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Editor: The following saga of an absentee ballot—Let’s call her “Abby”—may concern you and may even convince you to serve in the role of election officer for the 2022 election.

Abby the absentee ballot was likely conceived on a computer screen and then born in the Loudoun County Office of Elections in Leesburg. We can assume that Abby’s birth was greeted gleefully by the office’s staff, who likely reacted as proud parents do by smoking cigars or vapes, by high-fiving each other, and by shouting “It’s a ballot.”

But alas, days after her birth, Abby, while presumably locked securely in some sort of folder or thumb drive, will be sent 3,000 miles across the country to another office, a foster home of sorts, near Seattle, WA, where she will be cloned many times by employees of a vendor named K&H Printing.

After some time in protective custody at the “foster home,” Abby and her clones will be mailed by K&H’s employees to those Loudoun County voters who adopt the absentee method of voting. While the exact number of Abby’s clones to be mailed is yet unknown, the Loudoun County Office of Elections, on June 2, announced: “We estimate mailing 30,000 to 40,000 ballots for the November 2022 election.”

You, as a Loudoun County voter, may be concerned about Abby’s safety and the safety of her 30,000 to 40,000 clones, especially if you have seen Dinesh D’Souza’s recently-released movie, “2000 Mules,” which details corruption surrounding absentee ballots in some states during the 2020 election. 

You may be concerned that Abby might be overly-cloned. You may be concerned that Abby and her clones might be kidnapped or disfigured by unscrupulous people somewhere along their chain of custody. You may also be concerned about the length and complexity of the chain of custody which extends from the Loudoun County Office of Elections in Leesburg, to the vendor on the West Coast, to Loudoun County’s absentee voters via mail, and finally back via mail or drop box to the Central Absentee Precinct in the Office of Elections in Leesburg, where Abby and her clones will eventually be screened for irregularities and then scanned into a high-speed scanner for counting.

While you may be concerned, you should know that the Loudoun County Office of Elections has assured voters that K&H Printing is “a highly qualified vendor that has a proven record for the integrity and accuracy of its work” and that “only one ballot will be printed for each voter.”

Despite receiving these assurances, you may still be concerned, but you can lessen your concern by serving in the role of election officer. By doing so, you personally will be able to keep a watchful eye on Abby and her 30,000 to 40,000 cloned ballots and thus help to ensure that Abby’s saga will culminate in a fair and honest 2022 election.

Mike Panchura Sterling SHARE ONWhatsAppFacebookTwitterLinkedInGoogle+Pin ItEmailBuffer Related

This is exactly why all items associated with elections… paper ballots whether blank, completed, or voided, USB thumb drives, vote counting machines, electronic voting machines, registers, rosters, whatever… must be placed under signatory chain of custody. There must be strict accounting of anything like this sent out and when one is sent out to a voter it should be required to have an embossed stamp similar to what a Notary Public would do, and that stamp should be kept secured in the County Board of Elections office, or if issued by the State Board of Elections, with a stamp under their control. Every ballot sent out must be logged. Ballots without them are automatically not counted.

Make it easy to vote if you like… but when you do that you must step up all security measures to protect the votes and the process to avoid “finding a misplaced box with ballots,” “finding a misplaced USB drive,” etc. Above all else, REQUIRE VOTER ID. Don’t you think it’s funny how in Georgia that new requirement for mail-in/absentee ballots (write the control number from a government-issued ID) hasn’t hindered the number of votes received?

OMG you cited the work of a convicted criminal as evidence of some bizarre fantasy you have about a problem that doesn’t exist.

Why is everything so fantastical with you?

Occam’s razor applies: Absentee ballots are perfectly secure.

Spare me the “2000 Mules” nonsense. Dear Lord, have a brain.

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By Janelle McDonald, The Arc of Loudoun Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is a well-developed, research-based, scientific discipline among the helping

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