General Question

crazyguy's avatar

Why is there so much resistance to a simple request for a signature match audit?

Asked by crazyguy (3207points) December 2nd, 2020
80 responses
“Great Question” (0points)

The following article:
https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/02/politics/georgia-signature-audit-fact-check/index.html

states that signature matching is difficult and “there is no basis to conduct one.” One is left with the impression that some people are afraid of what might be uncovered. For the record, all Trump and his cohorts are asking for is an audit of a random set of envelopes that have been irretrievably separated from the ballots. What can we do about the signature mismatches? NOTHING, because the envelopes cannot be linked to a particular ballot.

However, the audit would provide some data on the frequency of the problem and possibly lead to other avenues for legal action.

Perhaps that is exactly what people are afraid of?

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Answers

Darth_Algar's avatar

Because that “simple” request isn’t so simple. People’s signature can vary quite a bit from one signing to another. I know mine can. But hey, whatever. Sloppy penmanship seems like a great reason to disenfranchise folks.

stanleybmanly's avatar

The idiot lost by better than 6 million votes. He lost in ALL 6 states where the votes were even close. EACH of those states was recounted and the results in most of them were overseen then certified by REPUBLICAN officials. REPUBLICAN authorities nationwide, including those from the states in dispute have concluded that this was the most accurate and transparent Presidential contest EVER. The fool lost and has cost the taxpayers millions in the futile effort to defy reality. Enough money has been thrown away on placating the fool and the morons who believe in him. Time now to evict him from the White House and initiate his many prosecutions. I look forward with relish to his further humiliation and well earned disgrace.

Pandora's avatar

Because it’s a bullsh*t request and poll workers are not handwriting experts and as Darth mentioned people handwriting can change and lastly because it wastes taxpayers dollars to placate the Giant Baby in office throwing a tantrum who can’t see the giant letters on the wall. He lost fair and square. Even other republican reps in those states keep telling him he lost fair and square, even when they are being threatened. Even if Trump could count that high and count every single ballot and his own people count every single ballot he would never believe he lost, because narcissists can’t accept ever losing.

LostInParadise's avatar

How do we determine if a signature matches? Who audits the auditors or the auditors? What is there to be gained by this exercise?

Hamb's avatar

You do realize that signature matching is not a thing, right? It’s literally a leftover social tradition that provides 0.00000 in terms of security. You know how there are some retailers that require a signature when you use a credit card (either on paper on or the screen)? That signature is for you – not the credit card company. It provides comfort to you, making you feel as though there is something secure about your transaction.

Now that you realize that signatures really are not a thing – let’s turn back to your question. What a “signature match audit” really means is an opportunity to throw away ballots. The audit – which is being requested without any need or evidence – is itself a method of fraud.

JLeslie's avatar

Because signatures are already reviewed and supervised, both parties are present during vote processing and there are observers also. Some states you can’t match the ballot to the envelope once it’s been processed so finding a few bad signatures won’t even change anything.

Everyone I know who worked the polls said it’s all done with both parties present and any doubts about a signature are addressed.

It’s not being audited because it’s already basically audited during the process.

Jaxk's avatar

First I will agree that it’s time to let this election go. There is no way that enough proof could be obtained to change the outcome. However, this is not the only election we will ever have. I have no doubt that even the most incompetent forger could fool most if not all the poll workers but in order to do so they would need to have seen the persons signature. That means that large scale forgery would be impossible. We’ve changed a lot of the rules for this election but some minor verification of the voter’s identity is not out of bounds. I would find it interesting to know what percentage of the ballots did not match even the most cursory examination. Let them do it so we know.

LadyMarissa's avatar

With my age & disability, I can sign my name 3 times in a row & they won’t pass 45’s compatibility test & I’m NOT the only one with this phenomenon!!! It’s just an excuse to suppress legitimate votes. Look at 45’s signature. You can’t even read it to know who voted, so he would throw out his own vote. On top of that, it would slow down the election process by months as EVERY ballot would need to be checked & that would break another of 45’s rules that the count needed to be completed by midnight on election day.

Hamb's avatar

@Jaxk: “I would find it interesting to know what percentage of the ballots did not match even the most cursory examination. Let them do it so we know.”

