Four for Friday: Fact-checking the fraud claims in PA

Days before a single ballot is tallied in Pennsylvania, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has been casting doubt on the commonwealth’s election operations and laying the groundwork to contest the results if he loses the battleground state. 

Trump has already spread claims of fraud related to voter registration applications and ballots,  without evidence, setting the stage for Pennsylvania to once again be ground zero for preemptive claims of a rigged election.

Several counties have reported instances of questionable applications or ballots, with each county indicating they’re investigating the matters and have safeguards in place to ensure the election is done freely and fairly. 

Here’s what we know – and what we don’t know – based on what local officials tell us in these counties: 

Bucks

In the southeast collar county of Bucks, long lines for early voting led to an unforced error that Trump aides and allies pounced on. When early voters were cut off while trying to request and cast mail-in ballots in person, Trump’s legal team successfully sued to extend the early voting period by one day. On top of the one-day extension – one that local officials celebrated as a win for voter accessibility – Trump and many aligned with him seized the opportunity to cast the situation as voter suppression and intimidation. 

Pennsylvania doesn’t allow early voting on voting machines, as some states do, but Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration did urge counties to allow every voter who was in line by the 5 p.m. deadline to submit a mail-in ballot application; county officials confirmed that that did take place. 

Lancaster

While officials in Lancaster County were reviewing voter registration applications for possible fraud, Trump posted without evidence on social media Wednesday morning that there was cheating “at large scale levels rarely seen before,” and again on Thursday, stating: “We caught them CHEATING BIG in Pennsylvania. Must announce and PROSECUTE, NOW!”

Lancaster County District Attorney Heather Adams, an elected Republican, said election workers raised concerns about two sets of voter registration applications with numerous similarities. Trump has claimed bad actors were “caught” with “2,600 votes,” but Lancaster officials are looking into voter registration applications, not votes or ballots. County officials clarified that some forms contained false names, questionable signatures and other problematic details but did not reveal if they were written by the same person and how many were deemed problematic. 

Monroe

Two other counties discovered suspect voter registration forms and were able to identify an Arizona-based company as the source of the last-minute applications, which are now under investigation. Suspect forms were found in Monroe County, where the Board of Elections staff identified about 30 irregular forms and referred them to the district attorney's office.

Monroe County District Attorney Mike Mancuso said several forms were “fraudulent as they were not authorized by the persons named as applicants” and were traced back to one specific person. The company involved, Field+Media Corps, conducts voter registration and outreach programs and is run by Francisco Heredia, a Mesa councilman and a longtime voting activist in Arizona. 

York

York County officials also confirmed this week the county was reviewing suspect voter application forms. The Board of Elections provided an update on the situation Wednesday night, stating that out of the 3,000 flagged voter registration applications, 47% were verified and approved, about 29% were incomplete and won’t be approved unless additional information is provided by the applicants. The remaining 24% were declined, with 85% of those being deemed duplicate registration requests and put under review by the district attorney. 

York County Chief Clerk Greg Monskie confirmed that just as in Monroe County, Field+Media Corps forms are under investigation in York County as well. The company submitted those forms on behalf of the Everybody Votes campaign, a national nonprofit voter registration organization. Everybody Votes said in a statement that the company has not been contacted by officials in Lancaster, York, or Monroe counties about ongoing investigations, but would help resolve any issues with the forms if contacted.

What’s next

State and county officials have emphasized that the news shows how the state’s election processes are working, noting that election officials flagged the applications as potentially problematic and that no ballots were involved. Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt, a Republican who faced threats from Trump supporters in 2020 as Philadelphia City Commissioner, said the fraud claims are being made to “manufacture outrage” and encouraged voters to get their information from “trusted sources.” 

“Spreading videos and other information that lack context, sharing social posts filled with half-truths or even outright lies is harmful to our representative democracy,” he said during a media briefing Wednesday.

Attorney General Michelle Henry also spoke on the alleged fraudulent voter registration applications, stating that the “apparent attempts…have been defeated.” 

“The Office of Attorney General is working with the respective county officials to investigate those responsible for this conduct,” Henry said in a statement. “These attempts have been thwarted by the safeguards in place in Pennsylvania. We are working every day with our partners to ensure a fair, free, and safe election. The investigations are ongoing, and offenders who perpetrated acts of fraud will be held accountable under the law.”