RNC chair falsely claims states 'don't have the counting machines' for ballots

Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said on Monday that states “don’t have the counting machines” or the personnel to tally mail-in ballots for the November election.

McDaniel’s comments were part of the GOP’s ongoing attacks on mail-in voting and echoed similar sentiments Donald Trump has expressed on multiple occasions in a campaign to cast doubt on the results of the election before it is even held.

The Brookings Institution notes in its guide to mail-in voting that votes cast by mail are counted no differently from any other votes, with the methods used depending on what kind of ballots a given state uses. The website ThoughtCo runs down counting procedures for punch-card voting, electronic voting, paper balloting, and other methods, which can be tallied by hand, by machine, by card reader — but, says Brookings, “On Election Day, states count the mail ballots and add the results to the votes of those individuals who cast their ballots in person.”

There are no additional “counting machines” needed.

From the Aug. 10 edition of “Fox & Friends”:

RONNA McDANIEL: The way I view it is, it’s like having a wedding for a hundred guests and having 100,000 people show up. The systems are not prepared for this deluge of mail-in ballots. They don’t have the counting machines, they don’t have the personnel. That’s why it took six weeks to get results in New York. Could you imagine, we have an Election Day and it takes two to three months to get the results? What that would do to this country when we’re as divided as we are?

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.