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Posted on 08/23/2025 6:07:34 AM PDT by lightman
The Benedictine Sisters of Erie, falsely charged with election fraud ahead of the 2024 election, are the recipients of a prestigious national award for political courage.
The nuns are the 2025 winners of the Margaret Chase Smith American Democracy Award from the National Association of Secretaries of State.
Other recipients of the award include President Jimmy Carter, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and civil rights activist Rosa Parks.
“The good Sisters earned this award by courageously challenging political disinformation when they were targeted with false charges of voter fraud just before the 2024 election,” said Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt, who nominated the nuns.
“The Sisters thoughtfully confronted the baseless claims and used their time in the spotlight to warn the public that ‘a free republic depends … on a discerning and conscientious citizenry who do not unquestioningly accept the word of anyone who has a social media platform."
The nuns rocketed onto the national scene in October when a social media influencer posted that someone had gone to the monastery in Erie where 53 nuns are registered to vote and reported “NO ONE lives there.”
The post went viral with 2.5 million views and the nuns found themselves fielding media calls from around the world.
The Benedictine Sisters of Erie, who have been in that city since 1856, had to issue a press release to clear up the misinformation.
“We do live at Mount Saint Benedict Monastery and … [we] want to alert those who subscribe to X and other social media platforms to be vigilant and seek additional information before accepting these posts as truth,” said Sister Stephanie Schmidt (no relation to Secretary Schmidt) in the release.
Sister Schmidt told CNN at the time: “These sisters don’t deserve to be put down by some misinformation that we’re a sham, that we’re a fraud.” She added that while Sisters are encouraged to vote, the Benedictine Sisters are nonpartisan and don’t endorse any party or candidate.
The Margaret Chase Smith American Democracy Award was established in 1992 to recognize acts of political courage, uncommon character, and selfless action in the realm of public service.
The award’s namesake, Margaret Chase Smith, was the first woman elected to both houses of Congress. As a senator from Maine in 1950, she risked her political career when she delivered her “Declaration of Conscience” speech in oppositon to Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s anti-Communist crusade.
Sister Linda Romey said she and her fellow nuns have committed their lives through God to be a “presence for good” in their community the world.
“It feels a little awkward to be recognized for doing what is fundamental to who we are, following Gospel teaching, raising our voice against injustice, and standing for truth,” she said. “We’re especially humbled when we look at those who have previously received this award. They remind us that we must all continually recommit ourselves to the values that guide our lives.”
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Do democrat propaganda awards really count to anyone other than democrats?
No, but this story illustrates the fact that if false accusation weren’t a major problem it wouldn’t be listed in the 10 Commandments.
Margaret Chase Smith, a Republican…
I can tell you the Deep State existed back then. And Republicans were in on it too even then.
Here's the receipt from Jeremy (one of our leaders in Erie) 5:37 PM · Oct 22, 2024
The story is likely more complex than the press.....
Yes, it is a Leftist Propaganda award.
When I saw they were falsely charged, I thought “Wow! Did some legal system, somewhere, somehow charge them???? They must have had good reason.”
Then I saw they weren’t actually “charged”. Some rando labled as “an influencer” (whatever that is, probably had 800 “followers”, whatever those are) said the convent was empty.
So, they all got this award for political courage for saying “We live here.”?
Well, just look at who founded it and who the recipients have been and who it is named after.
I guess this is just part of the new Amerika. Get an award for going to work and doing what you’ve been hired to do. Cool!
Are they pro-life nuns?
MSN’s caption for the same article:
“Nuns Hit Back After ‘Disgusting’ GOP Voter Fraud Accusation”
Yes. It is part of an effort (in the form of giving and idiotic “prize” of an award) to discourage any attempts to look into what is possibly the single most corrupt election system in one of the most corrupt states in the entire country in a key battleground state.
Those people on the Left aren’t going to just roll over and easily give up their election fraud, and this is simply part of that.
“The nightmare follows Maloney alleging Tuesday that one of his door knockers had visited the nuns’ monastery to check on the status of an unreturned mail-in ballot that was registered to a Republican. While there, someone on the property told him that no one lives there, despite 53 voters — the vast majority listed as “liberal” — being registered as residing at the address.”
Yes, Smith was a Susan Collins or Jim Jeffords or John Lindsey kind of a Republican. They were and are all RINO’s. Occasionally, she would vote with conservatives.
Fraud is fraud—left, right, and center. Nobody needs to publicize anything except to the good where no fraud exists.
I hadn’t heard of this before. Sounds like much ado about not too much
Apparently not...never heard of this case.
Exactly.
It is propaganda, the brave nuns, standing up to...some internet poster, somewhere.
As if that doesn’t happen millions of times a day across the Internet.
They made it sound like the nuns were were “charged” for election fraud by some right wing DA and were going to be tied together like the captured Mayan indigenous peoples to bamboo poles (as was done in the movie “Apocalypto”) and marched in their mud infested habits through insect and snake infested jungles in their death march to a J6 type of jail somewhere, probably in El Salvador.
Talk about an overheated, breathless “news” item.
McCarthy was right.
Yes he was. Margaret Chase Smith...
Spit.
Leftists give one another Orwellian awards to symbolize virtue, but they really symbolize corruption.
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