A statewide series of events aimed at convincing the public the election process is reliable will include a swing next week through Mount Airy, where one local Republican official is skeptical.
Billed as the North Carolina Trusted Elections Tour, the non-partisan effort involves 27 town hall meetings being held across North Carolina.
The session in Mount Airy is scheduled next Wednesday from 6:30 to 8 p.m. in the council chambers of the Municipal Building on South Main Street. Everyone is invited.
That event will be sandwiched between two other town hall meetings in Statesville and Asheboro as part of the series. It began on Aug. 19 in Hendersonville and is to conclude with an Oct. 15 virtual town hall.
Those conducting the series of 90-minute sessions are providing information on the electoral process, seeking to build trust in the voting system and strengthen civil discourse.
An announcement for the local meeting states that attendees will hear “election experts explain why your ballot and your vote are secure.”
The Trusted Elections Tour is being hosted by the North Carolina Network for Fair, Safe and Secure Elections, described as a grassroots project initiated by The Carter Center. The League of Women Voters is a partner in the series along with an organization called Veterans for All Voters.
“The event will have an emcee and a moderator with topics including election administration and cybersecurity, as well as rules for election observers,” according to Surry County Director of Elections Michella Huff in announcing next week’s town hall meeting here.
“This is merely a small list of topics with many more during the event, so come join us to learn about elections in your state and your community,” Huff added in urging local citizens to attend.
Panelists to be on hand include office personnel from the Surry Board of Elections and a bi-partisan team with members of the county elections board that governs the local voting process.
They include Dwayne Carter, the board chairman, and Jimmy Yokeley.
Additional panelists of bi-partisan representatives also are expected to attend, according to Huff, with a question-and-answer period to conclude the event.
Along with various officials, election law attorneys have attended town hall meetings elsewhere, with other discussion topics including concerns about electronic voting machines and hacking and explaining the security of the electoral process in collecting/counting ballots.
Experts also have addressed how challenges, recounts and fraud allegations are handled through proper legal channels.
The Surry elections director is thankful to the city government in providing the host site for what she called an “informative event.”
GOP leader unconvinced
Keith Senter, the chairman of the Surry County Republican Party, this week referred to the North Carolina Trusted Elections Tour as a kind of promotional gimmick.
“It’s a sales pitch, is all it is,” said Senter who has been a staunch critic of local election operations.
“Absolutely there is a bunch of questions about it,” he said of the tour and those presenting information.
“They’re trying to tell us our elections are accurate, but they’re not telling us what that is,” Senter added.
One concern in particular involves allegations that the state Board of Elections has allowed non-citizens to register to vote, thus undermining the integrity of the process. The Republican National Committee and the North Carolina GOP are suing the state board over that issue.
From monitoring various reports, the local Republican chairman said it appears to him that state election officials are OK with small numbers of illegals somehow managing to trickle through, although he offered no documentation or any evidence to support his claim.
“One is too many,” said Senter, who advised that he likely will not be attending next week’s town hall meeting in Mount Airy.
“I probably wouldn’t be able to hold my tongue,” the GOP chairman explained.
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