Back in 2016, the country had to deal with allegations of voter fraud. Everywhere you looked, people were convinced the Republicans had somehow altered the elections. When the 2020 primaries occurred, many were convinced it would happen again. Now, we have some of the first convictions of those feelings, and given the push for absentee ballots with little to no oversight on them, nobody should be very surprised.
A Minneapolis, MN man took advantage of the system to get the candidate he wanted through the primary. Muse Mohamud Mohamed was charged and convicted of two counts of making false statements to a grand jury. It took the jury of 10 women and two men just 40 minutes to convict him. His charges stem from the accusation of his lying to a grand jury last fall when asked about obtaining three absentee ballots for the primary. Mohamed claimed he had received them on behalf of three voters who, then, filled them out before he returned them to the election office.
The problem was, he never took them to the voters named on the envelopes, nor did they give him ballots to turn in according to Federal prosecutors; allegations the defense vehemently denies. This whole scandal breaks down to being about MN’s decision to allow for what is called “agency delivery.” The purpose behind this service is to allow people who would like to vote but are unable to due to health concerns or disability.
Those wishing to use this service request do so after the usual absentee voter request deadline, and they designate an agent to act on their behalf. These agents need to be over 18, have a prior relationship with the candidate, and cannot be a candidate themselves. Agents are also allowed to provide this service to three people in total.
Per the prosecution’s filing, the city election documents showed that Mohamed dropped off three ballots as an agent for three voters during the August 11, 2020, elections. They go on to allege that Mohamed was not known to the victims, nor did they ask him to provide these services. One ballot was rejected as the voter had cast their ballot in person. As a result, Mohamed appeared twice to testify before the grand jury that was investigating the process behind the service.
As prosecutors wrote “Ultimately, Mohamed stated he received the three absentee ballots from the voters themselves. When confronted with the fact that the voters each gave statements that they do not know Mohamed and that they did not ask him or anyone for agent delivery of their ballots for the August 2020 election, Mohamed continued to stand by his answer that he received the ballots from the voter.”
While this election was not a part of the 2020 presidential nomination process, Mohamed was a volunteer for Omar Fateh, according to reporting by the Minnesota Reformer and the Sahan Journal, two independent news websites. Fateh is a democratic socialist, and in that primary, he defeated incumbent Democratic Sen. Jeff Hayden by roughly 2,000 votes. While the two votes that appear to have been counted from Mohamed would not have been enough to change the election, there is no telling how many more of these ballots crept in from other people.
As of now, Mohamed is the only one to be indicted for this kind of offense during the Minneapolis election. Considering that these proceedings are typically conducted in secret, there are no other details about the scope of the investigation or if other ballots were compromised. A crime like this should worry every American. The stories and allegations of these kinds of fraudulent activities are everywhere, and they always surround the Democrats doing the wrong things to win. Just like the stories with any other crime, we only hear about a few of the hundreds of other cases that are out there.
