‘INACCURATE SUMMARY’

Prosecutors Dispute Barr’s Claim of Voter Fraud Case With ‘1,700 Ballots’

In his latest salvo against mail-in voting, the Attorney General referenced a DOJ case that didn’t exist.

In his latest salvo against mail-in voting, Attorney General William Barr overstated a case of voter fraud by leaps and bounds during a Wednesday CNN interview. Barr said, “Elections that have been held with mail have found substantial fraud and coercion. For example, we indicted someone in Texas, 1,700 ballots collected from people who could vote. He made them out and voted for the person he wanted to. Okay?” Federal prosecutors have not brought an indictment that matches Barr’s description, and a DOJ spokesperson said Barr had been provided “an inaccurate summary about the case which he relied upon.”

The case in question was not a case, rather an investigation of 700 ballots that listed the same man as having helped the individual voters cast them, but the ballots did not favor one candidate or party, and some were blank. The Justice Department investigated, found the ballots to be legitimate, and charged no one. Barr and the president have repeatedly asserted without evidence that fraud will plague voting by mail in the November presidential election. Public health experts have recommended voting by mail to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus at polling places. Election officials and experts have repeatedly said claims of widespread fraud in voting by mail have no basis in available fact, nor do claims that the practice favors one party over another.