A Walker County, Georgia, man was handed a very hefty sentence for submitting another resident’s absentee ballot that had erroneously wound up in his post office box.
Following his conviction for voter fraud, William Chase, 62, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for forging a ballot in Georgia’s January 2021 runoff election, according to WTVC News.
District Attorney Chris Arnt told WTVC that a couple who had requested absentee ballots grew concerned when they received just one ballot and contacted the Walker County Elections Office. Records showed the missing ballot had “already been accepted, but not yet counted.”
After viewing the signature at the Elections Office, the woman knew it had been forged.
Arnt said an investigation conducted by the Secretary of State Office determined the woman’s ballot had been sent to Chase by mistake and that he had already sent in his own ballot. Chase was arrested after his fingerprints matched those on the forged ballot.
According to the DA, Chase was convicted of “forgery in the first degree, illegal acts regarding election documents, unlawful acts regarding elector’s vote, and repeat voting in same election.”
Chase’s criminal history includes convictions for “bankruptcy fraud, theft by shoplifting, forgery in the first degree, stealing public documents, and financial identity fraud.”
“Chase is sentenced to 25 years, with the first 15 years to be served in the Georgia Department of Corrections without the possibility of parole,” the report said.
While that may seem to be an overly harsh punishment for the act of forging an absentee ballot, voting is one of the most sacred rights of an American citizen. Chase knowingly tried to disenfranchise this woman by forging her signature.
Chase’s conviction is unusual in that typically, voter fraud is difficult to prove. But, particularly in states who send ballots out to every resident included on their voter rolls, it’s clear how easy it would be to collect and submit those ballots. And, in a close election, the fraudulent votes could be sufficient to sway the result.
In the months leading up to the 2020 election, former President Donald Trump repeatedly warned of the danger posed by the explosion of mail-in voting. He pointed out the obvious: it opens the door to voter fraud. He was fiercely attacked by the left for his remarks.
The Democratic Party has been lobbying for years to expand the use of absentee and mail-in voting and in some states, it had already gained wide acceptance long before the coronavirus reached our shores. But it was the pandemic that handed Democrats a golden opportunity to expand this new way of voting.
In 2005, former President Jimmy Carter and former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker, III, co-chaired the Commission on Federal Election Reform. The most memorable takeaway from the commission’s final report was that “[a]bsentee ballots remain the largest source of potential voter fraud.”
The Wall Street Journal looked at the Carter-Baker Commission report ahead of the 2020 election and noted that intimidation and vote buying were among their chief concerns. The report read, “Citizens who vote at home, at nursing homes, at the workplace, or in church are more susceptible to pressure, overt and subtle, or to intimidation. Vote buying schemes are far more difficult to detect when citizens vote by mail.”
The report, according to the Journal, cites examples of such schemes, including “the 1997 Miami mayoral election that resulted in 36 arrests for absentee-ballot fraud. The election had to be rerun, and the result was reversed.”
Trump’s warnings about the dangers of mail-in voting in 2020 were prescient. To this day, many Americans remain skeptical over the accuracy of the results in several battleground states.
Days before the midterms, parody site The Babylon Bee published an article that began: “As Republicans continue to expand their leads in polling across the country, Democrats are worried that the leads may soon grow beyond the normal margin of Democrat cheating.”
Despite the fact that this is satire, the reason why this is amusing is that there is a certain amount of truth to it. This is precisely the type of scenario that conservatives worry about.
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A previous version of this article appeared in The Western Journal.
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I wonder if taking his hand, the one that stole the ballot, would make any better a difference, than the punishment handed down? That does happen in other countries. Either way, he has 25 or so years to ponder his crime.
I also wonder when the day will come when the ones who instigate others into doing what this man did, will get their punishment, like a Marc Elias or a Stacy Abrams type? If that day comes, the process will probably have an impact on those who steal others’ rights. Good news, anyway you look at it.
Were one to take his hand, an accusation of cultural appropriation would certainly follow, with reparations to the muslim world called for in the name of equity.
So likely!
absurd hypocrisy on the part of the court.
maybe a 90 day sentence.. but this is ridiculous.
Have you taken into consideration his previous criminal history, and Georgia law, concerning that? Repeat offenders often have harsher sentences, not necessarily of repeating the same crime, but having repeatedly crimes that are felonies against the state. Kinda defines the
nature of a criminal, who will continue to commit crimes.
I stated above, that I wondered about if his hand was taken. Some countries consider that theft from another as the taking of a hand as suitable punishment. I wasn’t suggesting that as punishment, but offered it to show that his punishment was not as absurd as some might conclude. When one loses his hand, it can’t be put back on.
Something was taken from someone else. Does she get it back?
When you diminish the punishment of the crime, you diminish the crime. We already have a problem in our judicial system of letting habitual criminals walk, only to go and commit more crimes.
I thought the penalty for TREASON was death.
Given the criminal history, the 15 years before possible parole is a welcome hiatus in his criminal behavior.
In light of the absolute RAILROAD job that is being inflicted upon the J6 ‘Insurrectionists’ I think this is a fitting punishment. Perhaps fraudsters will give some thought to the seriousness of this crime going forward. NOW, if we can only get judges and juries in OTHER states where this is such a serious problem, then, perhaps we can get back to Free and Fair Elections.
Now go after the DemocRATic party for voter fraud. The 2020 election was totally rigged to put senile, little girl fondling Joe Biden and the ignorant moron Commie-la Harris into office.
Watch this video and see 19,958 votes flip from Trump to Biden in the 2020 election.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-B-Nci99GI&ab_channel=BlaqBalled
Keep your eyes on Pennsylvania! In this clip PA has Trump at 1,690,589 & Biden is at 1,252,537 at the beginning of the clip.. then at the end when Pennsylvania pops up again, Trump magically is then down to 1,670,631 & Biden has gone up to 1,272,495.. what happened was 19,958 votes FLIPPED right before our eyes! Biden’s number went UP by the EXACT same amount Trump’s number went DOWN! again, watch Trump (1690…) goes down to (1670…) while biden (1252…) goes up (1272…) There’s been machine “glitches” similar to this one reported in several different areas.. some have pointed out its a program that is designed to do exactly what you’ve seen here
Those machine “Glitches” have been around for years, if not decades, and have happened incrementally to get us used to them, causing many to see them as more normal. It was a bad mistake to allow that to happen, but that’s how politicians minimize our value system, so that they can attain undeserved power, and corruption. We rely on corruptible equipment to cast our votes. It was only time before they got corrupted, if that wasn’t parted out in the design.
I remember several years ago, when people saw their votes, in real time, switch before their eyes to another candidate. I didn’t believe it until it happened to me, and I live in Tennessee, where that stuff was thought to never happen. Well, it did, I just caught it and complained, and did everything to make sure my vote was cast for the one I picked.