Both Democrats and Republicans brought lawsuits.

Some matters already have been settled. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court sided last week with Virginia by allowing the state to remove the names of 1,600 noncitizens from the voter rolls. And in Pennsylvania, Republicans successfully sued to extend early voting hours.

However, courts tossed other election cases on procedural grounds or cases remain unsettled and could prompt arguments in close elections.

Here are eight issues to look out for, both on Election Day and after.

1. Voter Registration in Pennsylvania

At least four jurisdictions in Pennsylvania are investigating potential voter registration fraud.

State prosecutors in Pennsylvania’s Lancaster County are investigating two batches of about 2,500 voter registration forms that may include several hundred fraudulent forms.

As of Monday afternoon, the Lancaster County District Attorney’s Office had determined that 17% of the forms were fraudulent. Another 57% were determined to be legitimate, WPMT-TV (Fox 43) reported. The rest were still being investigated.

York County officials also are investigating potential voter registration fraud. Of a batch of 3,087 forms, about 24% were declined after being found to be duplicate requests.

York County also is reviewing challenges to 350 overseas mail-in ballots.

And the Monroe County District Attorney’s Office last week identified fraudulent voter registration forms. A specific number wasn’t given and the investigation continues, the Pocono Record reported.

Berks County also referred two potential voter registration violations for investigation.

Pennsylvania Attorney General Michelle Henry, a Democrat, said attempts to submit fraudulent voter registration forms in the four counties “have been defeated.” Henry said her office is working with local law enforcement.

“While we will not be divulging sensitive information about these investigations, we want to clarify that the investigations regard voter registration forms, not ballots,” Henry said in a public statement, adding later: “The investigations are ongoing, and offenders who perpetrated acts of fraud will be held accountable under the law.”

2. Undelivered, Duplicate Ballots

In Erie County, Pennsylvania, Democrats sued over a debacle concerning absentee ballots.

Judge David Ridge ruled Friday that Erie County must offer a new set of absentee ballots to almost 20,000 voters who didn’t receive them. The state judge also said the county would have to stay open longer office hours until Election Day.

The vendor wasn’t able to confirm the status of between 13,000 and 17,000 absentee ballots requested by Erie County residents before the deadline, USA Today reported. In addition, 1,200 county residents who said they would be out of town requested absentee ballots. On top of that, 365 duplicate ballots were sent to voters.

3. Overseas Mail Ballots

Republicans lost three federal lawsuits regarding a law called the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, which governs how Americans living overseas can vote in federal elections.

The GOP lawsuits over UOCAVA focused largely on nonmilitary overseas voters, many of whom indicated no intention to return to the United States.

Six Republican members of the U.S. House sued Pennsylvania over the state’s counting procedures. The GOP lawmakers’ complaint says that about 15,000 nonmilitary American voters living abroad but casting ballots in Pennsylvania elections should have to provide the same personal identification as Pennsylvania residents.

But U.S. District Judge Christopher Conner determined last Tuesday—one week before Election Day—that an injunction could “upend the commonwealth’s carefully laid election administration procedures to the detriment of untold thousands of voters.”

Michigan Court of Appeals Judge Sima Patel ruled against the Republican National Committee’s challenge to rules in the U.S. law. The RNC challenge was based on nonresidents’ dependents who live abroad voting in state elections. Patel ruled that the GOP lawsuit was an attempt to “disenfranchise” voters.

Similarly, North Carolina Superior Court Judge John Smith ruled that the RNC challenge “presented no substantial evidence” of fraudulent voting.

4. 218,000 Arizona Voters With No Proof of Citizenship

Arizona state Judge Scott Blaney last week ordered the office of Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, a Democrat, to release the names of voters who were misclassified as not being required to show proof of U.S. citizenship, The Associated Press reported.

Fontes initially said that the number of misclassified voters was thought to be 98,000 registered voters who lacked proof of citizenship and thus could not vote in state and local elections. However, a revised estimate put the number more than twice as high, at 218,000 voters who lacked proof of citizenship when registering to vote.

Arizona state officials contend that a coding glitch caused the problem. Arizona law requires proof of U.S. citizenship for voting in state and local elections, but not in federal elections. The concern is that the 218,000 voters without proof of citizenship could vote in state and local elections because of the glitch.

Arizona state law requires proof of citizenship for voting only in state and local elections, not federal elections such as for president or Congress. The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 prevents a state from imposing proof-of-citizenship requirements for federal elections.

So, Arizona voters lacking proof of citizenship would be able to vote in the presidential election, just as in any other state. However, these voters normally would not be allowed to vote in state and local elections in Arizona.

The total of 218,000 voters without proof of citizenship—who may vote in federal elections but not state elections—prompts concerns because federal law prohibits noncitizens from voting or registering to vote.

The America First Legal Foundation sued for the voter registration records.

Blarney, in his ruling, rejected Arizona’s contention that the information would provoke violence. He gave Fontes a deadline of noon Monday to release the names of the 98,000 misclassified voters.

5. Georgia Ballot Centers

The Trump campaign and the RNC sent letters over the weekend to county ballot processing centers, asserting the reopening of the offices was illegal.

The letters called for sequestering the ballots received after Nov. 1, Georgia’s deadline for receiving absentee ballots. The Republican National Committee filed a lawsuit as well.

The RNC contends that the Democrat counties of Chatham, Clark, Cobb, DeKalb, Fulton, and Gwinnett accepted Saturday in violation of Georgia law.

6. Nevada Postmarks

The Nevada Supreme Court last week determined that mail ballots that arrive three days after Election Day with no postmark will still be counted.

Nevada uses universal mail-in voting.

The state’s highest court rejected a challenge brought by the Republican National Committee, which argued that when a ballot lacks a postmark it’s difficult to know whether it really was sent before Election Day.

The court also determined that ballots with smudges and indecipherable writing would be counted.

7. Iowa and Noncitizen Voting

Although the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a Justice Department lawsuit against Virginia for removing the names of 1,600 noncitizens from the voter rolls, the United Latin American Citizens of Iowa sued Iowa’s Republican secretary of state, Paul Pate, and election officials from five counties over removal of noncitizens’ names.

Pate sent a list of 2,176 registered voters who were suspected noncitizens to local election officials in Iowa.

