Absentee ballot fraud: thanks to our readers and commenters ... by gimleteye

G.O.D. began writing about absentee ballot fraud in Miami-Dade in the fall 2010. On Dec. 31. 2010, "Absentee ballot fraud is the issue I see that is most troubling and the issue I want to put effort into in the New Year. That is my resolution."

Since that time, Eye On Miami published more than 130 posts on absentee ballot fraud. This topic generated more reader interest than any other we have published. What I would like to highlight in this post are some selection of the hundreds of comments we received from readers. Some are clearly insiders who work local elections and are disgusted with the rampant abuse of democracy. Some are insiders who analyze voter data and know how to count in specific races. Using the search feature of our blog, I went back and re-read most of the posts and comments.

I particularly value comments, anonymous as they may be, of people who have experiencing working the inside of absentee ballot fraud. These comments provide insight for journalists covering the issue and law enforcement investigators. (I would also like to give a shout-out to my co-blogger, G.O.D., and the fact that we are not always recognized by The Miami Herald for doing work as volunteers that the city's only daily newspaper ought to have done.)

But this post is about our readers. Using cut and paste, I copied some of the comments over the two years (nearly) we have covered absentee ballot fraud, but mainly G.O.D. who demonstrated the courage in diving into the elections department to view first-hand how little integrity there is to the vote count for absentee ballots. Click 'read more' to view the comment selection:


The Republicans are masters at the ground work. Foot Soldiers (they call them) and "helping" elderly fill out their absentee ballots. After these "assistants" leave nursing homes, Adult Day Cares, Assistance Living Facilities and homes of elderly, some don't close envelopes properly which gives them time to make "adjustments" to absentee ballots. These "adjustments" will be based on calls they place to candidates asking them for a certain amount of $$ in exchange for votes. They will then mail those ballots to the Supervisor of Elections and noone will ever know this happened. Ah, yes Democracy at its best.


As a former Republican Candidate, The reason they win absentee is because they hire a few women that dedicate themselves to gathering the absentee ballots from certain sections of the county. This includes the senior citizen centers. If you pay one of these ladies $5,000 to $10,000 they will get you 2500,5000,10000,or more AB's. This is how its done here in town. This is something that I've never had enough money to do.


It is the very costly, sophisticated absentee mail effort (combined with a phone campaign to "chase" these absentee voter applicants to ensure they return their completed ballots) that is largely responsible for the disparity between the GOP and the Dems.


The Republicans have a well-oiled machine of absentee ballot brokers and managers of senior activity centers and senior public housing. These brokers get paid to work the absentees. The way it works is you pay anywhere from $1000-$2000 per month to these folks and they ensure you a number of ballots. It's not just one or two little old ladies doing the work, they have a method, and they can do it because they have multiple candidates per election. They send out paid workers to the senior homes to wait for the ballots when they're delivered by the post office. Some of the crooked senior activity center and housing managers ensure that only their candidates get in to see the seniors, and even threaten the seniors to give them the ballot unmarked with the envelope signed only on the left of the flap - so the signature does not go over the seal and they can get them open and then can "broker" the votes. The seniors know better than to question these people because they will be thrown out of the senior public - yes PUBLIC, paid by all of us taxpayers - housing or out of the activity center. Then, the even more crooked ones, re-sell the unmarked signed absentee ballots to the highest bidder, making money off of the candidates who paid them the monthly fee and off the opponent who buys them at a premium, sometimes up to $100 per ballot.

The authorities can verify this by opening an investigation and looking at the ballot envelopes, and they will see a statistically disproportionate number of ballot envelopes signed left of the flap.

This is why Republicans always win with absentee ballots.


The military vote is insignificant. In several state house races there were only 100-200 military absentee ballots.

The Joe Garcia campaign had a very strong absentee ballot campaign with several mailings, door to door and phone bank follow up, but you can't compete with the Republican absentee ballot machine, not until its dismantled and we send the lot of them to jail.

The other factors are gerrymandering that happened after the 2000 census, resulting in higher Republican percentages in the districts and packing high turnout Cuban American Republican seniors into these districts. Also Democrats like to commit suicide every 2-4 years by sitting home because their candidate is "not liberal enough" or did not send out more flyers than the Republican. Helloooooooo!