Please read my comment above. It sounds as though you think that signature matching is a thing, which it is not. I have never signed my name the same twice, and as others have mentioned, there are disability issues that come into play.

I understand that this may come as a shock to you, but signatures are not a thing. They never have been. They don’t match, they can’t match, and your efforts to push this means that you either have been tricked into thinking that signature matching is a thing or you are intentionally pushing this nonsense to trick a portion of the country into believing in pseudo-scientific nonsense so you can help paint a political narrative.

Do you know that in the handful of times that I have been asked to sign my name in the past few years, I have drawn smiley faces and stick-figure mini cartoons? I’m serious. Repeat after me: signatures are placebo devices that help nervous people feel comfortable in engaging in financial transactions. This is similar to “close door” buttons on elevators or certain walk signals at traffic lights. They give people a sense of control and calm, but they are not functional. Neither is the signature.

I can’t believe people don’t know this.

Zaku's avatar

Well, there is signature matching done routinely in at least some places, as I have mentioned before I’ve had done to my ballot in Washington State. Different states clearly have different processes.

I would assume that when a ballot is separated from its envelope, the existing process would be satisfied that the ballot is ok.

Even if in some places there may be not so great processes for checking signatures, I would say it’s still probably not a reasonable request, if one considers the point I and others have made repeatedly to @crazyguy on other questions (which he’s never come close to answering to my satisfaction), that there is no scenario in which it would be possible to get a significant number of other people’s ballots to tamper with and forge signatures on, without an overwhelming risk of being at least detected, because of all of the people who are involved in the process as voters, volunteers, officials, and investigators.

SEKA's avatar

It’s not that simple in that the signature isn’t on the ballot, but was on the envelope and t.he envelopes weren’t kept with the ballot as there has never been a challenge requiring signature match in our history. The person demanding signature match knows this and that’s why it has become so important to his hissy fit

JLeslie's avatar

@SEKA In my state the ballots and envelopes have an identifying number, not sure about the states they are throwing their hissy fits in.

It would be interesting if more Republicans defect from the party because of these accusations of fraud and the tantrums.

@ALL I’m sure you all heard about the Georgia elections official plead for Trump to stop his accusations of fraud and to say something to stop the threats against his staff. Here’s the video if you haven’t seen it. I recommend watching it if you have only read about it. From what I understand he is a Republican. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nH9FnY0qvNI

SEKA's avatar

Georgia is one of the states that didn’t retain the envelopes with sigatures

JLeslie's avatar

@SEKA Didn’t keep them? I didn’t realize the envelopes were discarded. I wonder if Florida does the same.

SEKA's avatar

Unless I totally misunderstood, they kept the ballots and discarded the envelopes because the envelopes weren’t needed. I heard it on the news today so I haven’t found a verifying link yet. Found it According to this they do have the envelopes but they have been separated and with 1.3 million mail-in ballots, it’s almost impossible to rematch each and every one. Assuming that Biden did receive every vote of the 1.3 million votes, it still wouldn’t give asshole the win

crazyguy's avatar

@Pandora You say: “poll workers are not handwriting experts”. Isn’t that a good enough reason for an audit of just the envelopes to determine how many signature matches present a problem?

@LostInParadise I’ll readily grant you that we may be opening Pandora’s box (sorry @Pandora ). However, an attempt is necessary for the following reasons:

1. It is important to know the extent of possible problems for future elections.
2. As @Pandora said “poll workers are not handwriting experts”.
3. How else can you verify that the person who voted is indeed the person who was intended to vote?

@Hamb You say: “signature matching is not a thing…” How else would you suggest that absentee ballots be checked to make sure that the intended voter is the one actually voting?

@Zaku Yes, I am very aware of your suppositions about how many ballots might be affected. However, neither you nor I or anybody else has any idea of what the actual number is. In fact this whole discussion is about the possibility of finding out.

@JLeslie @SEKA You are absolutely correct. The ballots are separated from the identifying envelopes per State law. The envelopes are saved, just in case. But they can never be reconnected to the ballots they once contained. That, however, does not prevent a quantification of the percentage of signature mismatches using a statistically significant sample of the envelopes.

