(Source: MIRS.news, Published 05/23/2022) The Bureau of Elections (BoE) flagged today an unprecedented 36 petition circulators responsible for at least 68,000 estimated invalid signatures, finding sheets that unnaturally lacked basic wear-and-tear and some with the same two or three handwriting styles reappearing.
Upon Monday's review from Michigan's BoE, the aforementioned circulators were jointly accountable for at least 10 candidate petition drives being spoiled, making several of them ineligible to be placed on the August 2022 ballot if the bureau's findings hold.
The document was titled "State Report On Fraudulent Nominating Petitions," and shared that the 36 individuals submitted "fraudulent petition sheets consisting entirely of invalid signatures."
"Although it is typical for staff to encounter some signatures of dubious authenticity scattered within nominating petitions, the Bureau is unaware of another election cycle in which this many circulators submitted such a substantial volume of fraudulent petition sheets consisting of invalid signatures, nor an instance in which it affected as many candidate petitions as at present," the report reads.
The bureau published that currently, it has no reason to believe that any specific candidate or campaign was aware of the actions conducted by the fraudulent-petition circulators. It noted media reports illustrating the roadblocks securing circulators and signatures for 2022, "given the abundance of petition campaigns nationwide and the continuing lack of in-person events."
"Reportedly, the average cost of signature gathering rose from $5 to $7 per signature to $20 per signature," the review reads. "The Bureau does recommend that candidates and campaigns implement a quality control process before filing petitions, and to cross out any invalid signatures property to submission."
Mark GREBNER of Practical Political Consultants filed some affidavits to flag faulty petition lists in Wayne County. After reading the report tonight, he said "I think that we've got a whole new world here."
He said he can imagine the bureau distributing a handout with "tips for candidates" in the future, warning campaigns to check their petitions before dropping them off.
Grebner explained with the modern-day signature collector able to make $20 to $50 hourly for circulating petitions, there comes a scenario of people down on their luck being financially cornered.
"They're not serving in Congress. They're not famous artists. They're just guys who have trouble making enough money to pay the rent," Grebner told MIRS. "Here we only have the nominating petitions. At the same time, there are what? Eight different drives for initiative petitions, and they've been turning in signatures there too, I promise you."
He made the observation that a lot of the circulators come from unfortunate circumstances, saying that many of them struggle with holding a job, experience substance abuse or criminal justice problems and journey around the country looking for the next petition sheet to hand out.
"You've got so much financial pressure urging people to do this. The marketplace is waving money wildly trying to get people to do this, and people responded and did the best they could," he said. "Like with a fake painting, you think of different ways to fake the randomness of petitions. The fact the handwriting is different and that each line is different and they use different pens and so on…you do all of those things, but you can't really create the perfect fake."
He compared the present-day state of signature collecting for campaigns to the Middle Ages, and a king has just offered to pay a fortune for anybody to turn lead into gold.
"If you pay enough money, you're gonna get people from all over who have just the most complicated gadgets to produce gold out of lead," he said.
Across the numerous petition sheets that were made up entirely out of invalid signatures, bureau staff members noticed they presented one or more of the following tendencies:
- "An unusually large" amount of sheets where either each signature line was completed, "or where every line was completed but one or two lines were crossed out."
- Multiple sheets presented indications of "apparent attempts at 'intentional' signature invalidity," like a sheet where an entry placed a county name in the "city of township" field or a birth date was inserted incorrectly as the date of signing.
- Many sheets lacked the basic wear-and-tear – like folding or miniscule water damage – that would come from sheets being kept on clipboards, held by multiple individuals and carried around in a public outdoor or indoor setting.
- Sheets that appeared to be the product of the "round-table" practice where a group of people pass "around sheets with each individual signing one line on each sheet with handwriting different from the circulator's handwriting."
- Sheets with blank and completed lines randomly dispersed across the page, suggesting that a sheet was turned in "mid-round-table," where it was subjected to the "round-table" practice and was called to be submitted prematurely.
- Sheets with all ten lines featuring signatures and incomplete addresses or dates, while "only a random subset were fully completed."
According to the BOE, the above examples include alternating lines filed out by different colored pens as an effort to show off randomness. However, according to the bureau, “similar handwriting is clear across sheets and especially when the lines completed in a certain color are considered together.”
There were also sheets where certain letters came from nearly identical handwriting and where the same specific two or three handwriting styles appeared repeatedly.
Staff also noticed flaws when comparing an entry to the name's presence on the Qualified Voter File (QVF), like multiple entries providing the person's former – but not present – address or the signature appearing differently on the QVF.
They also found some names either being spelled incorrectly or using the voter's middle name or nickname, there was also "an unusually high number of signatures corresponding to formerly registered voters whose registrations were canceled because the voter had died months or years prior to the date of the signature."
In one situation, the BoE was informed through email of a resident who indicated that two judicial candidates pursuing the same office were connected to the same group of fraudulent circulators, the review reads.