This is disgusting. It weakens our democracy and it needs to stop.


The GOP spends a great deal of cash BUYING these absentee ballots. They buy them from people -- BLANK'S sister -- who manage and control the old folks "comedores" --that's the free dining rooms that feed the Cuban seniors. They also buy them for people who control the nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and the many PRIVATE nursing homes [that house maybe 6 or 8 seniors each] located in family homes. They start very early to spread the cash, and this is the way they do it! You mean to tell me, Genius, you didn't know this? And how about those "mental group therapy clinics" where you find hundreds of Cuban seniors being treated for a mental illnes that they don't really have, and where they go because the establishment ownership gives them part of the Medicare prceeds in cash. Im surprised, Genius, that you don't know that where there's a Cuban senior, there is an absentee ballot for sale! And yes, I happen to be Cuban!

How many seniors can we get to come forward and state that their ballots have been "negotiated" by the many procurers who do? I can give you more than 50 names, right now, but I won't. For what? This is something of an election protocol that has been going on in Miami Dade County for, at least, the past 30 years, and if you don't know it... where the hell have you been living? Just look at it, you deleted the name of the politician who's sister had engaged in this type of practice for years, and a bunch of people knew who I was referring to!!! It's like the little story about the Pino posse. It's been going on forever, but not everyone knows it. LOL


Nursing homes, section 8 housing, assisted living facilities. It's a cottage industry. Let's get real, they are bending and breaking the rules everywhere. Do you have the cash to win an election in South Florida? If so, sign up and go to work.


I agree with the previous post. Having run a clean campaign I can tell you that if you don't have the money to buy into the absentee ballot machine you don't have a prayer. I have a voter that the ballot was never received at her daughters house and yet she voted. Why? Good question. I let the department of elections know and that was the end of that. They should be looking at the signatures of voters from nursing home etc. just like they are looking into the recall signatures. Voters with alzheimer, or any mental illness that affects their ability to make sound judgement, should not be allowed to vote. Are they allowed to drive? It is up to the children to revoke their voting rights and I guarantee that many don't know that the parents are voting (or someone is voting for them)and those that do know are playing the game...I have 3 votes for you ;)

You canot judge the Republican Party's absentees ballot plan by looking at Republican primary elections, beause the Party isn't involved in the effort - it operates just in the general election. The data from these primary elections show that some GOP candidates have a better organized AB efforts than others. Sure, there are AB vote-getters in the Latin senior citizen community, and they charge for their services, just as certain "palm card" distributors do in Black precincts in Democratic primaries. Evidence of local political machines is not evidence of voter fraud. Sorry.


Want to understand ABs? Forget the parties altogether and look at the down-ticket non-partisan races -- judges, school board, etc. You will see race after race that was close in actual voting, but where ABs ran 10- or 15-to-1. You will see races where ABs were massively out of proportion to the split of actual votes cast.

Everyone in this town knows the names of the consultants/lobbyists to call. The corruption is perfectly vertically integrated: "I get you elected, then when you get to Tallahassee or on the bench or at the school board, you're my guy or gal. I'll only charge you $15K per election -- not your money anyway -- because the REAL money comes to me from phosphate miners or the car dealers or the builders or the PBA or whomever it is that hires me to help with their "cause." They pay me because YOU, the candidate I got elected, listen to me. Then we all take pictures together in the shadow the Capitol that I like to think of as my private stable."

Trouble is, these folks will NEVER be prosecuted because the prosecutors call them at election time, too. In any decent town, there would be a special grand jury and the subpoenas would number in the hundreds. Here, it's all settled over lunch at Versailles.

There simply is no democracy here as most people understand that word. Visit the apartment in Sweetwater with the bins of hundreds of completed ABs waiting to be delivered. Visit the comedores, where my people gladly sell out the votes of the viejos who brought them here. Visit with los boleteros as they make their rounds.

It is as bad as you can imagine and it is never going to get better. Best to say eff it, and go to the beach.