The plaintiffs filed their complaint Oct. 30. On Sunday, an Iowa judge denied the motion for a temporary restraining order or temporary injunction, and determined that the voter registrations would not be restored before Election Day.

The judge determined, however, that any individual would be allowed to cast a provisional ballot.

8. Unsent Mail Ballots in Georgia

In this case, the Democratic National Committee sued Cobb County, Georgia, alleging that the county’s Board of Elections failed to send mail-in ballots to more than 3,000 voters who requested the forms.

Georgia law requires elections offices to send ballots within three days of receiving a request. The deadline to receive a request was Oct. 25.

The elections board announced it didn’t get all ballots sent on time, and planned to send some by express shipping. However, Democrats, in their complaint in state court, contend that wasn’t sufficient since that’s not enough time to ensure ballots would be counted.

Democrats are suing to extend the deadline to receive ballots from Nov. 5 to Nov. 8.

With the notable exception of the more metropolitan Asheville, county seat of Buncombe County, most of the hardest-hit North Carolina counties in the path of Hurricane Helene are rural and lean Republican.

But the state election board for the fiercely contested battleground state—former President Donald Trump is neck and neck with Vice President Kamala Harris—has a 3-2 Democratic majority.

Harris and Trump are polling less than 1% with one another, according to the Real Clear Politics polling average, and past presidential contests have been tight in the state.

The election board unanimously voted Monday to allow 13 counties most affected by the storm to make changes in election procedures, so long as there is a bipartisan majority to do so.

The process would include changing or adding voting sites and notifying voters by mail and through local media about such changes as quickly as possible. The resolution adopted by the state board allows the chairman of local election boards to appoint replacement members if someone is unable to carry out his or her duties.

“These measures were put in place to ensure the victims of Helene can vote in the upcoming election and provide election officials in the hardest-hit areas the tools they need to conduct a secure election under extraordinarily difficult conditions,” Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, said Monday during a teleconference with reporters.

I am in Big Oak Park, a mobile home community 30 mins south of Asheville.

Its residents, many of whom are 55+ years-old and at-risk have been without power for 10 days.

Residents tell me that trash has been building up, inviting disease and bears.

More to come. pic.twitter.com/kOTZHXxH9b

— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024

“While several of North Carolina’s neighboring states have moved to implement those lessons, North Carolina’s Gov. Cooper has been shockingly inactive, as have his allies on the state board,” he said.

The Tar Heel State has become a major battleground for the 2024 presidential election. In 2020, incumbent Republican Trump carried the state against Democratic challenger Joe Biden by just 1.3%. In 2016, Trump beat Democrat Hillary Clinton in North Carolina by less than 4% of the vote.

In-person early voting begins Oct. 17. Mail-in voting began Sept. 21, after a brief delay to accommodate a court ruling to remove independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name from the ballot.

“We have every intention of starting early voting as scheduled on Thursday, Oct. 17, in all 100 counties,” Bell, the state election board’s executive director, said.

Meet Dianne Messer, who, along with Doug Warden, who is 93-year-old, run Big Oak Mobile Park in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Dianne was kind enough to show me around the property and introduce me to some of the residence, many of whom have been without power for 10 days.… pic.twitter.com/tRZuvYhqi9

— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024

“While several of North Carolina’s neighboring states have moved to implement those lessons, North Carolina’s Gov. Cooper has been shockingly inactive, as have his allies on the state board,” he said.

The Tar Heel State has become a major battleground for the 2024 presidential election. In 2020, incumbent Republican Trump carried the state against Democratic challenger Joe Biden by just 1.3%. In 2016, Trump beat Democrat Hillary Clinton in North Carolina by less than 4% of the vote.

In-person early voting begins Oct. 17. Mail-in voting began Sept. 21, after a brief delay to accommodate a court ruling to remove independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s name from the ballot.

“We have every intention of starting early voting as scheduled on Thursday, Oct. 17, in all 100 counties,” Bell, the state election board’s executive director, said.

This is how high the water got during hurricane Helene over a week ago in

River Arts District, Asheville pic.twitter.com/RgNdOgYrLr

— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 6, 2024

Hurricane Helene made landfall first in Florida, then swept through parts of Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Alabama, killing more than 220 and leaving catastrophic property damage. Of these states, North Carolina sustained the worse beating.

Cuccinelli’s Election Transparency Initiative noted one reported concern that relocated nursing home residents won’t be able to vote.

The elections watchdog group also noted that it’s still unknown which preapproved polling sites are unserviceable in the 22 counties affected by Helene. North Carolina law requires the election board to approve alternate sites.

Also, suspension of deliveries by the U.S. Postal Service in the state’s western counties disrupted mail-in voting.

Cuccinelli said Cooper and the elections board should “stop stalling and start working to ensure that those communities already devastated by Helene at least have their voice through their votes.”

Cuccinelli, also a former Virginia attorney general, specified two top North Carolina Republicans who could do this.

“To the extent Gov. Cooper refuses to make immediate adjustments, when the General Assembly convenes next week we urge swift action from House Speaker Tim Moore and Senate Leader [Phil] Berger to maintain the integrity of the upcoming election across the western counties of North Carolina—ensuring it proceeds securely and fairly without compromising the democratic process,” Cuccinelli said.

Cooper’s office did not respond to inquiries from The Daily Signal by publication time.

Patrick Gannon, a spokesman for the North Carolina State Board of Elections, referred The Daily Signal’s request for comment to the governor’s office, but also sent an email statement from the board arguing that criticism of the state is “uninformed.”

“The State Board of Elections is committed to ensuring every eligible voter is able to cast their ballot, regardless of their circumstances following the disaster,” the board’s statement said, adding:

The affected counties and their staffs are working around the clock to guarantee their neighbors their right to vote. Criticism like this is simply uninformed. It’s also a slap in the face for the dozens of election workers, especially those who are themselves victims of the disaster, who are putting in long hours under trying circumstances to serve their voters.

Hendersonville, North Carolina | Alexander, a resident of Big Oak Park, gave me a tour of his community yesterday.

Many of the trailers destroyed by hurricane Helene are uninsured and
Some belong to families with newborns. @DailySignal pic.twitter.com/XcMQ315EEK

— Tim Kennedy (@TimKennedyJr1) October 7, 2024

The board provided increased flexibility to these 13 counties: Ashe, Avery, Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Transylvania, Watauga, and Yancey.