JLeslie's avatar

@crazyguy Do you mean in GA they can’t be reconnected? In FL they can.

crazyguy's avatar

@JLeslie In Georgia, state law requires that the envelope be separated from the ballot in such a way as to guarantee privacy of the ballot. I spent a few minutes looking for a link that says this, but I was unable to find it.

JLeslie's avatar

@crazyguy I don’t need a link. Thanks.

I don’t understand why you have a problem with the multiple people who have already checked the signatures and basically everyone reports the processing of ballots was orderly and transparent.

There are Republican congressman and election officials stating it also. Did you watch my YouTube link?

Pandora's avatar

@crazyguy How does that prove that the person who mailed it in signed it? It’s a waste of taxpayer money. Even Bill Barr (Trumps Roy Cohn) said there is no proof of widespread fraud to the point that it would change the outcome. I accept all the experts who say this was the fairest election to date. There are always discrepancies and we learn adjust as we go. But all the agencies thus far have agreed with the former director of Cisa. Even Barr. Wishing doesn’t make things fact. I wished Trump didn’t win in 2016 but the fact was that he did win and yet that was by almost 4 million votes less than Hillary. I doubt you cried in your coffee cup when that happened. So maybe you should try accepting Trump actually lost.

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “You say: “signature matching is not a thing…” How else would you suggest that absentee ballots be checked to make sure that the intended voter is the one actually voting?”

Think about what you just asked. Since we know that signatures are not a thing, and provide absolutely no benefit to your alleged problem, you can’t phrase it as “how else”. This implies that signatures are one possible solution. They are not.

You can ask, “How would you suggest that absentee ballots be checked to make sure that the intended voter is the one actually voting?” This question is a legitimate one. The “else” makes it completely illegitimate. So, before addressing this question, you’d also have to identify why the question is required to begin with – and the “absentee” qualifier is added.

If there is a problem of people voting who are not the person on the ballot, the same issue applies to in-person voting, since when you vote, you just walk up and declare who you are.

So, you are stuck dealing with the question of how to verify that in-person and mail-in ballots are completed by the actual person.

Now, if I went to vote in-person and was told that I already voted, that would be an indication that some kind of shenanigans was going on and I could report it. If I went to mail-in my ballot and was told that the reason I didn’t receive a mail-in ballot was that I already mailed it in, again I would know that fraud had occurred and I could report it.

It is my understanding that neither of these things has ever been shown to happen in any scale worth investigating. Am I incorrect?

So, we’re left with trying to find a solution to a problem that does not exist.

crazyguy's avatar

@JLeslie I did not watch the video, but I have seen the footage before. Have you seen the video showing shenanigans in Georgia (suitcases of ballots being pulled out and counted)?

@Hamb What you are saying our politicians are so honest that no audit is necessary? We should allow just anybody to vote because chances are they are who they say they are?

@Pandora I have no idea how many ballots were affected by the discrepancies. I think it is fair to point out that the only way to quantify the number is by a thorough investigation. Anybody who says otherwise is probably afraid of the truth.

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “What you are saying our politicians are so honest that no audit is necessary? We should allow just anybody to vote because chances are they are who they say they are?”

No. Read what I said again…slowly.

Hint: I am saying is that the situation that exists today – in 2020 – is the same that has existed for years. We don’t talk about Ronald Reagan having won “only because we didn’t conduct a full audit of every vote”. Right?

If you are uncomfortable with the way voting happens in the US, then you should advocate and push for change. However, the change cannot be something that disenfranchises people just for the sake of disenfranchising them. It can’t be arbitrary, like signatures or the ability to draw a bicycle. And it can’t be discriminatory, like requiring a certain level of income or physical feats of strength.

While you’re attempting to determine how to resolve some potential weak spots in the US voting system, you might want to ask yourself how long you have been beating this drum. Did you beat it in 2000? 2004? earlier? Once you have identified when it was, you should ask why.

Hamb's avatar

As an aside, your desire for change in this area seems to conflict with your philosophy….

@crazyguy: As far as money being able to buy preferential treatment, that, unfortunately, is the way of the whole world. Get used to it!

@crazyguy: I would not like my child to keep banging his/her head against an immovable wall. I think human nature and greed are part of an immovable wall.

