Free Republic

Perhaps the most notable observation from the latest Bank of America Fund Manager Survey is the finding that 74% of respondents believe that a contested election is the biggest reason for volatility in 4Q, and that 61% of Wall Street professionals believe the election will be contested. Consistent with this, 44% of respondents in a parallel survey targeting FX and Rates investors found that 44% of respondents expected uncertainty to linger for up to a month if not longer—still a considerable share. Yet even as the market is setting up for the possibility of greater volatility, it now appears...

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a Republican application to stay the decision of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to grant the Democratic Party’s request to make several changes to mail-in voting that critics have decried as vulnerable to fraud. As Breitbart News reported last month, “The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled … that ballots received three days after Election Day will still be counted — even if there is no evidence they were postmarked on time.” Republicans sought a stay. The Supreme Court, however, split 4-4 on the request, leaving the decision of the lower court in place. Chief Justice John Roberts...

Former Gov. John Kasich (R-OH) said Thursday night on ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” that President Donald Trump’s concerns about large scale mail-in voting were “just a big joke.” Kasich said, “When these results are in, we will have as many, you know, maybe as much as 20% of the public saying that the election was not legitimate. If you have a situation like that and people don’t legitimize the election, that is a very dangerous road we go down.

The contractor in Jefferson City, Kentucky, discovered 112 absentee ballots in a dumpster, triggering a federal investigation. The ballots never arrived at their intended recipients. “When the investigation is concluded, the case will be presented for federal prosecution to the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” Special Agent Scott Balfour said in a statement. Balfour said that the ballots had been handed over to the Postal Service so that they could be distributed.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that absentee ballots in the presidential battleground state of North Carolina must have a witness signature, a boost for Republican groups seeking to enforce stricter rules on mail-in voting. U.S. District Judge William Osteen in Greensboro issued an injunction essentially barring voters from being able to “fix” an absentee ballot they had already sent in if it lacked a third-party signature attesting that the voter, and not somebody else, signed the ballot. The judge was reversing a previous directive by state officials that had allowed voters to remedy the lack...

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that absentee ballots in the presidential battleground state of North Carolina must have a witness signature, a boost for Republican groups seeking to enforce stricter rules on mail-in voting. U.S. District Judge William Osteen in Greensboro issued an injunction essentially barring voters from being able to “fix” an absentee ballot they had already sent in if it lacked a third-party signature attesting that the voter, and not somebody else, signed the ballot. The judge was reversing a previous directive by state officials that had allowed voters to remedy the lack...

Neighbors says the special agents confiscated eight large garbage bags of suspected undelivered mail. BALDWIN, Pa. — Special agents from the United States Postal Service raided the home of an Allegheny County mail carrier over the weekend. At a time when public confidence in mail delivery is low, a mail carrier is suspected of putting out his deliveries with the morning trash. Special agents from the United States Postal Service raided the carrier’s home in Baldwin on Sunday night, confiscating eight large garbage bags of suspected undelivered mail, according to neighbors. From inside his house on Meadowcrest Road, mail carrier...

Mail-in ballots STOLEN from residential mailboxes in Escondido, CA (SanDiego) https://twitter.com/DrJanesDC/status/1315268431508373505  

Actor Wayne Knight, who played the malicious mailman Newman on "Seinfeld," is starring in a new ad by a Democratic super PAC slamming what he calls President Trump's "systematic, premeditated assault on the U.S. mail" in the wake of highly controversial recent changes to the U.S. Postal Service. "They had the unmitigated gall to try to slow down the mail," alleges Knight, appearing to speak as Newman. "When everyone knows the only person who can slow down the mail is a mailman." Knight, 65, then chomps down on a turkey drumstick while charging the Trump administration is intentionally attempting to...

More than a week ago, I received in the mail an absentee ballot I assumed would allow me to vote remotely in the Nov. 3 presidential contest amid the COVID-19 pandemic. SNIP Apparently, in a fit of dazzling incompetence, the New York City Board of Elections neglected to have a dash or a slash inserted between the words “absentee” and “military,” which would have indicated that the document would work for everyone. An unknown number of the flawed voting materials were shipped to adults in Brooklyn, where I live, and Queens. SNIP On Thursday, a surprise second large envelope arrived...

Ann Mintz and Clifford Wagner have been struggling with indecision about the election for weeks. Their angst isn’t over whom to vote for — the Philadelphia couple are Democrats who support Joe Biden. It’s about how, precisely, they should cast their ballots. They voted by mail without hesitation in the state’s June primary. But now there are new stresses. Will a slowdown at the U.S. Postal Service make ballots arrive too late? Will technical mishaps filling out ballots lead to the vote not getting counted? Or, in one even more complicated but possible scenario, would their mail votes be tallied...