The board’s Democratic chairman is Alan Hirsch, president of the North Carolina Healthcare Quality Alliance, a nonprofit focused on rural treatment of opioid addiction and prevention as well as on mental health issues.

Hirsch has donated thousands of dollars to Democrat campaigns, including the state’s Democratic Party, then-President Barack Obama, and Cooper, the sitting governor, according to Open Secrets.

Bell has been executive director of the North Carolina Board of Elections since 2019. She is listed on the board’s website as the state’s “chief elections official.”

Bell previously was the election board’s deputy director beginning in 2015. She oversees 100 county election boards.

Bell has worked in administrative roles for county and state elections since 2006. From 2011 to 2015, she directed the election board in Transylvania County, which is heavily Republican-leaning. Before that, she was a district elections technician for the state board.

In a Monday op-ed in Townhall, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a Republican, noted that about 40,000 mail-in ballots were sent to voters in Helene-affected counties and that only 1,000 were returned.

“These hard-hit counties, which supported Donald Trump with 61% of the vote in 2020, are now grappling with slow recovery efforts, unreliable communications, and an inadequate federal response,” Blackwell wrote. “As citizens in rural, heavily Republican regions seek to participate in the democratic process, the state’s electoral integrity is on the line, especially as concerns about political maneuvering grow in the aftermath of the storm.”

Blackwell also warned against sweeping statewide changes that could undermine confidence in the Nov. 5 election.

“Expanding voting measures across the entire state, including areas that were not affected by the hurricane, could open the door to accusations of partisanship,” he wrote. “It’s important that we help the residents of these rural, counties without altering the broader electoral landscape in a way that might be seen as tipping the scales.”

Tim Kennedy contributed to this report. 

“CEASE & DESIST,” the 45th president posted Tuesday. “I, together with many Attorneys and Legal Scholars, am watching the Sanctity of the 2024 Presidential Election very closely because I know, better than most, the rampant Cheating and Skullduggery that has taken place by the Democrats in the 2020 Presidential Election. It was a Disgrace to our Nation!”

Trump’s post comes on National Voter Registration Day, which falls on the same day this year as Constitution Day.

Trump, a Republican who faces Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, vowed that 2024 would be different from 2020.

For this election cycle, the Republican National Committee launched the Protect the Vote initiative. Under the initiative, the RNC has filed more than 100 lawsuits across 25 states and recruited more than 150,000 lawyers and volunteer poll watchers across the country.

Trump stated that because he and the RNC are watching, “the 2024 Election, where Votes have just started being cast, will be under the closest professional scrutiny and, WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again.”

“We cannot let our Country further devolve into a Third World Nation, AND WE WON’T!” Trump continued. “Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.”

Trump posted a near identical message on Sept. 7 on Truth Social, warning that election cheaters will be prosecuted. This came a day after early and mail-in voting began in North Carolina, also a battleground state.

JUST IN – President Trump has vowed to prosecute ANYONE caught participating in election fraud in the 2024 presidential election.

Do you support this?

A. YES
B. NO pic.twitter.com/N8zHSiphcs

— The Trump Train (@The_Trump_Train) September 7, 2024

In response to Trump’s initial Truth Social post about prosecuting those who cheat in elections, Minnesota’s Democratic Secretary of State Steve Simon, the president of the National Association Secretaries of State, asserted that Trump is a threat.

“Threatening people with punishment for cheating is deeply disturbing if ‘cheating’ simply means that you don’t like the outcome of the election,” Simon posted on X, formerly Twitter. “I trust the integrity of our election officials, who will keep delivering elections that are fair, accurate, honest, and secure.”

Threatening people with punishment for cheating is deeply disturbing if “cheating” simply means that you don’t like the outcome of the election. I trust the integrity of our election officials, who will keep delivering elections that are fair, accurate, honest, and secure. https://t.co/oy76oaw0qY

— Steve Simon (@MNSteveSimon) September 9, 2024

Trump challenged the outcome of the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won. Trump had previously prepared for a rematch with Biden after both won their party primaries convincingly. Democrats switched out to Vice President Kamala Harris after Biden’s poor performance in a June debate with Trump.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., released a 22-page report Monday that says the Department of Homeland Security, the Secret Service, and the FBI all failed to answer the public’s questions about the first attempted assassination of Trump on July13 during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“In response, Senator Hawley personally visited the Butler, Pennsylvania rally site to interview whistleblowers, opened up a whistleblower tip line, and encouraged those with relevant information to tell their stories,” the Hawley report says. “Since then, many individuals have come forward with information regarding the events of July 13—from the Secret Service, DHS, and local law enforcement, as well as private citizens.”

The Secret Service contends that it is working with members of Congress on oversight of the July 13 shooting, which clipped Trump’s right ear, killed one rallygoer, and wounded two others.

“The U.S. Secret Service is aware of the senator’s report and will continue to work with congressional oversight committees in both the House and the Senate,” Secret Service spokesperson Nate Herring told The Daily Signal in an email responding to an inquiry about the Hawley report.

Here are top takeaways from the new report on the attempt to kill Trump in Pennsylvania.

1. ‘Gunman Would Have Been Handcuffed in the Parking Lot’

The Secret Service’s Counter Surveillance Division didn’t perform a normal evaluation of the Butler site, the whistleblower alleged. The division performs threat assessments of event sites involving protectees.

“The whistleblower stated that if personnel from CSD had been present at the rally, the gunman would have been handcuffed in the parking lot after being spotted with a rangefinder,” the report says.

The whistleblower said the Secret Service had ordered significant cuts to the division that could include reducing manpower by up to 20%.

Secret Service personnel also expressed alarm that individuals were admitted to the Pennsylvania rally without vetting. The whistleblower alleged that those who raised such concerns faced retaliation.

2. ‘Former President, and Not the Incumbent’

The Hawley report notes that during a Senate hearing July 30, Ronald Rowe, the acting director of the Secret Service, testified: “If you’re talking about Butler, Pennsylvania, all assets requested were approved.”

However, the whistleblower told Hawley’s office that countersniper teams and countersurveillance resources were not included in the request because Secret Service officials told the requesting agents that such requests would be denied.

