More Questions About Alleged Election Fraud in 9th District Race
BLADEN CO., NC – More questions about alleged election fraud in the 9th district race. The State Board of Elections is investigating claims of absentee ballot tampering.
βShe wanted me to fill them out and I told her I wasnβt educated enough to fill it out,” says 87-year-old Emma Shipman, who lives in Bladen County.
She is one of six people who signed sworn affidavits alleging election fraud in the 9th district race.
She says a young woman came to her house in September claiming she was assigned to collect absentee ballots.
βShe was sitting here and she explained to me thatβs what she was doing,” Shipman says.
Shipman says the woman seemed convincing and ended up taking her ballot unsealed and unsigned.
βI thought she was assigned to do that. Until, you know, kinda later on I felt kinda funny,” she says.
The State Board of Elections is investigating the possibility this could have happened to hundreds of people.
Documents show nearly 500 absentee ballots in Bladen County and more than 1,000 in Robeson County were requested, but never returned.
Political operative McCrae Dowless is accused of paying people to go door-to-door to collect absentee ballots.
That practice known as “harvesting” is illegal.
“Youβre asked to pick up absentee ballots, he told us that he would put gas in our car and just a little bit of money during the week to help out,” says Bladen Co. resident Cheryl Kinlaw.
She admits Dowless paid her to be a harvester.
Kinlaw says the ballots were delivered to Mark Harris’s election headquarters in Bladenboro. She claims she had no idea what she was doing is illegal.
βMy stomach felt like it just dropped and I was like, βWhat?β and please tell me that we didn’t have nothinβ to do with that,” she says.
The State Board of Elections has refused to certify the results that show Mark Harris beat Dan McCready by 905 votes.
They plant to hold an evidentiary hearing by December 21st.
