Earlier today, The Charlotte Observer called for a new election in NC-09. The Observer, the largest paper in this district, came to the same conclusion that a lot of people have already drawn this week. That is, the evidence of massive and potentially criminal irregularities with absentee ballots on the far eastern end of the district has become too great to be ignored, and there is no remedy short of a new election.
The North Carolina Board of Elections is due to hold an evidentiary hearing on the race sometime later this month. It has the power to order a new election if it finds enough evidence of “irregularities and improprieties” that they “taint the results of the entire election”—even if the fraud doesn’t exceed Mark Harris’ apparent 905-vote margin over Dan McCready.
There is little doubt that this threshold has been met, based on multiple reports that McCrae Dowless, an independent contractor for the Harris campaign, oversaw a massive scheme in the two easternmost counties of the district, Bladen and Robeson, in which absentee ballots were collected before being sealed and even filled in before they were completed. At least two of the people flagged by multiple reports for witnessing an implausible number of absentee ballot signatures admitted on camera that they helped Dowless collect absentee ballots.
Combined with the abnormally high rates of absentee ballot requests and unreturned ballots in those counties—suffice to say that at the very least, there’s a lot of smoke. Enough that there are at least three separate federal and state investigations underway.
We also know something else. Regardless of what the board ultimately decides, Harris should not stay in this race.
The more that emerges, the harder it is to believe that Dowless would have concocted this scheme if the Harris campaign hadn’t fostered an environment in which it was remotely acceptable. Consider what we’ve learned from the affidavits that have been filed. People being asked to turn in their ballots before they were signed and sealed. Incomplete ballots being filled in before they were completed. Evidence that poor and elderly voters—mostly black—were targeted. When the best-case scenario is that Harris was disengaged in a way that a major-party candidate cannot be, that’s not a good sign. After all, even if he didn’t know how Dowless was going about mobilizing absentee voters, he should have made it his business to know.
As I note at RDTDaily, the growing evidence of fraud makes Harris’ apparent radio silence on the matter puzzling, to say the least. Harris hasn’t commented on this since Friday, when he called for the board to certify him as the winner even as the investigation continues. His social media accounts have been completely silent since paying tribute to Bush 41 on Saturday. Given that we now know beyond real-world doubt that there was indeed fraudulent and criminal conduct by his campaign, you would have thought he would have shown some leadership and spoken up. But instead, nothing.
The incoming Democratic majority has already let it be known that Harris will not be seated until this matter is resolved. It has the power under the Constitution to throw out the results on its own authority and order a fresh election. However, it should only use this power if the board doesn’t have the good sense to throw out the original results.
But Harris should save everyone the trouble. Just like Chris Christie should have resigned for fostering the environment that led to Bridgegate, Harris should decline to be seated in January. That will give the GOP a chance to pick a replacement candidate and ensure that whoever ultimately wins that seat will do so without any question as to his or her legitimacy.