The Secret Service denied the requests for additional security in part because Trump was “not the incumbent” president.

“The whistleblower alleged that officials within this office preemptively informed the Pittsburgh field office that the Butler rally was not going to receive additional security resources because Trump is a former president, and not the incumbent president or vice president,” the report says.

The whistleblower said the manpower request didn’t include extra security resources because agents on the ground were told not to ask for them in the first place, according to the report.

“Importantly, these resources included countersniper teams and CSD personnel,” the report says.

Members of Congress have questioned why Trump didn’t have more protection after the first assassination attempt July 13.

On Sunday, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw told reporters that since Trump isn’t a sitting president, Secret Service coverage was limited.

“If he was [the sitting president], we would have had this entire golf course surrounded,” Bradshaw said.

During a Monday afternoon press conference, Rowe talked about both the July and September attempts on Trump’s life.

“Coming out of Butler, I have ordered a paradigm shift,” Rowe said during a press conference Monday. “The Secret Service’s protective methodologies work. And they are sound. And we saw that yesterday. But the way we are positioned right now in this dynamic threat environment, it has given me guidance to say, ‘you know what, we need to look at what our protective methodology is.’ We need to get out of a reactive model and get to a preparedness model.”

3. ‘Known to Be Incompetent’

One whistleblower asserted that the Secret Service agent in charge of the Butler rally was responsible for mitigating line-of-sight concerns at the site.

Another whistleblower alleged the same lead agent at the rally made decisions that “likely compromised the overall security of the event.”

“The Secret Service’s lead site agent on July 13—the agent with specific responsibility for the security of the rally site, including line-of-sight concerns—was known to be incompetent,” the report says. “That incompetence led to the placement of items like flags around the Butler stage and catwalk, impairing visibility.”

The report continues:

For example, campaign material such as flags were permitted to be placed around the stage and catwalk used by the former president, despite the fact that these items were typically prohibited because of how they affected the line-of-sight of those agents responsible for identifying threats.

The Secret Service also did not check IDs when issuing credentials that authorize access to restricted areas of the site, contrary to typical practice.

4. ‘Loose’ Security for Trump

The government whistleblower informed Hawley’s office that the Secret Service considered Trump’s July 13 rally a “loose” security event.

Among other things, this meant that “detection canines were not deployed to monitor entry and detect threats in the usual manner for outdoor campaign rallies,” the Hawley report says.

The report also says that individuals “without proper designations” could access backstage areas at the Pennsylvania rally.

“DHS personnel failed to properly police the 5-foot security buffer near the stage and allowed people to move barricades around the buffer,” the report says, referring to the Department of Homeland Security, parent agency of the Secret Service. Further, the whistleblower said, DHS personnel were not familiar with security protocols for campaign events.

“The whistleblower further alleged that the majority of DHS personnel working the rally were agents with the department’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) team,” the report continues.

5. ‘Abandoned the Roof’

The whistleblower told Hawley’s office that there was supposed to be a security presence on the roof of what is called AGR Building 6, where the would-be assassin aimed and fired shots at Trump, killing one man, striking two other men, and grazing the right ear of the former president as he spoke onstage.

That rooftop was supposed to be covered by personnel, the whistleblower said, “but the post was abandoned because of the hot weather.”

During the Senate hearing July 30, Hawley questioned Rowe, the Secret Service’s acting director, about this point.

Rowe replied that law enforcement was “posted up inside” Building 6. He said “we’re going to ensure that state and local countersnipers are on roofs.”

Hawley pressed whether law enforcement officers had abandoned their post on the roof. Rowe replied that he did not “know that to be a fact.”

6. No Drone Coverage

On July 25, Hawley wrote a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas about a whistleblower allegation that drone coverage for the Trump rally had been denied by Secret Service supervisors.

The report provides more information on the matter.

“The whistleblower alleged that the night before the rally, Secret Service personnel repeatedly denied offers from a local law enforcement partner to utilize drone technology to secure the rally,” the report says. “According to the whistleblower, the drones that were offered to the Secret Service could not only identify active shooters but also help neutralize them.”

After the shooting, Secret Service personnel asked local law enforcement to deploy the drone technology to survey the site, the whistleblower told Hawley’s office.

The 20-year-old would-be assassin used his own drone to survey the rally area up to two hours before Trump took the stage.

7. ‘Poorly Secured’ Hospital

After the July 13 shooting, Secret Service agents rushed the stage to shield Trump before taking him to Butler Memorial Hospital for medical treatment.

Although the campaign rally wasn’t adequately secured, neither was the hospital, the whistleblower told Hawley’s office.

“The hospital site where former President Trump received treatment after the shooting was poorly secured, and the hospital site agent could not answer basic questions about site security,” the report says.

The report later adds: “The Secret Service site agent responsible for hospital security did not know what was going on and could not answer basic questions about site security.”

The Missouri Republican senator’s report found the Secret Service intelligence units were absent from the Butler, Pennsylvania, rally on July 13. The intelligence units are teams of Secret Service agents that are paired with state and local law enforcement to handle reports of suspicious persons.

NEW – Following the latest assassination attempt on ⁦⁦@realDonaldTrump⁩, I’m releasing a comprehensive Whistleblower Report on the multiple failures of Secret Service & DHS – including new allegations & numerous unanswered questions due to USSS stonewalling pic.twitter.com/Rxcim9N05U

— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) September 16, 2024

Hawley also found that the hospital where Trump was treated was poorly secured. His report states that the hospital site agent failed to answer basic questions regarding site security.

The report further highlights that neither the Secret Service, a division of the Department of Homeland Security, nor the department itself, provided answers about who made the decisions to deny counter-sniper coverage to the rooftop where the Pennsylvania shooter shot Trump.

The report also says neither agency would publicly name the lead site agency for the rally.

They also did not answer questions about reports that the Secret Service denied the Trump campaign the protection resources it requested.

Hawley is a member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and is among the members of Congress to personally survey the Butler site.

The senator shared the report with the House Task Force investigating the July 13 shooting in Butler.

In North Carolina, ballots can be mailed up to 60 days before the election. It was the lone state where voting was set to begin six days before the scheduled faceoff between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump on Tuesday night in Philadelphia.

