NC-09

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_canpakes
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Re: NC-09

Post by _canpakes »

Who is McCrae Dowless, man who appears to be center of 9th District investigation?

As the North Carolina Board of Elections investigates the results of the 9th Congressional District election between Republican Mark Harris and Democrat Dan McCready, questions swirl about a Bladen County electioneer.

For years, Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr. has been well known in Bladen County political circles.

Dowless, who goes by McCrae, serves on the board of the Bladen County Soil and Water Conservation District as the vice chair, an elected position.

Dowless is better known for his work on campaigns other than his own.

Attempts to get in contact with Dowless have been unsuccessful. When Channel 9 stopped by the Bladen County Soil and Water Conversation District Office last week, an employee said Dowless is only in for meetings and he doesn’t use computers often.

Dowless has a criminal record dating back to the 1980s. Records show Dowless served six months in prison after being convicted of felony fraud charge in 1992. Dowless has also previously faced a charge for perjury.

A criminal past has not stopped Dowless from working on campaigns of several prominent local and statewide politicians.

Dowless’ political career has been centered around getting out the vote.

According to campaign finance reports, Dowless’ first major race was in 2010, working for Harold Butch Pope’s campaign for Bladen County district attorney.

The Pope campaign paid Dowless $7,127 over the course of the year. A majority of the payments were for "get out the vote" efforts. Pope defeated Jon David by more than 4,000 votes.

Over the next couple of years, Dowless was paid thousands of dollars for get out the vote efforts and, at times, campaign manager for eastern North Carolina candidates Wesley Meredith, Al Leonard, Ken Waddell, and William Brisson.

Dowless’ candidates have not been limited to eastern North Carolina.

He was paid $800 for “consulting fees” for Republican Charlotte City Council candidate Pete Givens. Mark Harris, a friend of Givens, did a fundraiser and campaigned for him.

The NCSBE is currently investigating claims of irregularities and fraudulent activities related to absentee by-mail voting.

Dowless’ past work includes huge differences between his candidate’s absentee by mail total and opponents.

Dowless wasn’t always connected to the Harris campaign. In the 2016 primary, records show Dowless worked for Todd Johnson, who ran against Harris and Robert Pittenger. Campaign finance reports show Dowless was paid $6,456 by Johnson’s campaign. The disbursement description was for “get out the vote.”

In the June 2016 primary, Johnson finished last in the race, trailing the top vote-getter Pittenger by a little more than 1,100 votes. Despite the loss, Johnson dominated in Bladen County, carrying 68 percent of the vote.

A deeper look at the votes reveals Johnson received 98 percent of absentee by mail votes. Johnson received 221 absentee-by-mail votes. Pittenger and Harris combined for five.

The 221 absentee-by-mail votes amounted to 51 percent of his total votes received by that method and 21 percent of the total amount of absentee-by-mail votes when each candidate’s totals are added together.

As Channel 9 reported last week, Dowless was referenced in two affidavits that are now included in NCSBE’s investigation.

In one affidavit, a witness claims he overheard a person saying Dowless would be paid $40,000 for a Mark Harris victory.

Another man claims in an affidavit that Dowless told him he was doing “absentees” for the Mark Harris campaign and James McVicker’s campaign for Bladen County sheriff.

Campaign finance reports confirm the Bladen County sheriff paid Dowless at least $7,000. The purpose on campaign finance reports was listed as “get out to vote.”

Dowless does not appear on any campaign finance reports for Harris because he was working for Red Dome, a political consulting firm hired by the Harris campaign.

Records show the Harris campaign paid Red Dome more than $428,000. The disbursements are listed for admin and staff and grassroots.

Andy Yates, founder of Red Dome, did not respond to Channel 9’s calls Sunday evening.

According to the North Carolina Secretary of State’s Office, the Red Dome Group was dissolved in 2017. A certificate of administrative dissolution was issued by Secretary of State Elaine Marshall on Aug. 15, 2017.

The North Carolina Secretary of State’s Office has previously told Channel 9 when a business is dissolved by the secretary of state the business is not in good standing.

Similar to Johnson, Harris put up huge absentee by mail numbers in the primary for Bladen County. Harris received 437 of 456 absentee-by-mail votes. Incumbent Pittenger only received 17. In the general election against Democrat Dan McCready, Harris received 61 percent of the absentee by mail votes. Analysis by political expert Dr. Michael Bitzer found Bladen was the only county Harris received more absentee-by-mail votes than McCready.

“In Bladen County, 61 percent of the accepted absentee-by-mail ballots went Republican--the only county to do so; meaning that along with the almost 20 percent of loyal registered Republicans who voted that method, Harris would have also received almost all the registered unaffiliated voters and/or some Democratic registered voters to make it to 62 percent of the vote,” Bitzer wrote in his analysis.


https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/man-i ... /882190369

BLADEN COUNTY, N.C. - Channel 9 was back in Bladen County, North Carolina Monday, tracking down people involved in the controversy surrounding mail-in-absentee ballots in the U.S. House District 9 election.