Your concerns about dishonest politicians has you pushing for policy/actions that can potentially correct for this dishonesty. Why not just “get used to it!”?

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb So, what you are saying (and I had sort of already figured out where you were heading) is that the problem of people saying they are somebody else and not having to prove it has always existed. Therefore, we should leave it alone.

WOW! That seems like a great solution!

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb My philosophy is to make changes where possible. The two examples you cite relate to human nature. I have learnt during my 73 years on earth that human nature is something we cannot change by legislation and/or enforcement. You can and should find ways of discouraging the search for, and taking advantage of, loopholes. Any law has loopholes, and it is human nature to try and squeeze into those.

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “So, what you are saying (and I had sort of already figured out where you were heading) is that the problem of people saying they are somebody else and not having to prove it has always existed. Therefore, we should leave it alone.”

Ummm…did you re-read what I wrote?

You’re partially correct. Yes, I’m saying that the current way of voting and the potential weaknesses have always existed. However, I’m saying that these weaknesses would reveal themselves via the ways I have described (I go to vote and I’m not allowed to because someone already voted in my place, etc). Since this has not happened, it tells us that the potential weakness does have a mechanism for determining if it breaks down. It has not.

@crazyguy: “WOW! That seems like a great solution!”

I’m not proposing a solution, because I don’t think the problem exists.

crazyguy's avatar

All, there is a fine line between disenfranchisement and protecting our election integrity. That is what we have the judges for.

However, keep in mind that judges can only react to lawsuits – they do not make the rules.

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “My philosophy is to make changes where possible. The two examples you cite relate to human nature. I have learnt during my 73 years on earth that human nature is something we cannot change by legislation and/or enforcement. You can and should find ways of discouraging the search for, and taking advantage of, loopholes. Any law has loopholes, and it is human nature to try and squeeze into those.”

We’re a bit off topic (my bad), but you don’t address the contradiction here. If you’re concerned about “human nature” being greedy, then it would only make sense to develop and implement policies that account for this. It’s not an attempt to change the supposed “nature” – you change the material conditions and encourage those aspects of human nature that we find more beneficial to human flourishing.

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb I agree. Since humans are, by nature, greedy, a society has to be structured so that all expressions of illegal greed are caught and punished. These include bribery, corruption, and election fraud.

Hamb's avatar

^ You agreed and implicitly conceded that your point about how we should “get over it” in the other thread were misguided. But you think you didn’t because you added a qualifier (“illegal”) to greed. Note, however, that this “illegal” greed is only “illegal” because it’s – in your model – part of human nature that we’ve determined should be stopped. Therefore, your whole “immovable wall” talk makes no sense.

Hamb's avatar

Anyway, to get back on topic: You have been arguing that we need a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist, yet you haven’t provided any legitimate reason why you believe the problem exists and why you suddenly (in 2020) believe this to a problem.

I don’t think we’re likely to agree here.

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb I believe I have been consistent. But hey, I am human. Like Walt Whitman said in his famous “Song of Myself”:
_Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)_

Actually, I am convinced a problem exists because of my lack of trust in human honesty. If it is true that in-person voting requires no identification (I have not voted in-person in over 25 years), then I am 100% certain that somebody has cheated. And others have taken note of where large scale cheating can take place. That is human nature.

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb Continuing on that theme, it is easier to cheat on mail-in voting, simply because the number of checks available to the authorities are more limited.

jca2's avatar

What about people who can’t write and put an “x?” How would you match an “x?”

crazyguy's avatar

@jca2 Any time you change the requirements to make it easier for somebody to vote, you are possibly inviting others to slip into that crack. And when it comes to crawling into loopholes, people can be awfully creative. If you look at some of the tax dodges people have attempted over the years…

Zissou's avatar

In Michigan, signatures are checked before the votes are counted, at least for absentee ballots. I voted by mail, and I was informed by email when my ballot had been received and when my signature had been verified. Trump lost by ~150,000 votes here, fair and square.

jca2's avatar

@crazyguy: So then you’re saying the requirement to vote should be that people must be able to write?

