DECISIONS

GOP Candidate Sought Fishy NC Aide, Despite Warnings: Report

Republican Mark Harris said to have been cautioned about Leslie McCrae Dowless.

North Carolina Republican candidate Mark Harris was issued numerous cautions that a local political operative may have previously used improper tactics to wrangle ballots—but he hired him anyway to assist his campaign for the Ninth Congressional District, The Washington Post reports. Leslie McCrae Dowless now is at the center of the election-fraud investigation, which has been set to determine if Harris himself knew that his campaign potentially used questionable methods in order to win his election by 905 votes. Reports allege Dowless misled voters to partially fill out what could be more than 1,000 absentee ballots that he later completed with votes for Harris.