The state refused to officially declare Republican Mark Harris the winner over Democrat Dan McCready, looking into potential wrongdoing in the election.

What Channel 9 found appears to be a targeted effort to illegally pick up ballots, in which even the person picking them up had no idea whether those ballots were even delivered to the elections board.

Consistently, Channel 9 found the same people signing as witnesses for the people voting, which is very rare.

Of the 159 submitted and accepted absentee ballot envelopes, below is the breakdown of those who signed as witnesses:

Woody Hester witnessed 44
James Singletary witnessed 42
Lisa Britt witnessed 42
Ginger Eason witnessed 28
Jessica Dowless witnessed 15
Cheryl Kinlaw witnessed 13
Deborah Edwards witnessed 11
Sandra Dowless witnessed 10

Many times, people on that list witnessed ballots together.

Channel 9’s political reporter Joe Bruno went door-to-door in Bladen County trying to find out who these people are.

No one answered at Woody Hester’s home. James Singletary wasn’t home either and Lisa Britt doesn’t live at the address she said she did on the ballots.

Bruno then visited Ginger Eason. She told him why her name appeared so many times as a witness.

“I was helping McCrae pick up ballots,” Eason said.

Eason said Leslie McCrae Dowless, Jr. paid her $75 to $100 a week to go around and pick up finished absentee ballots.

Dowless is the Bladen County Soil and Water Conservation District Supervisor who appears to be at the center of the state investigation. He was named twice in sworn affidavits as a worker for the Mark Harris campaign.

Eason said she never discarded ballots or saw who people were voting for, but after picking them up, she didn’t mail them. She said she gave them to Dowless.

She said Dowless never told her what she was doing was illegal.

For days, Channel 9 has been trying to contact Dowless. On Monday, Bruno confronted him, but he did not answer his questions.

“Did you pay people to pick up ballots?” Bruno asked.

“At this time, I have no comment. Have a great day,” Dowless replied.


http://amp.wsoctv.com/news/local/channe ... ssion=true
_EAllusion
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Re: NC-09

Post by _EAllusion »

So the actual story has moved beyond whether establishing illegal election activities on behalf of Republicans has occurred, which is pretty obvious at this point, to what Harris's campaign knew and when did it know it.

This election fraud story is absolutely wild. The relatively muted national media coverage of it so far is even more wild to me. I have zero doubt that this would be a melt-your brain level of coverage situation if Democrats were the suspected culprits in an election Democrats eeked out. It'd be the one time straight reporters could prove how fair they are by treating a claim of election-related fraud by Democrats seriously, and so they'd hammer it into the ground while right-wing media finds a way to turn the outrage up to 11 since it is real this time. Instead, it's sorta getting lost in the news cycle churn. It's a pretty good example of media bias caused by this dynamic.
_EAllusion
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Re: NC-09

Post by _EAllusion »

This brief buzzfeed piece on Dowless's machine is something:

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/br ... ot-machine
_EAllusion
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Re: NC-09

Post by _EAllusion »

So we have a Republican operative going back many years with a history of felony fraud. We have affidavits form elderly black voters testifying to their absentee ballots illegally collected in shady circumstances. We people testifying being ballot harvesters for the Republican operative engaging in illegal activity. We have outlandish statistical anomalies showing a severe bias towards Republican candidates the Republican operative worked for in areas of his influence. This includes his primary candidates winning over 90% of the ballots in a close election with those numbers flip-flopping when who hired him flip-flopped in different elections. We have physical evidence that numerous absentee ballots were signed as witnesses by the exact same people with fictional addresses.

What I'm saying is, this is a hell of a frame job by Democrats. Those Democrats sure are some evil bastards.
_subgenius
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Re: NC-09

Post by _subgenius »

The irony being that Democrats fought hard against voter i.d. laws in NC (gee only 76% of country thinks its a good idea), and against reforms to clean up voter rolls...but now, suddenly, fraud exists...seemingly because now they actually want to see it exist.

Good money says this is just a passing fancy for them.
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_Kevin Graham
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Re: NC-09

Post by _Kevin Graham »

Judge Blocks N.C. Law Stripping Power From Incoming Governor

RALEIGH, N.C. — A North Carolina judge granted a small victory to the state's incoming Democratic governor on Friday, temporarily blocking a law by Republican lawmakers stripping him of control over elections in a legislative power play just weeks ago.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Don Stephens blocked the new law, which would end the control governors exert over statewide and county election boards, as Gov.-Elect Roy Cooper is set to take office Sunday.

Stephens ruled that the risk to future free and fair elections justified the temporary block and said he plans to review the law more closely Thursday.

North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Martin also could appoint a three-judge panel to hear Cooper's challenge to the law's constitutionality.

Cooper sued on Friday to block the law, which passed two weeks ago. He said the GOP-led General Assembly's action is unconstitutional because it violates separation of powers by giving legislators too much control over how election laws are administered. Under current law, all elections boards would become controlled by Democrats in 2017 — unless the legislation in question takes effect.

Though that law creates a new body described as independent, Stephens got a lawyer representing Senate leader Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore — both Republicans — to admit that legislators would exert the greatest control on the new, combined elections and ethics board.