Pandora's avatar

@crazyguy. Is that what we should do from now on. Investigate every election or only the one you didn’t like? Should we start having elections done a year ahead so we can have all the agencies personally investigate every single ballot? Go knock on doors. Is this your ballot? Can you give us a blood sample so we can make sure you are you? Or do we just start barcoding citizens to make it easier? Oh, but that would have to go into some sort of system that can maybe be hacked. It’s already been thoroughly investigated by several agencies. Not one, not two PAC of Election Integrity, FBI and DHS (cisa). There is absolutely nothing you would believe.

As an actual citizen of the United States, I am absolutely fine with the investigations and how the election process was handled. I was disgusted by Trump supporters with guns that did show up in one of our cities to intimidate people from early voting but that was resolved and plenty of people went out to vote in my state.
By the way. Are you actually a citizen of the US or some foreign troll?

LadyMarissa's avatar

I’m waiting for 45 to amaze us with how brilliant he is because he scammed the system & voted for himself 20 times!!!

crazyguy's avatar

@jca2 Show me where I said that.

jca2's avatar

@crazyguy: I asked “what about people who can’t write and put an “x?” You still came back with insistence upon signatures.

crazyguy's avatar

@Zissou In California they messaged me when my ballot was received. But I never got notified when it was counted. I think I was supposed to.

@Pandora I think we should migrate over to an online voting system where questions of identity checking (facial recognition, fingerprint scan and/or cornea scan) are pretty much foolproof. That system would save money upfront and even more later because there would be no need ever for an audit.

@LadyMarissa What difference would 20 votes make?

@jca2 “You still came back with insistence upon signatures.” Show me where I did that.

gorillapaws's avatar

@crazyguy “I think we should migrate over to an online voting system”

Madness. How the hell would that be secured? You’d have everyone from wealthy domestic corporate interests and individuals, political parties, to foreign interests like China, North Korea, Israel, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, etc. trying to hack our election website. Not to mention there’s a huge “big government” aspect of having a biometric database with every American’s facial scan and fingerprint data… Pretty dystopian if you ask me and totally contradictory to “conservative” principles.

jca2's avatar

@crazyguy: ”Any time you change the requirements to make it easier for somebody to vote, you are possibly inviting others to slip into that crack. And when it comes to crawling into loopholes, people can be awfully creative

Pandora's avatar

Online would be a thousand times worse and would require everyone to have access to those things? Is the taxpayer going to pay for it? Nothing online is foolproof. The only way to keep hackers out is to have a closed system, which would be impossible if you have to deal with everyone’s computer to have access. And talk about big brother really having data on you and the Russians. I mean the government already has a ton of issue on us, but sure lets make it way easier. Might as well get bar coded or have them insert chips in everyone. You know for our freedom to vote.

Darth_Algar's avatar

So much for “government so small you can drown it in a bathtub” that conservatives claim to want.

jca2's avatar

@Darth_Algar: Small government when it comes to things like Social Services and administering mental health programs and programs to feed families. Large government when it comes to the Board of Elections’ budget! Transfer those workers from Social Services to the BOE!

LadyMarissa's avatar

Back in 2000 we had the hanging chad & it was the reps who insisted we switch over to the voting machines because it would be more secure with a less likely chance for fraud. Now, they are the ones screaming how the voting machines are being hacked. Today they were saying that we need to go back to paper ballots. The truth is that whenever they can’t win, they want to redo the rules in their favor!!!

How would online voting resolve the problem of fraud??? Hell, even our checking accounts aren’t safe from online fraud & the banks are supposed to have the top security!!! Granny’s in a nursing home & unsure how to vote online, so her nurse offers to do it for her. Nobody knows IF that nurse actually voted the way that Granny requested or whether or not Granny was voting at all.

@crazyguy Twenty votes don’t count for anything, but when has that stopped 45 from complaining about it. He spent $3 million for a recount only to give Biden 87 MORE votes!!! Where’s the logic in anything he does???

JLeslie's avatar

I’m coming to realize how all of it is just a way for Trump to make money. His groupies are still donating money for court cases, but he can keep the extra and buy a new yacht with the money if he wants. Filing a case is cheap and his lawyers are salaried. Such a scam.

crazyguy's avatar

@JLeslie In other words, you are absolutely convinced that fraud did not happen at all? Or, if it did, it is rather small, and has no chance of growing? Or, you think that if it did happen, the end justifies the means?

