Iowa Judges Declare Democrat County Auditors Broke Election Laws

TRUNEWS with RICK WILES Judges in two Iowa counties decided late last week that tens of thousands of absentee ballot request forms were invalidated because county elections officials filled them out before mass-mailing them out to all registered voters. The Trump 2020 campaign had sued the auditors over the move, and judges in Linn and Woodbury counties agreed it was illegal. Not only can the pre-filled forms not be used, every voter who received one must be notified their absentee ballots have been nullified. State law allows county auditors to mass-mail the absentee request form. It’s also published on county websites and even in the back of phone books published in the state. But the forms must not have any markings on them before handled by the voter requesting an absentee ballot. The decisions affected up to 50,000 ballot request forms in Linn County – home to the state’s second-largest city, Cedar Rapids – and about 57,000 forms in Woodbury County, home to the state’s fourth-largest city, Sioux City. A similar lawsuit in Johnson County – the state’s most liberal county and home to the state’s fifth-largest city, Iowa City, and the University of Iowa – has not yet been decided. The three counties account for 296,000 of the state’s roughly 2 million active registered voters. President Donald Trump won the state in 2016 by nearly 150,000 votes, but in 2018, two of the state’s three GOP-held congressional seats were won by Democrats, who edged out Republicans by more than 50,000 votes. (Photo Credit: Iowa Secretary of State’s Office) www.trunews.com