Election officials in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Wisconsin will be mailing out absentee ballots in the coming days, while other swing states, such as Arizona and Georgia, mail ballots less than a month before the election.

Courts sided with Kennedy’s efforts to get his name off the ballot in North Carolina and Michigan last week. The independent candidate suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump. The North Carolina State Board of Elections has appealed the decision to the state Supreme Court.

North Carolina Elections Director Karen Brinson Bell asked county election officials to ensure ballots will be ready to go out to absentee voters no later than Sept. 21, which is the federal deadline to send absentee ballots in a presidential election, according to a North Carolina State Elections Board news release Friday. She told county officials not to send ballots until the case is settled and the state knows what date to send the ballots. The news release touted: “That would have made North Carolina the first state to send ballots to voters for the Nov. 5 general election.”

There are 56 days between the first presidential debate Tuesday night and the Nov. 5 election.

In 10 states, mail-in or absentee ballots are shipped out more than 45 days before the election, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

President Joe Biden’s home state of Delaware, which has been solidly Democratic in presidential races since 1992, sends ballots out up to 60 days prior to an election, according to the NCSL, and is now the only state mailing ballots before the debate.

Pennsylvania mails out ballots 50 days before the election. Wisconsin will send ballots out up to 47 days beforehand. So, voters there will have the chance to compare the two candidates on the stage Tuesday night.

Another swing state, Michigan, is among 11 states that mail ballots up to 45 days before the election, according to the NCSL.

Battleground states Arizona and Georgia send ballots out fewer than 30 days before the election.

“We have 17 days of early voting, and we have Election Day voting, but all with photo ID,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger told The Daily Signal in an interview last week. “We think that it is a great gold standard to have a photo ID, no matter how you vote.”

He added that election results should be known sooner as well.

“We also think about pre-processing so we get the early votes and the absentee voting up no later than 8 p.m. on election night. Florida has theirs at 7:30. Ours is at 8. That’s good,” Raffensperger said. “It gives voters confidence in the process and keeps the lines short.”

“Early voting doesn’t start until the middle of October. People are requesting their absentee ballots now,” he added.

In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, 43% of all votes nationally were cast by mail, according to the Washington-based nonprofit Bipartisan Policy Center earlier this year, while 31% voted by mail in 2022. In 2016, just 21% of votes were cast by mail. Early in-person voting and Election Day voting were about evenly split in the 2020 presidential election.

Election-security advocates have long contended that too much mail-in voting can lead to problems, such as ballot harvesting, voter intimidation, and fraud.

“Election Day needs to mean Election Day, and not an election two weeks,” J. Christian Adams, president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, an elections watchdog group, told The Daily Signal.

Adams anticipates 2024 will go more smoothly than 2020.

“Courts cannot suspend election laws as easily as in 2020,” Adams said. “We don’t have a nationwide mail-in voting campaign the way we did in 2020. That’s a big deal.”

Election integrity advocates have also raised questions about how absentee and mail-in ballots have to be time-stamped and how existing laws will be enforced.

Two states split up the awarding of electoral votes by congressional districts. Both Maine and Nebraska begin mailing out ballots between 30 and 45 days before Election Day.

Now less than two months before Election Day, states are litigating about when mail ballots have to be postmarked, and whether ballots arriving after Election Day must be counted.

The most common deadline for delivery of mail ballots is by the close of Election Day, whether by mail or hand-delivered. However, the battleground state of Nevada—with all-mail voting—is among the 17 states that will count ballots that arrive after Election Day, according to the Public Interest Legal Foundation.

These jurisdictions still require ballots to be postmarked by Election Day. However, some jurisdictions accept an intelligent mail bar code or means other than a U.S. Postal Service postmark to date a ballot, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

While Nevada requires a postmark on Election Day or earlier, the NCSL says, “unclear postmarks received by the third day following the election are deemed to have been postmarked on or before Election Day.”

While dark-red Mississippi is far from a battleground state, it is the subject of a federal lawsuit now in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals contesting the state law that allows ballots arriving up to five days after Election Day. The state and national Republican and Libertarian parties have sued Mississippi.

“Multiple states allow ballots to keep rolling in after the election,” said Adams of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, which filed a friend of the court brief in the Mississippi case.

In 2020, among the most controversial states was Pennsylvania. State law there says absentee ballots must be postmarked and received no later than 8 p.m. on Election Day. But then-Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf wanted to allow ballots to be counted as long as they arrived by Nov. 6—three days after the election, and used the COVID-19 pandemic as a rationale. Republican legislators challenged that policy in court.

The Democratic majority on the partisan, elected state Supreme Court decided in a 4-3 ruling to allow mail-in votes to be counted that arrived by Nov. 6, and declared that if postmarks or dates are missing or illegible, the ballots would be “presumed to have been mailed by Election Day” unless evidence shows otherwise.

The Wolf extension was still expected to be an emergency measure that would not affect future elections, and the deadline has returned to the close of polls. However, last week, a Pennsylvania state appeals court ruled that ballots must be counted even if a voter puts the wrong date on the return envelope.

North Carolina previously counted ballots that arrived up to three days after the election. In 2023, it passed a measure requiring mail-in ballots must be received by 7:30 p.m. on election night.

Blue-leaning Virginia, closer this year than in recent past presidential contests, has previously counted ballots that arrive up to three days after the election.

The Public Interest Legal Foundation “has blocked Virginia from accepting ballots with postmarks after the election,” Adams said, referring to a 2020 lawsuit.

Virginia entered into a consent decree in early 2021 to permanently prevent the State Board of Elections from accepting absentee ballots up to three days after Election Day if the postmarks are not clear.

Honest Elections Project Executive Director Jason Snead supports ballots being received no later than the close of polls on Election Day.

“It’s best to have results on election night,” Snead said. “The concept of extending the ballot deadline as long as you have a postmark by the deadline is a problem. Many states are doing prepaid postage, so fewer envelopes are going to have postmarks on the envelopes at all.”

An RNC initiative called Protect the Vote has filed more than 100 lawsuits across 25 states and recruited more than 150,000 lawyers and volunteer poll watchers across the country.