In just one month, Americans will head to the polls — or, in many cases, to their mailboxes — to cast their vote for local, state and federal officials, in what is likely to be remembered as one of the country’s most consequential elections. Control of Congress and the White House is at stake, and it is almost certain the future of the country will be radically altered by the decision made by voters in November.In the wake of a global pandemic, the economic fallout from government-imposed shutdowns and widespread civil unrest, the absolute last thing America needs is confusion...

Huge trove of Pennsylvania mail-in ballot applications sent by the Trump campaign to individual voters, found destroyed in USPS trailers… Posted by Kane on October 7, 2020 6:13 pm VIDEO: Mail-ballot applications sent to voters in Pennsylvania by Trump campaign, found discarded in Seymour, Indiana pic.twitter.com/S3ynPXRMfY — SV News 🚨 (@SVNewsAlerts) October 7, 2020 Huge trove of Pennsylvania mail-in ballot applications sent by the Trump campaign to individual voters, found destroyed in USPS trailers in Seymour, Indiana.

Stat of the day: In North Carolina, men are outpacing women in vote-by-mail (VBM) return rate 34.1% to 31.6%! In Georgia, the male VBM return rate is 20.5% to 19.3% for women. What makes Georgia's numbers surprising is that a woman, Senator Loeffler, is on the ballot, as well as a well-funded black senate candidate (which will cause increased voting among black females). And who do you think benefits from strong turnout by men? And how about all of those college kids and other young voters who took to the streets in the BLM movement? Surely these young idealists are...

Tractor-trailer loads of undelivered letters and parcels were rerouted from the Lehigh Valley’s central post office to a facility in Scranton, postal workers concerned about ongoing efforts to delay the mail told U.S. Sen. Bob Casey. Casey in a statement Tuesday called on Postmaster General Louis DeJoy for answers after he pledged in August to reverse policy changes that caused mail to go undelivered. Casey cited photos provided by postal workers showing dozens of containers loaded with priority mail dating back to at least Sept. 17 that were rerouted from the Lehigh Valley to Scranton.

Murray Sabrin emails: I received my mail-in ballot and above is the information a voter must fill in, which includes certifying the statement "that I am the person who applied for the enclosed ballot". I did not request the mail-in ballot.

I preface this post by cautioning that it is still too early to draw firm conclusions from mail-in requests, but North Carolina numbers at this time look promising. Superficially, the Democrats appear to have the upper-hand: 150K Dem/ 47K Rep/ 82K Una mail- in ballots returned. Democrats have also been turning their ballots in at higher rate than Republicans. The good news is that the Democrats appear to be overwhelmingly cannibalizing their election day vote, which is occurring because Democrat PACS/DNC have been pounding their voters to vote by mail b/c of the China Virus. Meanwhile, Republicans may be holding...

SEDALIA, Mo. (KMIZ) The Pettis County Clerk announced Wednesday morning about 1,200 absentee ballots were lost in the mail recently. A post on the Pettis County Elections Office Facebook page said more ballots were sent out and voters should receive a new ballot on Wednesday. Pettis County Clerk Nick La Strada said his office delivered the ballots to the post office on Sept. 21. Absentee voting started in Missouri last week. County clerks in Cole and Boone counties have already received many ballots. Some ballots were submitted on Thursday and Friday, however, La Strada said his workers received calls over...

A pair of former Republican Michigan secretaries of state on Tuesday sued to stop the state’s plan to count late-arriving ballots. The Detroit News reports: The suit in the Western District of Michigan is the latest escalation in a legal fracas focused on a state that President Donald Trump won by 10,704 votes in 2016. The suit argues that Michigan’s current policy risks placing “the resolution of the contest past dates Congress has set for” the so-called safe-harbor deadline for settling disputes of Dec. 8 and the Dec. 14 Electoral College vote. Ruth Johnson and Terri Lynn Land — two...

Two affidavits were filed in the Texas Supreme Court against Texas Sen. Boris Miles and Harris County Commissioner Rodney Ellis, allegedly for illegal mail-ballot harvesting. Biden’s campaign official Dallas Jones is reportedly helping with the massive scheme. Following this issue, the Harris County Republican Party, chaired by Dr. Stephen Hotze and Sharon Hemphill, requested the state’s highest court earlier this week, as reported by Texas Scorecard, to halt the state’s earlier plans to send mail-in ballot applications to 2.37 million voters registered in the country, while the investigation is ongoing. Texas Scorecard reports: “We are thankful that the Texas Supreme...