Zac Eckstein: Setting the record straight on mail-in voting in Washington state

When it comes to election integrity, facts matter more than feelings. Trump and the GOP have spent an inordinate amount of time trying to convince us that mail-in voting is fraudulent or that somehow illegal votes by undocumented immigrants are swaying elections. These charges are both inaccurate and nonsensical, and have more to do with a desire for power than with ensuring you have a voice at the ballot box.

The well-documented truth is: noncitizens can’t vote — end of story. Not only can they not vote, but bipartisan research has shown time and again that instances of noncitizens even attempting to vote are vanishingly rare.

The conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation keeps a comprehensive database of proven voter fraud cases nationwide. They found just 23 instances of noncitizens voting between 2003 and 2022, which is less than two cases per year across the entire United States.

For immigrants, the path to voting eligibility is long and difficult. By federal law, a noncitizen must live in the United States for at least five years (or three years if married to a U.S. citizen) as a legal permanent Green Card holder before they can even apply for citizenship and become eligible to vote.

Moreover, unauthorized immigrants have every incentive to avoid contact with government authorities. It makes little sense to risk one’s livelihood to cast a single vote among hundreds of millions.

The logic of this fearmongering also falls apart considering Trump won both the electoral college and the popular vote in 2024. He repeatedly warned last year that the election would be rigged, in no small part due to undocumented immigrants voting. But after his victory, the election was suddenly an "unprecedented and powerful mandate" instead of the fraud-ridden mess he’d predicted.

So, “fraud” when he loses, “mandate” when he wins. Got it.

Here in Washington, we employ multiple layers of security that make fraud both difficult and dangerous for would-be violators. Washington's Republican Secretary of State Kim Wyman, who oversaw elections from 2013 to 2021, consistently defended our state's mail-in system.

After extensive analysis of the 2018 election, Wyman found that out of 3.2 million ballots cast, there were just 142 cases of possible voter fraud, a rate of 0.004%. These were cases where someone voted for a deceased spouse or attempted to vote twice. Most importantly, these attempts were caught by the security measures built into our system.

Hefty criminal penalties (a class C felony) and prison time are enforced in Washington and watchdogs from both political parties monitor the ballot counting process, filing challenges for ballots that are suspicious or potentially illegal.

As for the dubious claim that Democrats have been winning every state race since mail-in voting began: the last Republican governor of Washington was John Spellman, who lost to Democrat Booth Gardner in 1984, nearly two decades before widespread mail-in voting began. Since 1988, Washington has voted Democratic in every presidential election.

Here in Lewis County, we’ve elected Republicans to nearly every county or state office for many cycles, by significant margins—using mail-in ballots.

The fact is, the GOP supported expanding mail-in voting, and Trump even encouraged it during the 2024 election. As recently as a few months ago Republicans poured tens of millions of dollars into bolstering and promoting mail-in programs in their states. In fact, just before the election, our state Sen. John Braun encouraged us to vote-by-mail in this very paper.

Today, facing a 40% approval rating, Trump and his allies are resorting to the old playbook: claim voter fraud and attempt to make voting harder for eligible Americans so they won't have to win elections on merit.

We’ve conducted secure, accessible elections for decades in Washington. Our system has been tested, audited, and proven effective. We should be proud that we’ve led the nation in making voting both secure and convenient, and in fact, 71% of voters support and trust our system.

Politicians who stoke unfounded fears about voter fraud are setting the stage to blame anybody but themselves when they lose elections. Don’t buy into the rhetoric and risk silencing your own voice in the process.

•••

Zac Eckstein is chair of the Lewis County Democratic Party. Learn more about the party at https://lewiscountydemocrats.org.