by State Senator Bob Mensch
HARRISBURG – I, like you, am also alarmed and concerned about the many issues that are stemming from this election. The voting problems we’ve experienced over the past week began when Gov. Wolf decertified every machine in the state, immediately following the 2016 presidential election.
There was never any evidence of the inadequacy of the machines, and the notion that machines not connected to the internet could somehow be ‘hacked’ was an absurd lie. Of course, by that time, the secretary of state was also perpetuating this lie, and she has proven to be no more than a hack for the governor.
In fact, as late as 10:30 pm on election eve, the secretary of state was issuing operation changes to the county boards of elections, a clear violation of the voting laws. She is a political operative and I am calling on her to resign immediately.
The damage that she and the governor have inflicted on the voting process in Pennsylvania, sadly, is already done. Further, let’s not ignore the fact that the state Supreme Court has handed Wolf victories in his continued efforts to destroy the security of our voting system.
The majority of the ongoing vote counting is attributed to mail-in ballots. While the Supreme Court ruling allowed for the counting of ballots received past election day, it did not address counting ballots received before election day.
This year the volume of mail-in ballots well exceeded any previous record and certainly adds to the time needed to count. It remains to be seen if the U.S. Supreme Court will take up a case on the additional three days of mail-in ballots that are received after November 3, but that would not apply to mail-in ballots received before election day.
Amid ongoing lawsuits and searches into fraud, Pennsylvania has proven to be an embarrassment to the free world. Where once the election process was secure, today it is no more secure than the systems in regions of developing countries. In other words, it has become a sham.
Our party attorneys must, and will, do everything they can to right these wrongs before the election results are final. We are doing everything in our power to address these issues and identify all possible options to mitigate the egregious behavior we are witnessing.
We must immediately correct the abuses occurring in the ongoing count in 67 counties in PA; and we must ensure this sham of an election never occurs again in Pennsylvania, or our country.
State Sen. Bob Mensch represents Senate District 24 for portions of Bucks, Berks, and Montgomery counties.
