By Glenn Kessler, Staff writer<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Friday, April 22, 2022 at 3:00 a.m. EDT<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What Mark Meadows said about mail-in voter fraud in 2020<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want my vote or anyone else\u2019s to be disenfranchised. \u2026 Do you realize how inaccurate the voter rolls are, with people just moving around? \u2026 Anytime you move, you\u2019ll change your driver\u2019s license, but you don\u2019t call up and say, \u2018Hey, by the way, I\u2019m re-registering.\u2019\u201d<\/em><\/p>\u2014 Mark Meadows, then White House chief of staff, in <\/strong>an interview with CNN\u2019s Jake Tapper<\/strong><\/a>, Aug. 16, 2020<\/strong><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
After Donald Trump lost the presidential election, falsely claiming election fraud, Meadows became senior partner<\/a> at the Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI), which promotes \u201celection integrity\u201d efforts. The organization\u2019s \u201ccitizen\u2019s guide<\/a>\u201d urges activists to determine that the registrations of their neighbors are legal by checking on \u201cwhether voters have moved, or if the registrations are PO Boxes, commercial addresses or vacant lots\u201d and then \u201cobtaining evidence: photos of commercial buildings? Vacant lots?\u201d and \u201csecuring affidavits from current residents that a registered voter has moved.\u201dAdvertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Voter-list maintenance is one of the dividing lines in American politics. Republicans argue that if voter-registration records are not regularly purged and updated, election fraud can take place. Democrats push back that too many voter-list purges are conducted haphazardly, removing eligible voters who don\u2019t learn they are no longer listed until they show up to vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now it turns out that until last week, Meadows was simultaneously registered to vote in three different states \u2014 North Carolina, Virginia and South Carolina \u2014 according to state records obtained by The Fact Checker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The overlap lasted about three weeks, and it might have continued if revelations about Meadows\u2019s voting record had not attracted scrutiny in North Carolina. Meadows is still registered in Virginia and South Carolina.Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is the latest in a series of revelations about election-related behavior by Meadows that appear to contradict his and his party\u2019s rhetoric on election integrity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meadows, in fact, was the keynote speaker at a CPI Election Integrity Summit<\/a> in Atlanta on Feb. 19. \u201cWhat you\u2019re doing is investing in the future of our country and making sure only legal votes count,\u201d Meadows told attendees<\/a>. He said he had just gotten off the phone with Trump, who he said had told him: \u201cWe cannot give up on election integrity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
About three weeks after that speech, the New Yorker reported<\/a> that Meadows had registered to vote at a home where he did not reside. Meadows<\/a> and his wife, Debra<\/a>, had submitted voter registration forms that listed as their residential address a 14-by-62-foot mobile home<\/a> in Macon County, N.C., with a rusted metal roof that sold for $105,000 in 2021, even though they did not actually own it or live there. He then voted in the 2020 election via absentee ballot<\/a>.Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
North Carolina officials announced<\/a> last month that, as a result, Mark Meadows is under investigation for potential voter fraud. On April 11, his voter registration was removed by Macon County officials, the North Carolina State Board of Elections said<\/a> last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The state cited the fact that Meadows had voted in Virginia during the 2021 gubernatorial election that elected a Republican, Glenn Youngkin. Meadows and his wife had registered to vote in the state in September, his<\/a> and her<\/a> voter registration applications show, even though they were still registered in North Carolina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
About two weeks after publication of the New Yorker article, Meadows registered to vote in South Carolina, state election records show<\/a>. In July 2021, Meadows had purchased a three-story waterfront home<\/a> of more than 6,000 square feet in South Carolina for nearly $1.6 million<\/a>. But until this year, he also owned a townhouse in Alexandria<\/a> that he had purchased in 2017.Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is not unusual for some overlap in voter rolls as people move across state lines, and many people do not bother to terminate their voting registration when they move. In contrast to Meadows, however, former secretary of state Mike Pompeo canceled his voter registration<\/a> in Kansas just a few months after selling his home<\/a> in Wichita and moving to McLean when he became CIA director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
South Carolina and Virginia are members of the Electronic Registration Information Center<\/a>, a nonprofit that provides member states with reports on voters. If Meadows had listed his Virginia voter registration while registering in South Carolina, the state would have notified Virginia. Angie Maniglia Turner, Alexandria\u2019s general registrar and director of elections, said Thursday that there has been no change in the voter registration status in Virginia of either Mark or Debra Meadows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ben Williamson, a spokesman for Mark Meadows, declined to comment.Advertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the time Meadows registered to vote in North Carolina in 2020, using the mobile home address, he no longer owned a home in the state. In March 2020, Meadows sold, for $370,000, a house in Sapphire, N.C., that his mother had lived in. Meadows\u2019s mother, Mary Gail Garwood, had lived at and voted from <\/a>the Sapphire property in 2012, 2014 and 2016. She then registered to vote in Georgia on Sept. 12, 2018.<\/a> Meadows listed the property for sale the next day. Garwood did not respond to a message left for her at the retirement community where she now resides.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meadows, as of 2018, had been registered to vote from the Sapphire property.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gerry Cohen, a North Carolina election official, said that under state law, it was okay for Meadows to use his mother\u2019s property for his voter registration if he stayed there at least one or two nights a year. In fact, he said that under a little-known provision of state law<\/a>, Meadows could have continued to use the Sapphire address for voting even after he had sold the property because he was engaged in \u201cgovernment service\u201d in D.C. The law says the last address in the state \u201cat the time of that person\u2019s removal [from North Carolina] shall be considered and held to be the place of residence.\u201dAdvertisement<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thus, Meadows would not have needed to register to vote six months later using the address of the mobile home. The same courtesy, however, would not have been extended to his wife because she was not in government service. Voter registration records show Debra Meadows was also registered in three states at the same time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
North Carolina initially did not take action to remove Debra Meadows from the voting rolls at the same time as her husband. But state records now show<\/a> her voter registration was ended by Macon County officials as well. \u201cThe Macon County Board of Elections administratively removed the N.C. voter registration of Debra Meadows under N.C.G.S. \u00a7 163-57(6)<\/a> on April 21, upon receipt of documentation that shows she registered to vote and voted in Virginia during the 2021 election,\u201d said Patrick Gannon, a spokesman for the North Carolina State Board of Elections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Debra Meadows did not respond to a message sent to her email address at Right Women PAC, where she is executive director<\/a>, or to a text message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
washingtonpost.com<\/a> \u00a9 1996-2022 The Washington Post<\/p>\n\n