“We are defending the law and fighting for commonsense security measures that benefit all Americans—like stopping illegal immigrants from voting, mail ballot safeguards, voter ID measures, stopping leftist dark money, and cleaning the voter rolls,” Gineen Bresso, director of election integrity for the Republican National Committee, told The Daily Signal in a written statement. “We are winning in court and have recruited over 150,000 volunteers for the election. We are protecting the vote for all Americans.”

The Democratic National Committee didn’t respond to inquiries for this story.

Previously, however, the DNC issued statements criticizing Republicans’ litigation and asserting that RNC leadership was chosen by former President Donald Trump to “push lies” about the 2020 election. That leadership would be “anti-democracy” and promote conspiracy theories, the DNC said.

In August, the Democratic National Committee filed lawsuits opposing Republican-backed election procedures in Arizona and Georgia.

The Republican National Committee has pending litigation in Georgia, Nevada, and other states where the Nov. 5 presidential election looks close. Here, however, are five states where the GOP has gained major victories.

1. Arizona and Noncitizen Voting

The Republican National Committee won a partial victory Aug. 22 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to allow Arizona to enforce its law requiring proof of U.S. citizenship during voter registration.

Under the ruling, election officials may reject voter registration forms without proof of citizenship. The high court stayed a federal district court ruling while it awaits a hearing before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The lower court struck down provisions of Arizona’s law that require an election official to reject a voter registration that doesn’t include proof of U.S. citizenship. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, both Democrats, opted not to defend the state law.

So the RNC filed an emergency application to the Supreme Court to allow the state to fully enforce the law, which its ruling did.

“This is a major victory for election integrity that upholds a simple principle: American elections must be decided by American citizens,” RNC Chairman Michael Whatley said in a public statement on the high court’s decision.

Fontes, Arizona’s secretary of state, opposed the court ruling.

“My concern is that changes to the process should not occur this close to an election, it creates confusion for voters,” Fontes said in a public statement. “We respect the court’s decision and will implement these changes while continuing to protect voter access and make voting a simple process.”

Earlier this year, Arizona’s election system garnered increased scrutiny when billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk posted on his social media platform X, formerly Twitter: “Arizona clearly states that no proof of citizenship is required for federal elections.”

That’s technically correct, but no other state requires proof of U.S. citizenship to vote in federal elections, either. Arizona, however, requires such proof before someone may vote in state and local elections.

That’s because in 2013, the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Ariz. Inc. that the 1993 National Voter Registration Act, known as the motor voter law, determined that every state must accept the same standardized voter registration forms for federal elections.

However, the ruling, written by then-Justice Antonin Scalia, said Arizona’s law requiring proof of U.S. citizenship to vote could apply to state and local elections but not federal ones.

As a result, Arizona uses two different ballots for state and federal elections. A state resident with documented proof of citizenship may vote using both ballots. A voter without proof of citizenship may still vote for president and Congress.

2. Stopping Presumptions in Michigan

The Republican National Committee joined the Michigan Republican Party and Wayne County Republican Committee this week to sue the city of Detroit for not hiring a sufficient number of Republican election inspectors.

Michigan law requires hiring an equal number of Democrats and Republicans for election roles. But the GOP plaintiffs allege that Detroit has hired seven times as many Democrats as election inspectors.

The RNC gained a victory in Michigan after suing Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, regarding her instructions to local election clerks to presume—rather than verify—the validity of an absentee voter’s signature.

“In Michigan, we stopped the secretary of state’s illegal instructions to ignore mail ballot safeguards,” the RNC’s Bresso said.

The RNC teamed with the state Republican Party to argue that the instruction violated the Michigan Constitution, which requires verification of signatures. They won a partial victory in June when state Judge Christopher Yates ruled that Benson’s decision is a presumption that is “a foul under Michigan law.”

After the ruling, a spokesperson for Benson’s office noted that the judge agreed the secretary of state has authority to implement other ballot rules for the state’s more than 1,500 independent election clerks.

“Michigan’s clerks have and will continue to carefully review every ballot signature to ensure they agree sufficiently with the signature on file before accepting any ballot,” Benson spokesperson Angela Benander said, according to The Detroit News.

Going back to 2020, the RNC and the state party teamed to intervene in a lawsuit brought by a Democratic super PAC, Priorities USA, to strike down Michigan’s state ban on the process known as ballot harvesting.

In September 2022, a federal court upheld the ban, which allowed for the tracking of absentee ballots.

Ballot harvesting is when political operatives distribute or collect large quantities of absentee ballots, prompting concerns of voter intimidation or improper influence.

3. Poll Watchers in North Carolina

The Republican National Committee also filed two lawsuits against the North Carolina State Board of Elections in a span of four days in late August.

One lawsuit alleges the state election board failed to require identification to prove U.S. citizenship, a violation of the 2002 Help America Vote Act. The state and national GOP contend this lapse opens up the opportunity for as many as 225,000 noncitizens to vote.

The previous week, the RNC sued the Tar Heel State alleging that it failed to check jury questionnaire responses to identify and remove noncitizens from voter registration lists.

These cases go on after an earlier Republican National Committee victory in North Carolina.

In a 2022 case, the RNC argued that the State Board of Elections was trying to weaken the rights of poll watchers. It scored a victory that August when the state’s Rules Review Commission rejected restrictions on the election board’s new poll watchers.

The State Election Board’s rules would have prevented poll watchers from standing too close to voting machines or poll books, and also give election officials the authority to remove poll watchers.

The following October, Wake County Superior Court Judge Vince Rozier sided with the RNC and blocked the rule preventing “at-large,” party-appointed poll watchers from going to different polling locations throughout Election Day.

The county court, however, also sided with the state board and moved back the date by which ballots must be accepted to Nov. 14, six days after the Nov. 8 election in 2022. The normal deadline of Nov. 11 fell on Veterans Day that year.

Patrick Gannon, the spokesperson for the State Election Board, told the Carolina Journal: “We are grateful that the judge denied the plaintiffs’ request to shorten the absentee ballot deadline. … The county boards of elections will, of course, abide by the judge’s ruling tweaking the replacement procedure for party observers. That is a polling place management issue that our bipartisan poll workers can be trusted to handle.”

4. Parity in Wisconsin

In Wisconsin, the Republican National Committee won a case to enforce the state’s law requiring an equal number of Republican and Democrat poll workers.

