Capitol rotunda on Monday to educate lawmakers about substance use disorder. Emily Rice has the story.

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The Legislature Today is West Virginia’s only television/radio simulcast devoted to covering the state’s 60-day regular legislative session.

Watch or listen to new episodes Monday through Friday at 6 p.m. on West Virginia Public Broadcasting.

Misdemeanor Election Crime Has W.Va. Felon On Parole Going Back To Jail

In West Virginia, it’s a crime to participate in elections while serving a sentence for a felony conviction, including any period of probation or parole.

Following a jury trial in July 2023, Fayette County resident Darrell Sharp II was found guilty of unlawful voter registration while on parole for a felony conviction. Fayette County Circuit Court Judge Paul M. Blake, Jr., handed down the maximum sentence of one year in jail and a $1,000 fine.

All states except for Vermont and Maine (and Washington, D.C.) have some form of restriction on voting rights for people with criminal convictions. West Virginia is among thirteen states that restore voting rights after completion of a sentence, including parole. Twenty states restore voting rights after someone is released from prison. Eleven states have policies that vary depending on the crime committed. Only in Virginia are people permanently disenfranchised after conviction of a felony.

Secretary of State Mac Warner said Sharp’s is the first conviction under tougher election fraud laws recently passed by the legislature. Warner said the sentencing sends a significant message.

“This conviction is just one further indication that we are going to continue this push for election integrity and security,” Warner said

West Virginia University Political Science Chair John Kilwein said in Sharp’s case, the punishment doesn’t fit the crime.

“It just doesn’t seem like it should be a high priority,” Kilwein said. “It doesn’t seem like my tax dollars should be supporting that guy in prison for that act.”

Warner said the court considered Sharp’s prior felonies as heinous, and he had attempted election fraud once before.

“I think the sentence was very appropriate,” Warner said. “With the history behind it, he was very intentionally making these efforts to vote and participate when he was not allowed to do so and had been put on notice of that.”

Sharp’s conviction for election law violations is West Virginia’s fourth such in 2023 and the third since July. Kilwein said in a state with 1.8 million people, four cases of voter fraud in the year, so far, is not a glaring problem.

“This smacks of politics that a candidate argues there is voter fraud,” Kilwein said. “Voter fraud is really a non-issue in this country. It is a glaring problem to the MAGA types, to the Fox News types, where they’re constantly told Democrats are trying to steal elections.”

Warner said vote fraud vigilance, no matter the scope, is needed. He said documentation shows that a single illegal vote can possibly sway an outcome.

“In the 2022 election cycle, we had 12 races that were decided by five votes or less,” Warner said. “Sometimes you hear, ‘well, it’s not massive voter fraud,’ or ‘it didn’t change the outcome of the election.’ We’ve had a number of cases here in West Virginia where just one or two votes does change the outcome of an election. And that’s why we take every voting fraud case very seriously.”

As to West Virginia’s restriction on voting rights for people with criminal convictions, Warner said he is pleased with the way things are, and if the legislature wants to change it, it can.

“But I don’t anticipate that with the current legislature because I think they are just as concerned with election integrity as I am,” Warner said.

Preventing Election Fraud In W.Va.

The Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, is a bipartisan, multi-state partnership aimed at helping states maintain accurate voter rolls. This past March, Secretary of State Mac Warner withdrew West Virginia from ERIC, citing partisan influences. Last month, Warner announced West Virginia was making new data-sharing state partnerships to prevent election fraud.

Warner said more than half of any voter duplications happen in neighboring states. He has West Virginia now joining in voter data-sharing agreements with Ohio and Virginia along with Florida. He said the goal is a 50-state membership.

“We’ll get to the broader states, a larger number of states over time,” Warner said. “You can see, we started with Virginia and now we’ll be working with Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Maryland. Again, this is the very beginning.”

Those states are three of the 24 states that currently belong to ERIC.

Wisconsin Election Commission Commissioner, former ERIC Chair, and current board member, Meagan Wolfe said the consortium offers highly secure, bipartisan state voter rolls data sharing that produces election safeguarding results.

“There have been more than a million voter records that have either been updated, updated with a new address, or deactivated where they’re no longer on Wisconsin rolls, because of information that we received from ERIC,” Wolfe said. “ERIC is also the only tool that allows us to see if somebody has committed some type of voter fraud, and voted in two different states.”

Warner said he withdrew West Virginia from ERIC because the system was stagnating.

“They were stuck,” he said. “There were 30 or 31 states, and a number of states, including the big one like California that I think were prohibited by their state law from entering into the ERIC type program. There’s nothing that prevents any of the states from getting into memorandums of agreement with individual states.”

Wolfe said ERIC is not stagnant, but a dynamic data sharing system.

“It’s not a one-time thing,” she said. “You can’t just get one ERIC report.

It’s something where you need to be constantly getting that data and incorporating it into your process, into your statewide voter registration database.”

With a handful of Republican states, including West Virginia, pulling out of the consortium in 2023, ERIC has become a national political football. Warner said the other reason West Virginia quit ERIC was suspected partisanship from ex-officio, non-voting, advisory ERIC board members.

