Fake voter registrations caught

A West St. Paul couple is expected to plead guilty in federal court to charges of voter registration fraud. That thing that never happens in Minnesota happened again.

Ronnie Williams (a/k/a “Michael Gibson”) and Lorraine Combs engaged in a paid effort to register nonexistent voters in 2021 and 2022. The two were paid by an unnamed foundation to collect the registrations, which the foundation submitted to unnamed county elections offices.

Charges were filed on Tuesday. The court filings include few details about the operation of the scheme.

Combs is scheduled to enter her guilty plea on June 24 at the Federal Courthouse in downtown St. Paul. The hearing for Williams has been postponed to a later date.

There are many foundations operating in Minnesota that are politically active across the political spectrum. It’s implied that the unnamed foundation (“Foundation 1” in court filings) is the victim here, having paid for voter registrations that were not bona fide. But without knowing the identity of the foundation, we don’t know what they intended to purchase.

The Minnesota Star Tribune has reported on the story, with an interview of Ms. Combs. The piece raises more questions than it answers. Neither the Star Tribune nor Combs names the foundation. The Star Tribune quotes the MN Secretary of State’s (SOS) office:

“There were no ballots cast in connection with this,” said Cassondra Knudson, a spokeswoman for the Minnesota Secretary of State’s Office, which oversees elections in the state.

The SOS has absolutely no way of knowing for certain, because the scope of “this” is completely unknown. Combs admits to the Star Tribune of fabricating 500 registrations. It is unknown how many were fabricated by William. And we have no way of knowing how many others were paid by the unnamed foundation to engage in the same conduct.

The Star Tribune goes on to list several state elections over the years that were decided by narrow margins. Curiously absent from their list is that Shakopee-area state representative race last year decided by only a handful of votes. The outcome, in turn, decided control of the state House of Representatives for the next two years. The margin of victory was less than the number of ballots the local county admits to destroying, uncounted.

I have many questions; here are three:

• Why is it legal to pay private individuals to collect voter registrations?
• Why can private parties submit voter registration forms on behalf of third parties?
• I thought that everyone was automatically registered to vote through the DMV?

Move along, nothing to see here.