“We successfully fought for poll worker parity and poll watcher protections,” the RNC’s Bresso told The Daily Signal.

The RNC also notes that it sued after finding the city of Appleton, Wisconsin, didn’t have GOP poll workers to assist in nursing homes. The city agreed to hire Republicans as well as Democrats.

The RNC also sued to achieve an equal number of election workers from each major party in the Wisconsin cities of Green Bay and Milwaukee.

State law requires the two major parties to have relatively equal numbers of election workers.

In September 2022, a state court ruled in favor of the RNC’s challenge of guidance by the Wisconsin Elections Commission. The guidance had instructed local election officials to fill in missing information on absentee ballot forms and to witness affidavits.

Judge Michael Aprahamian ruled that the elections commission “cannot continue to promulgate advice it knows—or should know—violates state law and the intent of the Legislature.”

Others objected, such as Claire Woodall-Vogg, executive director of the Milwaukee Election Commission, who told The Associated Press: “Historically, voters have not been penalized for minor errors in voting where intent is clear.”

5. Verifying Mail-In Ballots in Pennsylvania

In May, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on a mail-in ballot verification case in Pennsylvania that had worked its way through state and federal courts.

In the 2022 midterm elections, several county election boards in Pennsylvania announced plans not to enforce a law requiring voters to put a date on their mail-in ballots in order for the ballots to be counted.

The Republican National Committee teamed with the Pennsylvania Republican Party to sue and force those county boards to enforce the law. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court sided with Republicans, prohibiting the counting of undated or misdated ballots.

In response, several liberal groups sued in federal court to challenge the state law requiring mail-in ballots to be dated before being counted.

Among them were Pennsylvania branches of national left-leaning organizations such as the NAACP, the League of Women Voters, and Common Cause. They were joined by state-based or local groups such as Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower and Rebuild; the Black Political Empowerment Project; and Make the Road Pennsylvania.

Last November, a federal district court struck down Pennsylvania’s requirement of dated mail-in ballots.

But in May, the 2-1 ruling by a 3rd Circuit panel upheld the law.

Ari Savitzky, the senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project who argued the case, told reporters after the ruling that “voters may be disenfranchised for a minor paperwork error like forgetting to write an irrelevant date on the return envelope of their mail ballot.”

“We are considering all of our options at this time,” Savitzky said. “And we will not stop fighting for voters.”

Whatley, the RNC’s chairman, said: “Pennsylvanians deserve to feel confident in the security of their mail ballots, and this 3rd Circuit ruling roundly rejects unlawful left-wing attempts to count undated or incorrectly dated mail ballots.”

Ken McIntyre contributed to this report.

“Joe Biden has weaponized the Justice Department to viciously prosecute pro-life activists,” Trump said of the current president on Saturday during remarks at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s 15th annual Road to Majority Conference in Washington, D.C.

“I will also create a new federal task force on fighting anti-Christian bias,” Trump later added. “Its mission will be to investigate all forms of illegal discrimination, harassment, and persecution against Christians in America. It’s taking place at a level that nobody can believe. This is not America any more that we are living in.”

Trump specifically talked about the case of Paulette Harlow, a 75-year-old woman sentenced recently to 24 months in prison for singing in front of an abortion clinic after she was convicted of violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE Act.

Harlow told The Daily Signal earlier this month, “I felt like it was a tremendous privilege to stand in the court on behalf of the unborn, who have no voice.”

For its part, the Biden administration has said the FACE Act is in place to protect the health and safety of women seeking abortions.

Trump delivered a wide-ranging speech, talking almost 90 minutes about the border crisis, the economy and inflation, and crime. He also talked about his own legal problems, which he said were bogus.

He was in front of an enthusiastic crowd that interrupted his speech several times with chants of “Trump, Trump, Trump,” and “USA, USA.”

Trump said he has more political wounds than any other president, but noted Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Jackson come closest. His remarks come days before the first presidential debate between Trump and Biden on Thursday.

This was Trump’s ninth speech at the Road to Majority Conference.

He is banking on comparing the strong economy under his watch with the lagging economy and inflation under the Biden administration. Biden, meanwhile, is beginning to primarily campaign on Trump’s felony conviction in New York last month.

Trump began talking about the targeting of pro-life activists as a contrast with his position that abortion is a policy that should be decided by the states—not the federal government.

He talked about the three justices he appointed to the Supreme Court who voted with the court’s majority in 2022 to scrap the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that made abortion legal nationwide.

“Thanks to these justices, we have what the pro-life movement has fought for for 49 years and we’ve gotten abortion out of the federal government,” Trump said. “Now, the people will decide, and that’s the way it should be. Some states will be more conservative. Some states will be more liberal.”

Trump insisted Democrats don’t want people in the states deciding.

“If the radical Democrat extremes get their way, they will have a federal law on abortion to rip the baby out of the womb in the seventh, eight, ninth month, or even execute the baby after birth,” Trump said.

The “execute” reference, Trump said, was about former Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam, a Democrat, who had seemingly supported the idea of allowing a baby who survived an abortion to be killed.

Trump said he is pro-life, but made exceptions for the life of the mother, rape, or incest.

“Every voter has to go with your heart and do what is right. We have to get elected,” Trump told the audience.

Trump is scheduled for a rally in Philadelphia, and wasn’t originally on the conference’s speaking list. Trump said that his campaign staff encouraged him to cancel out of the Faith and Freedom Coalition event, and he joked, “I don’t have the courage to do that.”

Trump told the largely Christian crowd that not enough Christians turn out to vote.

“Christians go to church, but they don’t vote that much,” Trump said. “Do you know how much power you’ll have if you vote? Just this time. In four years, I don’t care.”

Translated from Spanish, the Oversight Project notes, the flyers posted by the organization Resource Center Matamoros say: “Reminder to vote for President Biden when you are in the United States. We need another four years of his term to stay open.” (The Daily Signal is Heritage’s news and commentary outlet.)

