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Recently we saw a letter to the editor encouraging us to recalibrate our thoughts on the last election.

Whether the election was stolen, or 100% flawless, one thing is certain, many citizens have lost confidence in the process. That is undeniable!

In our own county we had attempts to close outlying voting locations (Park County did in the Primary) to create centralized voting centers. As a result absentee voting morphed into mail-in voting, especially since voters can vote early in Wyoming.

Some counties, Park County included, counted ballots three days early per the unauthorized guidance of the Secretary of State. Theres a reason why early counting is prohibited bad players can use this information to sway an election.

Ballot boxes were unattended in some counties, Park County included, even though they were placed outside government buildings and polling places. There is no way to guarantee that those boxes and ballots werent tampered with.

There were improprieties nationwide illegal aliens being allowed to vote, ballot harvesting, boxes of unaccounted for ballots being discovered, disqualification of military absentee ballots. Each state had their own issues, and Wyoming likely had these things going on here.

At the end of this past legislative session our own legislature was unable to pass a cross-over voting bill. For 10 years Republicans have asked the legislature to clean up the laws that allow Democrats to participate in the Republican candidate selection by forcing the use of the primary ballot for the selection process. They again refused to address the issue even though many in Wyoming phone calls from a special interest group encouraging voters to register as Republicans before the 2018 primary, which lead to the election of the least conservative candidate for governor that year.

The Secretary of State has added to the voters concerns. He condoned a physical resident of Colorado to run for governor in Wyoming. This person registered for election using a Laramie business address. The Secretary allowed a Wyoming senatorial candidate to register using a room in his business as his residence to qualify for a run for office in that district.

Most recently he punted on ruling on the residency requirement in the matter of a Wyoming representative living outside of his legislative district. On the last matter, elected representatives undertook private conversations with the legislator in question and felt he was not violating the law. Of course, those conversations were also not held under the penalty of perjury. Adding insult to injury, the legislator in question was acting as co-chairman of the legislative redistricting committee. Legitimate? Please!!!

Lawfare, the use of frivolous or baseless lawsuits to bully and financially break an opponent has also found its way to Wyoming. In January 2022, 16 Wyomingites some of whom are/were prominent Republicans, one a former Speaker of the House and another a former representative from Park County, sued the state of Wyoming, the Republican Party and the Governor citing a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. and the equal protection provisions of the Wyoming Constitution. A process to fill a vacancy in an elected office is spelled out in statute and requires the Republican Party to submit names of three qualified candidates to the Governor. This time it was to fill the vacated seat of the superintendent of public instruction. This is a process thats been in place for 60 years, but they chose to file two days before the Governor needed to appoint a replacement.

Last, but not least, a director of a chamber of commerce complained to the secretary of states office about a second amendment organization allegedly lobbying for a candidate during the last election. It took a federal lawsuit to show the second amendment groups first amendment rights were violated by the Secretary of State and the Attorney General.

Organizations and individuals are involved in using these tactics and more to erode the electoral system and achieve their personal goals at the expense of the rights of the individual voter to participate in government by the people. There has to be strong voices opposing this or were headed to third-world status in voting and/or rights as citizens.

(Vincent Vanata is aState Committeemanfor thw Park County Republican Party)

See the original post:
Op Ed: Many reasons to be concerned about voting - Cody Enterprise