Oregon’s election process deserves vote of ‘no confidence’

Sen. Kim Thatcher

Salem, Ore. – Senator Kim Thatcher (R-Keizer) released the following statement following a press conference held by Governor Kate Brown and U.S. Senator Ron Wyden on their desire to expand vote-by-mail nationwide:

“Oregon’s election process should get a strong vote of ‘no confidence’ after being plagued by issues this Primary election,” said Senator Thatcher.

“This isn’t about one political party. Our vote-by-mail system is strangled with problems like 20,000 duplicate ballots in two counties, voters getting their party registration changed unknowingly, or voters receiving multiple ballots and told to simply ‘use the second one.’ While we haven’t seen election fraud yet, our Secretary of State needs to do more to reassure voters – beyond spouting a Haiku poem – that their ballots are being processed accurately.

Oregonians deserve fair and secure elections with safeguards in place to protect the integrity of our voting system. The entire nation should not be pushed to adopt Oregon’s plagued vote-by-mail system, when clearly this should be a decision made by individual states.”

Kim Thatcher is the Republican state senator for District 13 (Keizer, Newberg, St. Paul, Sherwood, Wilsonville, King City, and parts of Beaverton, Hillsboro, Tigard and Tualatin)