Some state Republicans want some changes to tighten election laws.
NBC Connecticut's Mike Heidek spoke with Sen. Rob Sampson (R-Wolcott).
Mike Heidek: You are, of course, a member of the Executive Management and Elections Commission. So this is something that is within your authority. Let's start with early voting. I would also like to request an absentee ballot. First, early voting for the primary election, which is a rehearsal for November, will be held for four days. What did you think of the results?
rob sampson: Mike, we've heard some feedback from people all over the state. And I think the answer I heard most often was that it was very time consuming and ended up taking up minutes of your day. And what I'm concerned about is that when voter turnout is much higher, like in the primaries and of course the general election, we might end up with a situation where there are long lines. . There are several other unknowns that need to be resolved. So certainly funding for some large municipalities. So Democrats created an early voting scenario by saying they needed to increase people's access. This would be great except for the fact that these towns didn't actually do anything to provide access because they didn't provide funding to allow them to set up multiple polling places. . In a large city like Bridgeport, I think there are usually 25 or 30 polling places. Well, there's one polling place for early voting, and that might change with money, but right now there's no polling place.
Mike Heidek: And the Secretary of State has been asking for money from the beginning. So I think it needs to meter itself out. Now, let's take a look at the general election scheduled for November. Under the same circumstances, you have 14 days to vote early. Do you have your opinion on that? The general election is a much bigger election. This is the year of the president, so polls will be a little more taxing. What's your vibe on how it's going to go?
rob sampson: right. I've never necessarily been against early voting. I think 14 days is a long time for him, especially in the first round. I think initially the Secretary of State also wanted to limit it to seven days. You know, as Republicans, we've proposed within three days, probably within five days, so that we can at least start building the capacity to do this efficiently and effectively. So we don't know yet how it will work. I would like to see the funds sent to the town. Because we don't want to continue to overwhelm the very hard-working people who run our elections. Because I don't want to prevent people from doing their work anymore. anything.
Mike Heidek: right. And we know that they sometimes face threats. Some of them are all retirees and may have fears or other reasons why it's difficult to hire poll workers in the first place. Therefore, we should try to keep their jobs easy.
rob sampson: I mean, beyond that, I mean, they're exhausted. I spoke with one of the registered voters who just participated in this presidential primary. She said it was tiring for four days with one day of rest in between.
Mike Heidek: And when it comes to the presidential election, it's going to be an even bigger uptick. Here's a look at what happened after the absentee voting debacle in Bridgeport. There, you know, they had to have two primaries for him and two general elections for him just to decide the mayor of the city. The security and trust in our elections was thrust not just into public debate, but into our laps as legislators. Your committee is calling for stricter election laws, including the abolition of postal boxes. Please discuss it. What is the motivation behind it?
rob sampson: Yeah, you know, the Bridgeport debacle that you call was a big eye-opener for a lot of people in the state. But this is something I've been warning about for years, so it's no surprise to me. In fact, I've debated and voted on these types of policies for years on the Board of Elections and in the Senate, and they always point to our absentee voting system as the problem. Connecticut. As you know, I think that our country's electoral system is generally quite strict. We keep paper ballots and use machines that are not connected to the internet. All the things that many of us have been concerned about in 2020, and more. But there are issues with absentee voting, mail-in voting, and voting. And this used to belong to only a few people – her 1% of the population. These are people who couldn't legally vote for whatever reason. We've expanded this to virtually everyone, so no-excuse absentee ballots will no longer be included on the ballot. When that happens, huge numbers of people will vote that way, and our system isn't ready for that yet.
Mike Heidek: One of the concerns about Bridgeport, at least, is that party operatives could distribute large numbers of absentee ballot applications. Should we change who can distribute them? Who can collect them? Do you think that's what we're talking about now? Or do you want to see that change?
rob sampson: Yes, that is one of the main changes I would like to see. And we witnessed some of it. You know, I think ballot collection has always been an issue.
Mike Heidek:That was before Dropbox. Ballot collection has long been an issue.
rob sampson: Well, dropbox is just one mechanism for returning your ballot after voting is over. And I don't think it's that important to be honest. I mean, Democrats are talking about cameras, they're putting cameras in ballot boxes, and look, that's fine. I don't object to that. I don't think it will solve anything. What is needed is to strengthen the mail service during the voting system period. ID required. We need to clean up our voter rolls. It is also necessary to eliminate unsolicited mailing of these applications. I think that's the big problem. There is currently a campaign going on and there may be local governments as well. I think the city of Hartford is actually talking about spending millions of taxpayer dollars on mailing out these ballot applications and ballots. I don't think that's necessary. We want to keep the same rules but allow individuals to ask questions. That way, only the right people are actually involved in the process. No one is subject to voting restrictions or anything like that. They still have access, but they save money and largely avoid the possibility of fraud.
