In a statement to the Editorial Board on Thursday about expanding mail-in voting here, Senate leader Phil Berger said he was concerned not only about voter fraud, but that he didn’t trust Gov. Roy Cooper and his state Board of Elections wouldn’t rig the election.
“There is zero trust that this process would be fair and transparent,” he said….
That looming tension prompted our initial questions Thursday of Berger. What, we wondered, did he think about funding the infrastructure to accommodate a mail-in surge or, as some states are doing, getting ballots out proactively to N.C. voters?
His 436-word answer acknowledged that state leaders “need to look at consensus actions that will prepare our state for the possibility of voting during a pandemic.” It also cautioned against rolling back mail-in ballot rules lawmakers passed in the wake of the 2018 NC-09 U.S. House election, which was tainted by widespread absentee ballot fraud in Bladen and Robeson counties. Then it turned its attention to the governor, whom Berger said has fought fiercely to achieve full partisan control over the state Board of Elections.
“All of this raises natural and legitimate suspicions about the motives of the Governor and the Board he controls,” Berger wrote. “Those same suspicions raise alarm bells at the prospect of a partisan Board of Elections controlling a process in which they ostensibly send ballots to every voter. There is zero trust that this process would be fair and transparent.”
Was Berger preemptively accusing the governor of rigging the election? No, said Berger spokesman Pat Ryan. The senator doesn’t expect Cooper to rig the election, Ryan said, but Berger doesn’t trust that the governor and his board of elections would conduct it fairly. That’s a distinction, maybe, but not much of one.