A Solution in Search of a Problem
Written by Nick Caraway –
JJ ran her post last week on the legislative agenda for the new year and the HUGE issue that is voter fraud. I decided to do some data diving and decided to look up fraud cases in Texas the last ten years. I will include the two she referenced for 2020 and give you the other year tallies according to the Heritage Foundation.
2019– 1
2018– 8
2017– 6
2016– 2
2015– 9
2014–4
2013– 8
2012– 8
2011– 4
2010– 11
I could do the research, but let’s ballpark this. In presidential elections, between seven million and ten million Texans will cast ballots. So, in 2012, 2016, and 2020 we could put in a reasonable guess of 25 million total ballots. Let’s say that the off-year elections are at around 15 million between 2010, 2014, and 2018. That’s 40 million combined ballots and that doesn’t include the odd years when you have mayor elections, city council elections, and school board elections. Maybe that’s a total of 5 million votes cast. So, we will estimate a total of 45 million votes cast between 2010 and 2020. I might even be lowballing it there.
So, if we add the total cases of documented fraud we get a grand total of 63 cases since 2010. Using the trusty calculator on my phone, that ends up being .00014 percent of the ballots cast in the last ten years. Remember, I’m lowballing the number of ballots cast in that time.
Okay, the counterargument to that is that we didn’t catch everyone. Fine. Let’s assume we only caught ten percent of those that fraudulently voted. That means that fraud impacted .0014 percent of the vote. So, after all that we are going to prioritize making our elections safe and secure? Okay, gotcha.