"That's what I thought the answer was," Stephens said during an emergency hearing Friday.
_canpakes
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Re: NC-09

Post by _canpakes »

subgenius wrote:The irony being that Democrats fought hard against voter i.d. laws in NC (gee only 76% of country thinks its a good idea), and against reforms to clean up voter rolls...but now, suddenly, fraud exists...seemingly because now they actually want to see it exist.

My compliments to NC Republicans for - after failing to find any election fraud themselves - setting out to manufacture some of their own for Democrats to find.
_EAllusion
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Re: NC-09

Post by _EAllusion »

Election fraud and voter fraud are distinct things, but the predictable response we are going to get from Republicans is going to use election fraud by a Republicans to justify laws aimed at reducing near non-existant voter fraud in order to make it more difficult for Democrats to vote. Like clockwork.
_Kevin Graham
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Re: NC-09

Post by _Kevin Graham »

More Evidence Of Illegal Activity Emerges In North Carolina Congressional Race

Two more voters reported handing over their ballots to canvassers who came to their home.

ST. PAULS, N.C. — The day after their absentee ballot arrived in the mail in September, Luis Reyes and Yomayra Torres, a couple in Robeson County, got a nighttime visitor.

It was a familiar face. The woman, Jennifer Boyd, had come with another woman a few months earlier to help the couple request their absentee ballots. Now she was back to see if they wanted help filling out the actual ballots. Reyes and Torres didn’t know who to vote for, and Boyd explained why she had voted for Mark Harris, a Republican pastor running for Congress in North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District. Torres remembers Boyd saying she was with Harris’ campaign, and she told them about all the good he had done for their community but said they should vote for whomever they wanted. Reyes and Torres didn’t know about any of the other candidates in the race, so they both decided to vote for Harris. Once they filled out their ballots, Torres says, Boyd offered to take their ballots from them, and they agreed. Torres said Boyd left with both.

It’s illegal for anyone in North Carolina, other than a “close relative,” to take custody of an absentee ballot. Reyes and Torres didn’t know that. Torres said she thought Boyd was just trying to be helpful and make it as easy as possible for them to cast their votes.

“At the time, we just thought she was being nice. She’s doing her job. She’s making sure that the vote goes in,” Torres told HuffPost outside her home. “We said, ‘Why not?’ and we just gave it to her.” Torres said she can’t recall whether the ballots she gave to Boyd were sealed or not.

Boyd appears to have worked for McCrae Dowless, a political operative who is drawing attention in an ongoing investigation of irregularities in the 9th District, according to records reviewed by HuffPost.

Reyes’ ballot was sent through to election officials, but there was something unusual on what they received. Even though Boyd was the only one who visited that night, another woman indicated she had witnessed him fill out the ballot (two witnesses are legally required to watch someone fill out an absentee ballot in North Carolina). The second woman who signed as a witness on Reyes’ ballot was Lisa Britt, who also worked for Dowless. Lying on the absentee ballot form is a Class I felony in North Carolina.

Torres isn’t sure why, but her ballot never made it to election officials. It got returned to her in the mail. Only one person had signed as a witness, she said. Her vote didn’t count in the election.

Jared Bradford, another Robeson County voter, also told HuffPost on Friday he gave his ballot to Boyd, whom he described as a family friend. Boyd had helped him request his ballot and was present when he filled it out. He said he proposed giving it to her to handle because he didn’t have time to deal with mailing it in. Election officials did receive his ballot.

What happened to Reyes, Torres and Bradford offers more evidence of illegal activity for state investigators probing the election irregularities. Officials are gathering evidence in neighboring Bladen and Robeson counties, where a suspiciously high percentage of people requested absentee ballots that were then never counted as returned to election officials.

Torres said investigators came to her home this week to ask her about their interaction with Boyd. She said the investigators took the ballot that came back to her in the mail.

Harris appeared to have defeated Democrat Dan McCready by 905 votes, but the state board hasn’t certified that result amid the investigation. There’s still no evidence any irregularities determined the outcome of the election, and its unclear if any ballots were destroyed or tampered with. However, state investigators can order a new election if they find enough evidence to cast doubt on the results.

Dowless was hired by the Harris campaign, through a consulting group, to focus on getting out the vote through absentee ballot operations. But three of his employees have come forward to say that they actually collected the ballots from voters.

Boyd served as a witness for 55 people in Robeson County, according to a WSOC-TV analysis, an unusually high number. The Dowless employees in Bladen County who said they collected ballots also served as witnesses for a high number of people.

Records at the Robeson County Board of Elections show Boyd delivered over 230 voter registration forms in September. She hand-delivered four absentee ballots — all for members of her family.

In Robeson County, 62 percent of the requested absentee by-mail ballots went unreturned, the highest percentage in the county. In Bladen County, Harris won 61 percent of the absentee by-mail vote, even though just 19 percent of those returned and accepted were from Republicans.

Torres said that she’s unlikely to vote absentee in the next election.

“I think we’ll just go personally and make sure the documents won’t be manipulated,” she said.
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