If PA’s Elections Are Secure, Why Did DOJ Launch Fraud Case?

A Montgomery County Pennsylvania man has been charged with election fraud — one man, multiple votes — but local media wants you to know election fraud is really rare.

Philip C. Pulley of Huntington Valley, was charged with falsely registering to vote, double voting, and election fraud. United States Attorney Jacqueline Romero announced the charges on Friday.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) accuses Pulley of registering to vote in three counties: Montgomery and Philadelphia counties in Pennsylvania, and Broward County in Florida, using a false home address, and a false Social Security number.

Pulley, 62, is accused of requesting a mail-in ballot to vote in Philadelphia County in the 2020 general election, while also voting from Montgomery and Broward counties. He is also accused of voting in both Montgomery and Philadelphia counties in 2022.

Neither the document outlining the charges nor a spokeswoman from the DOJ’s U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of Philadelphia provided Pulley’s date of birth, which would make it simple to look up his party affiliation. When specifically asked for clarification as to his party affiliation, the spokeswoman told The Federalist in an email that she was not able to provide any further information.

“If convicted, on each count of the information [Pulley] faces a maximum possible sentence of five years of imprisonment, three years of supervised release, a $10,000 to $250,000 fine, and a $100 special assessment,” according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Eastern District of Pennsylvania

But legacy media assures readers this kind of thing almost never happens.

“The case represents a rare example of documented voter fraud,” the Philadelphia Inquirer reported in the second sentence of its story, just under the comforting headline describing the alleged crime as a “rare voter fraud case.”

Insisting cheating is rare minimizes the seriousness of the crime. Tornadoes are rare, but people worry when conditions are ripe for one because tornados are destructive.

In Pennsylvania, conditions are ripe for more voter fraud. This case proves it can be done, and no one should be surprised; flimsy rules make it possible.

The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) requires voter registration applicants to provide a valid driver’s license number, or the last four digits of their Social Security number if the applicant does not have a valid driver’s license.

But in 2018, the Pennsylvania Department of State (DOS) issued guidance that removed a safeguard that would have prevented one person from registering multiple times.

The DOS directed counties not to reject voter registrations “based solely on a non-match between” the driver’s license number or Social Security number on a registration application and the “comparison database numbers.”

The application information provided by voters is compared to the matching government database for Social Security or driver’s license numbers. The DOS matching directive ultimately means voters don’t exactly have to prove who they are to get a ballot. The state says counties must send mail-in ballots to requesters, even if their data does not match.

“It is important to remember that any application placed in ‘Pending’ status while a county is doing follow-up with an applicant whose driver’s license or last four of [Social Security number] could not be matched MUST be accepted, unless the county has identified another reason to decline the application,” the guidance reads. “Leaving an application in Pending status due to a non-match is effectively the same as declining the application while denying the applicant access to the statutory administrative appeals process …”

This guidance is the subject of several lawsuits asking the state to repeal its matching directive, including one submitted in May by the America First Legal Foundation and Pennsylvania trial Attorney Wally Zimolong.

“This lawless directive does not just violate federal law; it creates a regime where an untold number of ineligible voters, including non-citizens, can register to vote in all state and federal elections in the Commonwealth,” the May complaint reads.

The complaint calls for the DOS to issue a new directive “in compliance with federal law, which requires the State to verify voter information, including driver’s licenses and Social Security numbers, before approving a voter registration application,” as the complaint reads.

The new directive “should also require counties to reject applications that supply a driver’s license or Social Security number that does not match state databases in accordance with HAVA,” the complaint continues.

Beth Brelje is an elections correspondent for The Federalist. She is an award-winning investigative journalist with decades of media experience.