Posted on 06/01/2026 8:03:14 AM PDT by Red Badger
Los Angeles County election officials are investigating after mail-in ballots were found damaged by fire inside an official ballot drop box just days before LA’s highly anticipated June 2 mayoral election.
The incident was discovered Sunday morning in downtown Los Angeles when election workers were collecting ballots from a drop box outside the county Department of Public Social Services building in the Civic Center area.
According to county officials, multiple vote-by-mail ballots appeared to have sustained fire-related damage inside the official drop box.
Authorities are also reviewing a separate act of election-related vandalism at a vote center located at Cesar E. Chavez Park in Long Beach.
In a news release, County officials said the Long Beach incident did not stop voting operations at the site, but the timing of both incidents raises serious concerns about the security of California’s election system as voters head into the final stretch before Election Day.
Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk Dean Logan said his office is working with law enforcement and other partners to review both incidents and determine whether any voters were affected.
“Our responsibility is to protect voters and ensure every eligible voter has the opportunity to cast a ballot,” Logan said in a statement.
Officials said voters whose ballots may have been damaged in the drop box fire will be contacted directly and given options, including replacement ballots if necessary.
The county has not yet released the number of damaged ballots, the identity of any suspect, or the cause of the fire. A police report was filed with the Los Angeles Police Department, according to the registrar’s office.
The incident comes as California continues to rely heavily on vote-by-mail ballots and ballot drop boxes. State election officials mailed ballots to active registered voters for the June 2 primary, and voters are allowed to return ballots by mail, at official drop boxes, county elections offices, polling places, or vote centers.
Drop boxes are supposed to provide a secure and convenient option for voters, but incidents like this show the obvious vulnerability of leaving ballots in public collection boxes for extended periods.
This is not the first time Los Angeles County has dealt with fire damage involving a ballot drop box. In 2020, a ballot box outside the Baldwin Park Library caught fire in a suspected arson incident, forcing firefighters to cut open the box and leaving numerous ballots damaged.
Election officials routinely tell voters that mail-in voting and drop boxes are safe and secure. Yet voters are now watching another incident unfold in America’s largest county, where ballots were reportedly burned inside an official drop box shortly before a statewide election.
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Ballot boxes are 100% a vector for election fraud. They are only there for election fraud.
They should be outlawed everywhere in this country… And mail in ballots should only be for valid reasons such as infirmary, military service, or travel. And that’s it.
Oh, wait… I forgot there is legislation on the table to fix these things as I recall…
Pity.
Not to worry. Those burned ballots can easily be “cured.”
nothing to worry about, with at least 1 drop box at every cemetary in the county, there is plenty enough to go around.
Mail-in ballots are absolute proof of a corrupt and unreliable, if not outright fraudulent, electoral process.
In-person paper ballots only
Same day voting only
Nation holiday or Saturday voting
Voting day and tax day the same day
Commence flaming.
Was the burned drop box in a republican district?
STOP MAIL-IN VOTING!!!!
Absentee voting in the United States was heavily restricted and required voters to demonstrate a specific, approved reason for not being able to vote in personQualifying Reasons
Most states required voters to fall into one of a narrow set of approved categories, such as being physically absent from your home county or state on Election Day (typically for work or travel), illness or physical disability that prevented travel to the polls, religious observance that conflicted with polling hours, or serving in the military.
The Application Process
Voters had to submit a written application — often a sworn affidavit — to their county registrar or clerk before Election Day, sometimes weeks in advance. On this form, you would state your reason for needing an absentee ballot and often had to sign it under penalty of perjury. Some jurisdictions required a witness or notary to sign the form as well, and some required a doctor's note or other supporting documentation if illness was the claimed reason.
The Registrar's Role
The registrar actually reviewed and could approve or deny your application. If your reason didn't meet the statutory criteria, you could be turned away. There was real gatekeeping — it wasn't a rubber stamp.
The Ballot Itself
Once approved, you received the ballot by mail, completed it, and often had to return it in a signed, sealed envelope — sometimes requiring a witness signature on the outer envelope. The signature was checked against registration records.
The Shift Away from This System
Starting in the 1990s, states began loosening these requirements. Oregon moved to universal vote-by-mail in 1998. The "no-excuse absentee" model gradually spread, meaning anyone could request a mail ballot without justification. By the 2020s, the majority of states had adopted no-excuse absentee voting, and several moved to automatically mailing ballots to all registered voters.
The old reason-based or cause-based system reflected a general philosophy that in-person voting was the norm and the default, and that departing from it required justification — the inverse of how many states treat it today.
Participation implies legitimacy.
Oh yeah. And voter ID.
That is exactly way mail in ballots should be eliminated with very few exceptions.
They aren’t going to let a non communist become LA’s mayor. And if people have time die, so be it.
Drop boxes should only be at voting centers...no exceptions..and they must be time stamped when deposited.
It appears that a cheating win will happen by INSERTING ballots.
Keeping in mind that mail in ballots are a tried and true method of election fraud on behalf of socialists, then who burned them and who benefits from burning them?
Did Rats smell ballots coming in for Pratt? Or the other way around leading to Repubs with a match?
The democrats keep on cheating because they can. The GOP has chances to stop this and they never do.
Even in the last election, California RATs were counting long after the voting ended. They just keep on counting until they win. Because we won the top prize, we just let them keep on counting and installing their own without a peep days and days later.
I like your suggestions except for making voting day and tax day the same day.
So the Democrats have a new way to suppress the vote - by lighting up drop-boxes in certain locations. VERY CLEVER of them, but if they do this in a widespread manner, they may well lose ALL of their drop-boxes.
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