Ignorance of the Law isn't the same as Fraud

[DISCLAIMER: I am not affiliated with any political party or organization. I am an American.]

[DISCLAIMER: This blog post is not alleging that any fraud in the 2020 U.S. election has occurred.]

Hypothetically, imagine for a moment that you are the Secretary of State conducting an election. In trying to make things more flexible for the voters, you tell them to vote here or there between these hours on these days. Maybe you add additional collection boxes or extend the hours of collection. In doing so, you inadvertently change something that can only be changed by statute passed by the legislature.

After the election, when it's pointed out that you accidentally told a million people to technically vote in an illegal fashion, how would you tell your voters? Just say: "Oops. Sorry. Your votes don't count. They weren't legally cast. My bad. I take full responsibility!" and get on with your life?

Herein lies the rub. If you don't count the ballots, millions of people will be disenfranchised through no fault of their own. If you do count the ballots, however, you are now doing so in violation of the law. Note that this is not an example of "election fraud" but an example of "counting illegal ballots."

How can this happen? If the law says "Must be postmarked by MM/DD/YYYY," then any mail-in ballots postmarked later than that date are illegal. If it says "Must be received by MM/DD/YYYY," then any late ballots, regardless of how slow the mail might have been, cannot be counted. Every state does it their own way. Whatever you do to vote where you live is not necessarily the same as someone living one county over. Not to mention several states away. In some states, the changes made by the Secretary of State are okay, but in others the changes are not okay.

Conducting the election all over again would be the right thing to do, but that's impractical. Getting the rules straight before the next election, whatever city, county, or state you inhabit, should be a priority for everyone. We all want every vote to be counted, but shouldn't we want to make sure that every vote is legally cast?

You can win by cheating, but true champions follow the rules.

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