“When they didn’t remove themselves or the board didn’t address that issue, then it showed the partisanship nature of the entire thing and just led to what is, if not the reality, at least the perception of partisanship,” Warner said.

Wolfe said Warner’s assertion of ERIC partisanship is part of a misinformation and rumor mill.

“It is not truthful information about what ERIC is, the results of information that’s just not accurate,” Wolfe said. “Based on concerns from other states, the ERIC membership all agreed to amend our membership process, and we no longer have any of those advisory seats. The voting states are made up of both Republicans and Democrats from across the country.”

Wolfe said creating a new state-to-state voter data sharing system will not be a simple task.

“Without Eric, there’s not the ability to be able to exchange that data in a way that is as effective or as secure, or that is allowed under state laws,” Wolfe said. “I would agree that it’s not a simple task, certainly to create some sort of alternate process.”

Warner said a 50-state solution is needed to address the real problems that will increase confidence in West Virginia’s elections. Several of the states that recently left ERIC have state leaders that aspire to higher office, including gubernatorial candidate Warner, who says that is not the reason.

“It’s a state issue, not a political aspiration issue,” Warner said.

W.Va. Leaves One Multi-State Election Group, Joins Another

The release calls the data sharing system free of partisanship and outside influence. Earlier this year, Warner pulled West Virginia out of the 30-plus state member Electronic Registration Information Center, a non-partisan data sharing group, better known as ERIC.

Secretary of State Mac Warner announced Friday that election data-sharing agreements have been made with Ohio, Virginia and Florida and the state is nearing an agreement with Tennessee. In a press release, Warner said the partnerships will help keep elections fair.

“The agreements set forth general terms to securely share data between states for the purpose of preventing and identifying fraud and form a foundation for future state partnerships ahead of, and after, the 2024 election cycle,” Warner said.

Warner said in the release that West Virginia’s surrounding states make up the majority of identified duplicate registrations.

“The states that have signed agreements account for nearly 50 percent of all abandoned registrations since 2017,” Warner said. “This regional foundation forms the beginning of onboarding other states interested in identifying and prosecuting fraud.”

WVPB reached out to the Secretary of State’s office for comment on the difference between the two data-sharing groups. As of publication time we had received no response.

Former Randolph County Resident Pleads Guilty To Voter Fraud

Jon Cooper entered a guilty plea to voting twice in the 2020 general election, once in West Virginia and once in New Mexico.

Jon Cooper entered a guilty plea to voting twice in the 2020 general election, once in West Virginia and once in New Mexico. The case was handled by Randolph County Prosecuting Attorney Michael Parker. The investigation was conducted by Investigator Elise Guice of the Attorney General’s Office at the direction of the Secretary of State’s Investigation Division Director Kimberly Mason.

Randolph County Circuit Court Judge David Wilmoth denied Cooper’s request for deferred adjudication and ordered him to pay a $500 fine.

In 2022, the misdemeanor punishment for illegal voting was changed to a felony crime, but the penalty was still a misdemeanor at the time of Cooper’s illegal voting activity. No word on how Cooper actually voted.

Secretary of State Mac Warner said Cooper’s guilty plea is the second this year for illegal voting in the 2020 election. Warner believes the conviction serves as a deterrent to those who would consider committing similar criminal acts in the upcoming 2024 election.

To report a possible election violation or voter fraud, call toll-free at (877) FRAUD-WV or text “WV” to 45995 to complete a mobile complaint form.

W.Va. Man Fined For Voter Fraud

Richard Fox was sentenced in Fayette County Circuit Court for casting two mail-in ballots – one in West Virginia and one in Florida during the Nov. 3, 2020 election.

A West Virginia man has been convicted of voter fraud after illegally casting more than one ballot during the 2020 presidential election.

Richard Fox was sentenced in Fayette County Circuit Court for casting two mail-in ballots – one in West Virginia and one in Florida during the Nov. 3, 2020 election.

Secretary of State Mac Warner Thursday announced that Fox was ordered to pay $1,000 and serve a year’s probation for illegal voting during the 2020 election.

Warner said Fox’s actions not only violated the law, but broke the trust of the state’s citizens, and harmed the integrity of every race on his ballot.

The release did not provide any information on who Fox voted for but Warner said his conviction serves as a warning to anyone tempted to commit voter fraud that they will face prosecution.

Warner, a Republican who is running for governor in West Virginia, has often questioned election integrity nationally, but has continued to say that West Virginia elections are safe.

His office has developed a “See Something, Text Something” cell phone tool that allows residents to submit tips about suspected illegal voting.

Warner made an appearance at the “March for Trump” rally in Charleston after the election, holding up a “Stop the Steal” sign.

He was one of the first GOP election officials to opt to withdraw from the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a nonpartisan group with a record of combating voter fraud.

Warner said he has had better success working with his own team to verify and investigate the rolls, as well as collaborating with other states.

Despite Warner’s repeated claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, multiple investigations, audits and court cases concluded there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud or improper counting that could have changed the results of the election.