August 06, 2021 09:32 AM UTC

Reminder: It's Always Republicans Who Commit Election Fraud

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Grand Junction Sentinel’s Charles Ashby reports–former Colorado Republican Party chairman Steve Curtis, convicted of election fraud and felony forgery after voting his estranged wife’s mail ballot in 2016, has lost the appeal of his conviction:

In a voter fraud case involving a former Colorado Republican Party chairman and conservative radio host, a three-judge panel set precedent in ruling that prosecutors were not wrong to charge Steven Curtis with violating laws outside of the state’s mail ballot statute for voting twice in the same election.

In Curtis’ appeal, filed by the Colorado State Public Defender’s Office, he tried to argue that when the Colorado Legislature created the mail ballot offense statute, it intended to limit what else prosecutors could charge in such vote fraud cases.

A three-judge panel of the court unanimously ruled that the mail ballot law does not supplant the state’s general forgery statute, nor is his felony conviction for forgery an extension of the misdemeanor ballot conviction, and therefore not a felony as Curtis’ attorneys tried to argue.

Take a moment to appreciate the irony here: not only was a former Republican Party chairman convicted of election fraud, thus proving again that Colorado’s much-maligned mail ballot system actually does work to catch illegal activity, but Steve Curtis’ appeal amounted to an attempt to significantly weaken the penalties for election fraud by arguing the felony forgery charge shouldn’t have been added to the misdemeanor voter fraud charge.

All told, it’s tough to see how Steve Curtis’ example could make MAGA Republicans baselessly crying vote fraud today look worse. Instead of wacky Donald Trump dead-ender conspiracy theories and frivolous court cases insisting a massive fraud was committed without any actual evidence, here’s a case of bonafide election fraud–signed, sealed, and delivered. There’s just one small problem.

Once again–and at least in Colorado, it’s always the case–the fraud is coming from inside the house.