These flyers were discovered by @realmuckraker throughout the Resource Center Matamoras (RCM) location including on the walls of port-a-potties

They also appear to be handed out when illegal aliens use the RCM for assistance in coming to the USA pic.twitter.com/hvlkwOI5Xs

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) April 16, 2024

The pro-Biden flyers, discovered by Muckraker and shared with the Oversight Project, were found throughout Resource Center Matamoros in Tamaulipas, Mexico, including on the walls of portable toilets, a video shows. It’s not clear whether RCM authorized the flyers, whether any action was taken to address their presence at the shelter for migrants, or who posted the flyers.

The city of Matamoros, located in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, borders Brownsville, Texas, where Biden spoke in February about the crisis of illegal immigration at the southern border.

RCM bills itself as an operation which houses functions for Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS), which helps illegal aliens enter the United States.@SecMayorkas is a former board member of HIAS, which received numerous grants from Soros' Open Society Foundation over the years pic.twitter.com/WMtKa2QjOh

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) April 16, 2024

Federal law bans foreign nationals, or non-U.S. citizens, from voting in federal elections.

On Friday, former President Donald Trump endorsed proposed legislation by House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., that would require proof of citizenship to vote in U.S. elections.

Save the Children received over $650,000 from Soros’ Open Society Foundation, and has provided grants to Team Brownsville pic.twitter.com/O9YyaTww0P

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) April 16, 2024

Resource Center Matamoras describes itself as a six-unit office complex that is “the home for HIAS, which is providing legal assistance and assistance with obtaining formal documents for job search and integration into the city of Matamoros as they wait to access the asylum process in the U.S.”

HIAS, founded more than 100 years ago to help Jews fleeing persecution in Europe, originally stood for Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, a Biden appointee who recently was impeached by the House for not enforcing border laws, is a former board member of HIAS.

The website of Resource Center Matamoras says its founder and executive director, Gaby Zavala, partnered with Mike Benavides of the community organization Team Brownsville in November 2023 to brief members of Congress about the humanitarian crisis at the Mexico-Texas border.

Zavala previously was an organizer for La Union del Pueblo Entero, or LUPE, a group founded by the late labor leader Cesar Chavez, who was an opponent of illegal immigration. LUPE is listed among partners of the George Soros-backed Open Society Institute.

RCM is a fiscally sponsored project of the Asylum Seeker Network of Support (“ASNS”)

ASNS 501c3 registration was forfeited in Texas in 2022

But Founder and Executive Director Gaby Zavala continued to operate despite the forfeiture pic.twitter.com/RrUhVVwRrw

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) April 16, 2024

Resource Center Matamoras also has ties to Angry Tias & Abuelas, a left-leaning organization that says it is dedicated to helping illegal aliens at the southwest border enter the United States.

Mayorkas has met with leaders of both LUPE and Angry Tias & Abuelas, according to documents obtained by Judicial Watch, a government watchdog.

The website of Resource Center Matamoras also touts close ties with the Mexican government, saying: “As a leading non-governmental organization providing trauma-informed care, RCM has established relationships with all levels of the Mexican government to advocate for health, wellness and dignity for refugees.”

ELECTION INTEGRITY IS UNDER ASSAULT

You do not need documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote. You can vote if you simply swear you are eligible

This flyer obviously seeks to prey on unsophisticated illegals and encourages them to illegally vote

— Oversight Project (@OversightPR) April 16, 2024

Among listed services: “Providing lobbying and advocacy to Mexican and U.S. government officials on behalf of the asylum seekers in Matamoros.”

“Impeachment is still on the table,” Comer said shortly after his remarks Tuesday at a government weaponization symposium at The Heritage Foundation, parent organization of The Daily Signal.

Congressional Republicans and other observers have been particularly concerned, because presidential son Hunter Biden and other members of the Biden family have struck lucrative business deals in foreign nations such as China, Russia, and Ukraine.

But as a House impeachment of Biden seems less likely because of the razor-thin Republican majority, Comer said he is considering making criminal referrals to the Justice Department—and that Biden’s own law enforcement agency could be forced to take the referrals seriously.

“The main goal for me is to provide accountability, because they have done wrong,” Comer said in a brief interview with The Daily Signal about the Biden family’s influence-peddling scandal. “I think there will be accountability.”

“Because of our investigation, were it not for our investigation,” the Kentucky Republican added, “Hunter Biden would have gotten blanket immunity several months ago.”

Last year, the president’s son reached a plea agreement with the Justice Department. However, after a federal judge scrutinized the deal, it fell apart. Two federal grand juries later indicted the younger Biden on a gun charge and unrelated tax charges.

“We provided an infrastructure to ensure there is a chance of getting accountability in the Justice Department now, in the Merrick Garland Justice Department,” Comer said, referring to the attorney general appointed by Biden.

“With respect to the other crimes, I think there is going to be [accountability]–because of our investigation—an opportunity to have real accountability for the Bidens and the crimes that they’ve committed.”

During his remarks at the Weaponization of the U.S. Government Symposium held by Heritage’s Oversight Project, Comer also stressed that accountability is the next step but didn’t mention the House’s impeachment inquiry.

“Right now, we are going to try to figure out the best way to hold this family accountable,” Comer said at the symposium. “We’ve proven they were influence peddling. We’ve proven [the] many financial crimes they’ve committed. This was never an investigation of Hunter Biden. This was always an investigation of Joe Biden.”

Comer noted that three Biden family business associates—Tony Bobulinski, Jason Galanis, and Devon Archer—have said the business enterprises revolved around Joe Biden.

“What we’ve proven, three Biden associates testified under oath that Joe Biden was the central figure in the influence-peddling scheme,” he said.

Another goal of his oversight committee will be to pass legislation to discourage influence peddling by officeholders, the Kentucky Republican said. He compared Biden to Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., who was recently indicted on corruption charges.

“I don’t think the American people approve of that. I don’t think they approve of our president or vice president being for sale,” Comer said. “We are going to try to figure out the best path forward. Then we are going to focus on, from my committee, how to pass legislation to keep the Bidens and the Menendezes from doing this again—because the law is pretty murky.”

Moreover, the House probe into the Biden family’s activities has expanded to include the actions of government agencies.

“What we’ve found in the Biden investigations is there were numerous government agencies that were investigating the Bidens—the Securities and Exchange Commission, FBI, the Department of Justice in several different jurisdictions, the IRS,” Comer said.

“Each time they were told to stand down. So in addition to the financial crimes that we’ve discovered, we found a massive government coverup in many different agencies.’