JLeslie's avatar

I think if there is any fraud it’s minuscule. The election is too far apart, it won’t matter. If 50 people signed for someone else it won’t matter and some of the forged signatures are probably ok anyway. If I forge for my husband it’s always with his consent. Lol. I don’t do it on the mail-in ballots since I know it is scrutinized. Out of the 50, if there is that many, 45 are already caught probably.

Darth_Algar's avatar

As usual for this TC he asks questions for which he will accept no answers other than those he wants to hear.

jca2's avatar

Few people in real life speak in absolutes, but here @crazyguy and a few others do .

Jaxk's avatar

This whole thing is getting out of control. Of course it wasn’t an issue before because we didn’t have this massive ‘mail in ballot’ before. There is no audit trail with this system. Frankly I like the system Iraq used where you show up, vote, and dip your finger in a bottle of ink. It clear and easy and each vote is tied to a person. Even if you add ‘absentee ballots’ you have an audit trail. you request a ballot, it gets sent and you return it. The vote is tied to a person.

This massive mail vote is new. Of course there will be problems. Let’s not ignore them simply because your guy won this time. Let’s shore up the process where there are obvious problems.

Hamb's avatar

@Jaxk: “This massive mail vote is new. Of course there will be problems. Let’s not ignore them simply because your guy won this time. Let’s shore up the process where there are obvious problems.”

I loathe the outcome of this election, as it means (among other horrors) that my kids’ futures are doomed. That said, mail-in ballots have always happened, and whatever potential weakness you can identify from mail-in ballots exist with in-person voting. There is no evidence of mass fraud, and all proposed solutions to this problem (that does not exist) are themselves calls for mass fraud.

Get busy crafting some dystopian voting system for the US and make it federally mandated. But for now, you’re stuck – along with the rest of the world – with Biden.

JLeslie's avatar

@Jaxk There is multi-millions of mail-in votes every election, especially in the last 20 years it has increased. You didn’t complain in 2016 when Trump won did you?

crazyguy's avatar

@JLeslie You say: “I think if there is any fraud it’s minuscule.” That is what you think, and you are perfectly entitled to think that. However, wouldn’t it be nice to know? Or at least have some defensible data, based on a sample of the signature envelopes in Georgia?

JLeslie's avatar

@crazyguy The signatures have already been checked. You would need a dishonest person filling out the ballot AND dishonest PEOPLE checking in the ballot. You need a lot of people working together to get away with huge fraud. The person checking the signature has NO IDEA HOW THE PERSON VOTED. They have no reason to let one ballot in and another ballot out.

crazyguy's avatar

@Jaxk The number of mail-in ballots has been going up. In 2016, there were 33.5 million mail-in ballots, in 2020 there were about 65 million (see
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/11/10/most-mail-and-provisional-ballots-got-counted-in-past-u-s-elections-but-many-did-not/)

It is obvious to most people who open their eyes just a little that mail-in ballots present more opportunities for fraud than in-person ballots, mainly because the only way to verify identity of the voter is by a signature match, whereas in-person voting exposes the voter to many possible means of identity verification.

Signature verification fraud is hard to audit because signature envelopes are not kept with the ballots. There is opposition to just matching signatures to determine the extent of the problem. Makes you wonder just what the Democrats are afraid of.

JLeslie's avatar

33.5 MILLION mail-in ballots and it was fine.

crazyguy's avatar

@JLeslie You have, in the past, admitted that there is, just theoretically, more opportunity for fraud with mail-in ballots than with in-person ballots. None of the other jellies has! Until that rather obvious truth is accepted, further discussion may be wasted.

You say: “The signatures have already been checked.” What would be wrong with taking, say 10%, of the signature envelopes and verifying the signature match. If the error rate is under 1%, your point has been made. If not, perhaps we need to check all the envelopes.

JLeslie's avatar

Go ahead, check the signatures a 4th time.

crazyguy's avatar

I wish it were you who could authorize the rather simple exercise!

JLeslie's avatar

Why was it not authorized? The courts said no? I haven’t kept up with it honestly. I know there are some recounts being done. Has there been no signature quadruple checks?

crazyguy's avatar

A recount is simply counting up the ballots again. Georgia had one recount by hand because the vote totals were within 1% of each other. Then, the second recount was done by machine at Trump’s request. However, no signature matching verification has been done.

