Nov. 2, 2021
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Special press release from MassGOP State Committeewomen Caroline Colarusso (Fifth Middlesex) and Kathy Lynch (First Middlesex)
WOBURN -- Nearly a year after the November 2020 election, Democratic Secretary of State Bill Galvin says he’s troubled over the future of mail-in voting.
Galvin urged lawmakers to act now to make what was supposed to be a temporary voting process into a permanent way of voting through no-excuse, universal mail-in voting.
"Galvin should be urging the legislature to follow the constitutional amendment process which requires votes in back-to-back legislative sessions followed by a vote of the people at the ballot box," said Republican State Committeewoman Caroline Colarusso. "If the Legislature can avoid the constitutional amendment process when it comes to voting, they can ignore it when it comes to any other freedom."
Within weeks of Galvin’s push to make mail-in voting permanent, Republican members of the Joint Committee on Election Laws sent ten substantive and basic questions to Galvin in a letter dated Dec. 9, 2020.
The letter requests that Galvin answer several questions regarding mail-in voting during the November 2020 general election, including:
- How many ballot applications were returned to sender from the USPS?
- What were the reasons for the returns?
- Did the individuals named on the ballot applications vote?
- Were signatures of voters matched by city and town clerks?
- Were chain-of-custody procedures followed?
Galvin has ignored the request.
Meanwhile, whistleblowers have indicated that there are over 500,000 returned-to-sender ballot applications locked up inside a state archives building in Boston.
Maintenance of accurate voter rolls is a responsibility that falls squarely on Galvin’s shoulders under the 1993 National Voter Registration Act.
"Republicans in the Legislature have been trying to find out since December what happened with the thousands of returned ballot applications the state collected last year and have been stonewalled at every turn," Massachusetts Republican Party Chairman Jim Lyons said.
"Is it too much, in the state of Massachusetts, to ask for the rule of law, to follow the constitution, and adhere to election integrity?" asked Republican State Committeewoman Kathy Lynch, the chairwoman of MassGOP’s Elections Review Committee.