"The email alleged that the pages circulated are nearly identical which caused (candidate Amanda SHELTON) to not submit the signatures. When comparing the pages between the two candidates below, they are virtually identical with the only difference between the two being the name of the information in the heading:"
(Source: MIRS.news, Published 05/23/2022) The Bureau of Elections (BoE) flagged today an unprecedented 36 petition circulators responsible for at least 68,000 estimated invalid signatures, finding sheets that unnaturally lacked basic wear-and-tear and some with the same two or three handwriting styles reappearing.
Upon Monday's review from Michigan's BoE, the aforementioned circulators were jointly accountable for at least 10 candidate petition drives being spoiled, making several of them ineligible to be placed on the August 2022 ballot if the bureau's findings hold.
The document was titled "State Report On Fraudulent Nominating Petitions," and shared that the 36 individuals submitted "fraudulent petition sheets consisting entirely of invalid signatures."
"Although it is typical for staff to encounter some signatures of dubious authenticity scattered within nominating petitions, the Bureau is unaware of another election cycle in which this many circulators submitted such a substantial volume of fraudulent petition sheets consisting of invalid signatures, nor an instance in which it affected as many candidate petitions as at present," the report reads.
The bureau published that currently, it has no reason to believe that any specific candidate or campaign was aware of the actions conducted by the fraudulent-petition circulators. It noted media reports illustrating the roadblocks securing circulators and signatures for 2022, "given the abundance of petition campaigns nationwide and the continuing lack of in-person events."
"Reportedly, the average cost of signature gathering rose from $5 to $7 per signature to $20 per signature," the review reads. "The Bureau does recommend that candidates and campaigns implement a quality control process before filing petitions, and to cross out any invalid signatures property to submission."
Mark GREBNER of Practical Political Consultants filed some affidavits to flag faulty petition lists in Wayne County. After reading the report tonight, he said "I think that we've got a whole new world here."
He said he can imagine the bureau distributing a handout with "tips for candidates" in the future, warning campaigns to check their petitions before dropping them off.
Grebner explained with the modern-day signature collector able to make $20 to $50 hourly for circulating petitions, there comes a scenario of people down on their luck being financially cornered.
"They're not serving in Congress. They're not famous artists. They're just guys who have trouble making enough money to pay the rent," Grebner told MIRS. "Here we only have the nominating petitions. At the same time, there are what? Eight different drives for initiative petitions, and they've been turning in signatures there too, I promise you."
He made the observation that a lot of the circulators come from unfortunate circumstances, saying that many of them struggle with holding a job, experience substance abuse or criminal justice problems and journey around the country looking for the next petition sheet to hand out.
"You've got so much financial pressure urging people to do this. The marketplace is waving money wildly trying to get people to do this, and people responded and did the best they could," he said. "Like with a fake painting, you think of different ways to fake the randomness of petitions. The fact the handwriting is different and that each line is different and they use different pens and so on…you do all of those things, but you can't really create the perfect fake."
He compared the present-day state of signature collecting for campaigns to the Middle Ages, and a king has just offered to pay a fortune for anybody to turn lead into gold.
"If you pay enough money, you're gonna get people from all over who have just the most complicated gadgets to produce gold out of lead," he said.
Across the numerous petition sheets that were made up entirely out of invalid signatures, bureau staff members noticed they presented one or more of the following tendencies:
- "An unusually large" amount of sheets where either each signature line was completed, "or where every line was completed but one or two lines were crossed out."
- Multiple sheets presented indications of "apparent attempts at 'intentional' signature invalidity," like a sheet where an entry placed a county name in the "city of township" field or a birth date was inserted incorrectly as the date of signing.
- Many sheets lacked the basic wear-and-tear – like folding or miniscule water damage – that would come from sheets being kept on clipboards, held by multiple individuals and carried around in a public outdoor or indoor setting.
- Sheets that appeared to be the product of the "round-table" practice where a group of people pass "around sheets with each individual signing one line on each sheet with handwriting different from the circulator's handwriting."
- Sheets with blank and completed lines randomly dispersed across the page, suggesting that a sheet was turned in "mid-round-table," where it was subjected to the "round-table" practice and was called to be submitted prematurely.
- Sheets with all ten lines featuring signatures and incomplete addresses or dates, while "only a random subset were fully completed."
According to the BOE, the above examples include alternating lines filed out by different colored pens as an effort to show off randomness. However, according to the bureau, “similar handwriting is clear across sheets and especially when the lines completed in a certain color are considered together.”
There were also sheets where certain letters came from nearly identical handwriting and where the same specific two or three handwriting styles appeared repeatedly.
Staff also noticed flaws when comparing an entry to the name's presence on the Qualified Voter File (QVF), like multiple entries providing the person's former – but not present – address or the signature appearing differently on the QVF.
They also found some names either being spelled incorrectly or using the voter's middle name or nickname, there was also "an unusually high number of signatures corresponding to formerly registered voters whose registrations were canceled because the voter had died months or years prior to the date of the signature."
In one situation, the BoE was informed through email of a resident who indicated that two judicial candidates pursuing the same office were connected to the same group of fraudulent circulators, the review reads.
"The email alleged that the pages circulated are nearly identical which caused (candidate Amanda SHELTON) to not submit the signatures. When comparing the pages between the two candidates below, they are virtually identical with the only difference between the two being the name of the information in the heading:"
