Elections Officials Investigating Suspected Voter Registration Fraud

The North Carolina State Board of Elections is investigating several allegations of voter registration fraud connected to a voter registration drive, a Brunswick County elections official tells The Federalist. 

‘Voter Impersonation’

Sara LaVere, director of the Brunswick County Board of Elections, told me that 18 voters have contacted her office saying they did not complete registration forms received by the board. LeVere said it appears someone “falsely filled out the forms.” Election officials are calling the alleged identity fraud “voter impersonation.” 

“We noticed some information that was different than what we had on record, an address, Social Security number, so we sent a letter to those voters asking them to complete that information,” the elections official told me in an interview Thursday.  

LaVere said the suspect forms originally were turned in to the State Board of Elections, which forwarded them to the county office for verification.

“The state voter registration forms appear to come from a voter registration drive,” she said, noting that the records include codes denoting their source. In this case, LaVere said, the code on the 18 applications showed they originated from a registration drive. 

‘It’s Not Me’

Brunswick County elections officials contacted the State Board of Elections. LaVere said she has not heard back from state officials on the status of the investigation. State officials did not return The Federalist’s requests for comment, including an email asking whether there are any suspects, arrests or referrals to prosecutors in the case. The email seeks to know who was behind the voter registration drive and whether other North Carolina counties are dealing with similar incidents. 

If the phony registration applications came from a voter registration drive, it’s possible other North Carolina county elections boards have received similar bogus forms. 

Leland, North Carolina, resident Shelley Gentner was one of the reported victims. Reached for comment, Gentner said she would not discuss the matter with The Federalist, but she did share her experiences with WECT News6 in Wilmington.

Gentner told the news outlet that she received a letter from the Brunswick County Board of Elections in August asking her to verify her voter information. Attached was a copy of a voter registration application form that included an incorrect birth date and the wrong last four digits of her Social Security Number. It did include her correct address and phone number, but the signature was forged, she told the TV station. 

“I’m like, ‘Okay, someone has signed my name on an application. It’s not my signature. It’s not me,’” Gentner, a registered, unaffiliated voter in the county since 2020, told the reporter. 

Because the registration form has not been used to falsely cast a ballot, the identity crimes are illegal but not technically voter fraud. Under North Carolina law, “Any person who willfully and knowingly and with fraudulent intent gives false information on the application … is guilty of a Class I felony,” punishable by up to two years in prison.  

Elections officials in North Carolina are dealing with election disruptions in more than a dozen counties pounded by Hurricane Helene, with early voting starting next week. With an army of leftist groups pushing get-out-the-vote campaigns targeting left-leaning voters and legal battles over hundreds of thousands of voter registrations, election integrity in swing state North Carolina is under assault more than ever this election season.

‘This is Fraud’

Ohio, too, is dealing with incidents of alleged voter registration fraud in several counties. In August, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose referred evidence of suspected election law violations to 20 county prosecutors “for review and possible criminal prosecution.” The violations, according to the secretary of state’s office, involve Black Fork Strategies LLC, an Ohio-based “engagement firm that focuses on all aspects of community and electoral field work.”

A month before, the Hamilton County Board of Elections had received a stack of apparently fraudulent voter registration forms, including one in the name of iconic U.S. diplomat, the late Henry Kissinger. The applications’ signatures all appeared to be in the same handwriting, Elections Board Director Sherry Poland told Hamilton BOE members at a meeting in July.

“The first thing I want to point out is, you know, we use words like ‘anomalies,’ ‘suspicion,’ and everything else because we try to be PC, I guess. But this is fraud, outright fraudulent behavior,” said Hamilton County Board of Elections member Alex Triantafilou, who also serves as chairman of the Ohio Republican Party. 

In Cuyahoga County, home to Cleveland, the local board of elections found at least 18 suspicious voter registration cards involving Black Fork, The Federalist reported in August.

Butler County investigators will soon release their findings in similar cases involving documents with suspect signatures submitted to the local board of elections, County Prosecuting Attorney Mike Gmoser told me in a phone interview on Thursday. 

Last month, elections boards in Delaware and Franklin counties reported fraudulent voter registration forms linked to Black Fork Strategies, according to the Columbus Dispatch. 

‘Where the Evidence Leads’

Ohio Secretary of State spokesman Dan Lusheck said the matter remains under investigation by the office so he cannot comment beyond what has been publicly reported. But Lusheck asserts the suspected voter registration fraud investigation remains a top priority. 

“We’re working with prosecutors in multiple counties to investigate and potentially prosecute wrongdoing related to Black Fork Strategies operatives,” he said in a statement emailed to The Federalist. “We’ll go where the evidence leads, and we’ll enforce the law wherever it’s been broken.” 

LaRose recently created the secretary of state office’s first full-time investigative unit exclusively devoted to election integrity. 

Black Fork Strategies officials have not returned The Federalist’s requests for comment. The company has released a statement saying that it is cooperating with elections officials on all requests for information regarding Black Fork’s voter registration program. 

“Black Fork Strategies take any allegations of possible voter registration fraud seriously and cooperates with investigations,” Black Fork’s statement concludes. 

For more election news and updates, visit electionbriefing.com.

Matt Kittle is a senior elections correspondent for The Federalist. An award-winning investigative reporter and 30-year veteran of print, broadcast, and online journalism, Kittle previously served as the executive director of Empower Wisconsin.