The problem with the Trumpists raising baseless fears of election fraud to promote their insurrectionist agenda is that they can never be persuaded away from the fictions they use to justify their crusade. Present them with plain facts to rebuff one lie, and the Trumpists just leap to another lie.
Such reckless Tarzanery is on display in courthouse attacker Aaron Grant‘s persistent justification of his violence against the public. As I reported last month, Grant lied his way into the Brown County Auditor’s Office last December 17 and smashed a county computer, claiming that he was protecting democracy from electronic voting. Brown County Auditor Cathy McNickle made clear to Grant that South Dakotans cast paper ballots, so Grant shifts to a different lie to justify his assault on the rule of law:
Grant said that after his conversation with McNickle he now recognizes that each voter fills out a paper ballot and that those ballots are scanned by a machine that tabulates the results. But, he said, at the end of the day, the compiled results are stored on a thumb drive that’s given to the state. That electronic copy, he said, is where he feels there’s a potential for manipulation [Elisa Sand, “Aaron Grant Smashed an Election Laptop. Now He’s Challenging Groton’s Incumbent Mayor Scott Hanlon,” Aberdeen News via Sioux Falls Argus Leader, 2022.04.08].
Now Auditor McNickle has to spend time refuting this false claim:
But Brown County Auditor Cathy McNickle said that claim is false. The drive Grant is referring to doesn’t store the results of the election. Instead, she said, it is locked behind a secure panel on the voting machine. It’s a secure, encrypted drive with the necessary programming that allows the tabulator machine to read the ballots and count the votes for the election.
The results, she said, are then printed on a piece of paper. Once election results are counted, she said, that encrypted drive is stored with the other election material for the next 22 months, per federal regulations.
South Dakota Secretary of State Steve Barnett said while counties upload unofficial election results on the state’s website, a paper copy of all county-level results are submitted on paper and verified in the state’s canvass of the election results.
Both Barnett and McNickle said the voting tabulator machine is not connected to the internet [Sand, 2022.04.08].
With all facts refuting his claims, Grant persists with his self-justifying falsehoods:
“I was still suspicious,” he said. “That’s why I did what I did.”
Grant said it’s inevitable that questions about election results will come up again.
“The discussion needs to continue,” he said [Sand, 2022.04.08].
No, Aaron, the discussion needs to stop. You’ve been proven wrong. South Dakota’s elections are not rigged. South Dakota’s election equipment, procedures, and officers are reliable. The only thing that may cause us to doubt the integrity of our elections is electing angry, violent, lying nutbars like you to public positions where you can wreak havoc on the election process.
Grant is running for mayor of Groton against incumbent Scott Hanlon. Mayor Hanlon assesses Grant’s dangerous criminal behavior with great understatement:
“It’s not the proper way to handle that situation,” Hanlon said. “We all have situations. There’s a proper way to handle things and not a proper way, and that wasn’t a proper way” [Sand, 2022.04.08].
…then goes on to remind voters of the practical problems he’s busy solving as mayor, like using covid relief funds to buy the bank building Wells Fargo abandoned and turn it into a nicer library and city offices.
Groton, do yourselves, truth, and democracy a favor. Don’t affirm Grant’s criminal violence and lies. Reëlect Mayor Hanlon and keep your town focused on real, civil solutions to real problems.
Thumb driving? Maybe that’s Ravnborg’s problem.
How long has this idiot Aaron Grant lived in South Dakota? Less than one election cycle? Anyone who has ever voted in SD should know that they filled out a paper ballot, yes the ballots are read by machine but the actual ballots are preserved and can be recounted by hand if need be.
grudznick grows weary of these numbats in the County of Brown.
I don’t understand paranoia over election results when Republicans – the ones dong the fussing – are winning all the elections. I have to ask, “To what end?” if the Democrats are doing so much cheating. If SD suddenly turned Blue, THEN I could see some eyebrow raised or a flag thrown, but this comes off as the Harlem Globetrotters getting on the refs for the Washington General traveling.
Rocket scientist Aaron Grant has stumbled upon the real culprits in South Dakota voting. Thumb drives! No wonder brain donors like the Greenfields (weren’t they on that TV show “Hee Haw” sitting on the couch?), Drew Dennert and the enchanting darling of the Senate Al Novstrup get elected out of Brown County again and again. This totally explains how an idiot like Kristi Noem got elected.
Well, let’s do something about it. Buy a sledge hammer and start smashing all the thumb drives in Aberdeen! Don’t have one? Popular Mechanics strongly recommends Estwing’s 3-Pound Sledge with Fiberglass Handle & No-Slip Cushion Grip. You can order one from Amazon for a low, low $18, and have it delivered free by Sunday if you order today and if you’ve got Amazon Prime.
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Thank you Double-A-Aron! Smash those thumb drives! Smash those thumb drives! Expechually them in-the-crypto drives!
