Patty Lovaas, recently championed by GOP Chairman Will Deschamps, is continuing her argument that she has uncovered massive voter fraud in the Missoula mill levy election last spring, despite a familiar lack of evidence.
Lovaas is advancing one of her favorite arguments here: when elections don’t turn out the way she wants them to, it’s certain evidence of voter fraud.
It’s kind-hearted of the Missoula County Sherriff’s office to indulge Ms. Lovaas with an investigation, but it’s hard to imagine that her complaint should be taken seriously, given her previous accusations of voter fraud.
In 2008, Ms. Lovaas received 7,632 votes in Republican primary for the Senate, placing 4th in a field charitably described as eccentric, and more accurately described as the worst slate of candidates a major party has ever fielded for federal office in Montana.
Undeterred by her defeat, Lovass sued the State of Montana, claiming that the 2008 election was fraudulent. Her evidence? That she asked 85 people in Granite County if they had voted for the winner, Bob Kelleher. Seriously.
From the District Court’s dismissal:
Although it is not entirely clear, it appears that Lovaas claims to have canvassed 85 voters in Granite County, which is one of the fifty six counties participating in the Montana Republican Party’s primary election. According to Lovaas, none of the individuals she canvassed would confirm having voted for the winner, Bob Kelleher.Lovaas alleges the results of this canvassing effort constitute “substantial evidence” that the official primary election “results differ significantly from those reported by individual voters.”
That’s certainly compelling evidence of statewide fraud, isn’t it?
Ultimately, the argument Lovaas and Deschamps are advancing is true in one respect: they don’t particularly like the messy business of voters making decisions. Consider Lovaas’s argument about 2008, in which she asserts that voters were disenfranchised because they voted for another candidate:
I initially became involved in Montana’s election process and procedures during the primary election of 2008, where Bob Kelleher, a previous Democratic party affiliate was selected as the Republican candidate… When he was elected by a majority of votes statewide in all but two counties, every electorate in Montana was disenfranchised as there was no ensuing debate on the contemporary issues, which is far more important than the individual candidate.
It’s time for Chairman Deschamps to do the right thing and to stop casting aspersions on the integrity of Missoula County election officials.
Anyone expect that to happen?