Darth_Algar's avatar

Trump was screaming about voter fraud before the 2016 election. He was screaming about voter fraud after the 2016 election, when he won. He’s been screaming about voter fraud off and on during his term. He set up a commission to investigate voter fraud which was quietly disbanded after it found no significant voter fraud. He’s been screaming about it more than ever now that he lost, even as his own legal team have failed, time and time again, to substantiate any of their claims in court. His own people have stated there’s no fraud and he brands them as traitors. And now he’s trying to pressure the state legislatures to ignore the vote and simply give him the states’ electoral votes.

And we’re suppose to take his claims of fraud seriously?

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “However, no signature matching verification has been done.”

Here it is. @crazyguy can no longer pretend not to understand that signature matching is itself fraud, yet he’s still here calling for it. @crazyguy is calling for voter fraud. This is not something to argue about any longer.

Own your shit, @crazyguy.

gorillapaws's avatar

@crazyguy Can you articulate the nature of the fraud you’re alleging occurred? Are you claiming that official ballots were counterfeited and submitted on a wide scale with forged signatures that happened to not collide with existing votes from voters? In this case signature analysis is unnecessary because the ballot itself could be tested for validity. Or are they intercepting valid mail-in ballots and altering them? In this case there should be evidence of tampering.

Remember that there are both Democrat and Republican representatives that are present for the counting. So what is the scenario that signature matching would reveal the alleged fraud scheme?

crazyguy's avatar

@Hamb You lost me. How exactly is signature matching (which is done with all mail-in ballots) fraud?

Hamb's avatar

@crazyguy: “You lost me. How exactly is signature matching (which is done with all mail-in ballots) fraud?”

We already went over this. Since signature-matching is not a thing, calls for signature-matching is literally calls to disenfranchise US voters.

Hamb's avatar

You might as well call for balancing the chi of all ballots, or having an astrological-based voting system.

Hamb's avatar

I get that you guys don’t like science. But christ – just own that you want to fuck with US voting by implementing pseudo-scientific horseshit.

jca2's avatar

I’m convinced that @crazyguy and others (plus many Repubs) won’t be happy with any answer unless it’s “Throw out the votes.” One acceptable answer, otherwise the arguments will not stop.

crazyguy's avatar

@gorillapaws Verifying the signature matching would accomplish one of two things:

The selected sample would show little or no problem, in which case we can rest easy (as far as Georgia goes)

OR, it will show x% of the signatures need confirmation. If x is over some predetermined number, that would send a clear signal that all the signature envelopes need to be examined.

As to articulating the nature of the fraud, here it is in a nutshell:

https://news.yahoo.com/mail-ballots-being-rejected-surprisingly-222200947.html

From the story:

In Florida, ” local officials have spent the past few weeks reaching out to voters with ballot problems and helping them to correct the errors. ” I suspect helping to correct the errors may have involved more than just help.

We do know the rejection rates nationwide were much lower than expected. For instance, see
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/02/us/election-ballots-rejections.html

crazyguy's avatar

@jca2 Please don’t abandon your usual high standards to side with @Hamb!

gorillapaws's avatar

@crazyguy You still haven’t articulated the mechanism for the alleged fraud. How was it carried out?

stanleybmanly's avatar

It is rather galling to hear anyone bolstering the behavior of our nincompoop talk about “standards”.

crazyguy's avatar

@gorillapaws What I think happened was mainly low-tech stuff like the overflowing urinal that was called a “main line break”. For the life of me I cannot understand how different apparently random events could have been co-ordinated without more leaks. Of course, we have had a few whistle blowers, and I expect there will be more if mainstream media stopped their unconditional support of Biden.

stanleybmanly's avatar

Mainstream media is confronted with exactly the same choice as the rest of us. It’s pointless blaming the media for the fact that a psychotic moron is loose in the White House. It isn’t the media which is responsible for either the psychosis or the glaring paucity of intellect. Both traits have been undeniably demonstrated with such nauseating intensity that they are definitively and irreconcilably beyond dispute.

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