We’re going to get to work next week with our new forged steel head Estwing sledges to right the wrongs committed by every county auditor in South Dakota! Release your inner reckless Tarzanery and git’r’done!!!
Grant tells the press he thought about smashing one of the vote tabulation machines, but when he heard the price tag, he chickened out and went for a smaller target. He wants to rage against the machine, but only at the cheap misdemeanor level.
Yes, Mike, Grant could do a lot more good fighting the threat posed to the public by Ravnsborg’s thumbing and driving than from any of our reliable county auditors’ efforts to conduct fair elections.
Rage against the moderately-priced machine just does not have the same ring to it.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a thumb drive is a good guy with a sledge hammer?
I was imagining Ravnsborg with one thumb in his maw and the other texting with no hands on the wheel.
If it ain’t one thing, it’ll be something else. These folks never stop with the lies and conspiracy mania. There’s an infinite number of wild goose chases you can send these nutcases on. They all have their fake PhDs in election management from listening to The Pillow Guy and the Trumpster.
In Wisconsin we’ve had several “investigations” of the Wisconsin election in 2020. One was at least semi-honest. That one concluded there was no evidence of widespread fraud or mistakes at any point in the 2020 election and that Biden won, but that the legislature should tighten up the laws on voting anyway. Well, that didn’t go far enough for Trump, so our Speaker of the Assembly was taken on a plane ride with Donald Trump. After that we got the “Gableman investigation,” still not concluded nearly a year after it started. And we’ve got several Aaron Grant-style nutcases back up with big bucks from the goofy right billionaires spewing stuff that the more responsible nutcases try to downplay. I mean, really, the nutcases are having a field-day grifting the sheep out of their money. All they have to do is come up with some cockamamie conspiracy or some phony algorithm and the money just flows their way.
I’m not sure
How come this criminal isn’t in jail yet?
Cory, its nice to see how Noem is attracting the best and brightest to South Dakota isn’t it? I thought they were all moving to Rapid but I see it’s statewide. All those little towns with all those cheap houses….
Their parents died from refusing the covid shot so they have a little money earlier than they thought. Why not. They won’t make it through the first tough winter but freedum rings for So Dak.
John Dale is somewhere nodding sagely in a room that suspiciously smells like bath salts.
The disintegration of the Republican Party has never been more urgent. We’ve known it since President Eisenhower told us and now America Balkanization is all but certain.
Praise be.
Under His eye.
May the Lord open.
Oddly enough, tho I lack the data skills of Cory and search capabilities, I have read in many editions of the MSM papers of searches for fraud and corruption in the 2020 election and I believe that at least 80 % of known and discovered cases were ALL committed by Republicans! Like Mark Meadows (trump chief of staff) that used a mobile home in Georgia he and his wife had never lived in as a way to vote in that battleground state. Also, in Arizona, several fraudulent votes uncovered-all from Republicans trying to cheat the system.
Not satisfied by ‘playing by the rules’, they want to use their own slanted version of “Oh, it’s all for a good cause-so it’s ‘ok'” !!!
Well..Jake…you’re on to something…I think any honest “forensic audit” of various states in the 2020 election would find very little voter irregularity, but what existed, would not be evenly distributed between the two parties, but would be skewed to the Republican side of the tally sheet. They have shown a propensity for illegal behavior and many believe that election fraud is a virtue if it assists GOP candidates. Or so I’ve heard at lunch.
He’s correct. There are several opportunities to exploit the ballot boxes, mostly in the digital chain of custody.
Would write more, but I’m busy following up on a lead that France is using only paper ballots and hand counting, the conclusive evidence in WI and Arizona, the obvious incompetence by LE in GA, and the outright fraud and unapologetic criminality in PA.
Spearditch is the new Roswell.
And for John Dale’s next fanfic, he tells a story of saving America by casting pyroblast and combust on Hillary Clinton. One reviewer noted: “Not great, but more believable than his election fraud stuff.”
The further from 2016 election steal by drumpf and Putin we get, the more prescient becomes HRC’s claims about deplorable, despicable magats.
Use to think john dale popped out of a rabbit hole, but now am more convinced that
he just keeps running around the same tree chasing his tail.
John Dale thinks there’s “conclusive evidence” in Wisconsin. I can tell you that even Republicans in Wisconsin are fed up with the constant b.s. coming from the “election steal” mental wards. For one, they are making accusations against well-regarded Republican election officials. Besides, the “election steal” is a 2020-Jan. 6, 2021 story. Since Trump’s coup failed, it’s a losing issue for Republicans. It gives Democrats a way to bring up the violence in the Capitol Building, etc. They’ve got newer fake issues to exploit, like CRT and the crime wave. Besides, the money has just about run out on the “election steal” fakery.
Ask John Dale about Foxconn and how that is working out for the good folks in Wisconsin. Kinda like the shrimpy farm in South Dakota, just more grift to stick to the taxpayers.
Stop the steal of trump and his outlaws on our money.