We need a real investigation by the Feds to stop the voter fraud taking place with absentee ballots and the Cuban American elderly in Miami. If they canvass the absentee ballot envelopes, they will see a disproportionate percentage of signatures LEFT of the flap. This is done so the voter hands their unmarked ballot, but open and signed envelope to the ABS "brokers" who then sell the votes to the highest bidder - even after being hired and paid by one candidate - they take the ballots and sell them to their opponent! It is rumored that one primary state senate candidate won by paying $25 and up to $100 per ballot. If the senior refuses to hand over the unmarked-but-envelope-signed-left-of-the-flap ballot, they are threatened to lose their section 8 apt or the daily meal at the senior center. Where are the state attorney's, AG and Feds that allow this to happen year after year? We all know this is happening, we even talk about it in the Elections Department lobby with the workers, then what does it take to put a stop to it? This nonsense is hurting our democracy, electing crooked politicians, and perpetuating a banana republic mentality in South Florida. Each and every one of us needs to write, call and email the state attorney, the attorney general of Florida, and the Feds to demand an investigation so we stop this once and for all! Let's do it, NOW.


There are cases where they would be “using” the absentee ballots mailed to the typical Cuban seniors -- those who are handicapped by their physical problems, and many who are not. These people don’t speak English; most live either in nursing homes or in private nursing homes [family homes that take up to 8 seniors], so the people who are the managers at these places are in control of the votes/people.

These seniors don’t know how to vote, so they trust their “handlers” to do this for them. Let’s say that there’s a private home that houses 8 seniors; the person who manages the place will sell their ballots to the people who are gathering votes for the candidates. This manager can collect anywhere from $50 to $100 per ballot. It all depends on how badly the campaigns need the vote and, most all, how much money is available for negotiating.

Why on earth do you think that the costs of running a political campaign in Miami-Dade get higher with every new election? Do you really believe that they need the money for radio and TV?

In the case of the dining rooms [“comedores”], I understand that it is more of a communal process. As the ballots arrive, the “handlers” sit with the seniors and they tell them that they are going to help complete the voting process, so it is easier for them. These seniors have no idea how to vote, and even the presence of a ballot scares them to death.

In the cases of the hundreds of Cuban clinics in Miami-Dade – that are no more than Medicare mills – the owners, or managers, ask the seniors if they want to “negotiate” their ballots, and they offer them money. Naturally, a Medicare mill is there to help the senior make money, one way or the other. And then the seniors request their ballots by phone, and even if they would need a medical excuse, stating that they “can’t go to the polls,” remember who’s helping them to do the transaction, THEIR CLINIC.
"Still, interviews with at least a half-dozen people involved in Greater Miami elections paint a picture of a flourishing cottage industry in which ballot brokers promise to deliver blocks of absentee votes for a price. To be sure, many strategies for targeting absentee voters are legal, but the practice becomes dubious when voters are pressured with insistent phone calls and home visits. And the efforts can cross the line into fraud, when ballots that are collected under the guise of helping a voter are altered or destroyed."

The elections department can't tell people that their absentee ballots have to be mailed by the voter - not picked up by others. Florida law allows third parties to request, pick-up, and deliver ballots on behalf of voters. Too bad the legislature didn't focus on fixing the broken absentee ballot procedures when they were shortening the early voting period. Your other suggestions are excellent and long overdue.

This is a far more complex issue than suggested on this blog. You're dealing with a myriad of schemes, some very legal and others that would prompt a call for United Nations observer teams. These absentee efforts can be coordinated among candidates whose districts overlap. Some of these operatives will engage in voter intimidation tactics and you'll hear allegations that some absentee chasers have inside information from Elections. Don't expect to find too many details on a campaign report as soft money can fund these operations. Until this is fixed you won't find good candidates to emerge from the general population because they just can't compete with the special interest money machine.


This corruption is older than Armando Guttierez.


I know several political campaign insiders who applaud you and your team for the exceptional work which only scratches the surface of the games played. What happens on the streets of Miami-Dade during election season openly violates the principles upon which this country was founded. Candidates employ a win-at-all-costs mentality and the ballot brokers know authorities won't touch them. Not so sure you can count on the Mayor to clean this up as his campaign employed some of these "questionable characters" too.