Op Ed: Don’t fall for Blumenthal’s “Anything Goes” Constitutional amendment this November

It’s quite telling to see the unbridled optimism coming from Representative Matt Blumenthal, regarding the proposed “No excuse” amendment to appear on the ballot in November. Like a poker player who can’t keep a bluff, Blumenthal shows his giddy hand in his recent Op Ed. This amendment is not about absentee voting—it’s about removing all guardrails in the process.

He claims CT “would join 36 other states”.

Excerpt: “Twenty-eight states offer “no-excuse” absentee voting, which means that any voter can request and cast an absentee/mail ballot, no excuse or reason necessary. Eight states and Washington, D.C., conduct elections entirely by mail (California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington), which means voters do not need to request a ballot, and instead automatically receive one.” —Source: www.ncsl.org.  

He then hearkens back to the Civil War, lamenting that the CT Supreme Court was obliged to adhere to the State Constitution in striking down an absentee voting law. Matt Blumenthal is a Harvard law school graduate—thus it’s a shame he doesn’t recognize the proper function of the CT Supreme Court. Like his father Dick, Matt believes the courts should be activists instead of interpreters. The Court made the right call, because at that time the State Constitution did not allow absentee voting. He should know the Court is not a substitute for the Legislative process.

Blumenthal conveniently fails to mention the elephant of an ongoing scandal: the national embarrassment of Wanda Geter-Patacky. Was Wanda just making sure others could still vote?

If the proposed amendment passes, Wanda can stuff as many extra ballots, or “votes” as she wants.

Under the proposed amendment, all she has to do is claim she’s voting on behalf of people who couldn’t—or wouldn’t—vote in person. Remember, no guardrails on absentee voting means anything goes.

Blumenthal’s claim: Absentee voting spurred the state of CT to a 79.7% turnout in 2020.

Fact check: AB voting helped provide roughly ⅓ of the total votes cast, or 35% of the total vote.

Blumenthal’s claim: Other states’ absentee voting actually causes fraud to be “vanishingly rare” 

Fact check: Blumenthal indirectly implies that a low fraud rate is somehow connected to absentee voting laws. There is no evidence to support or oppose this claim.

Blumenthal claim: “Lion’s share” of AB improprieties stems from getting an AB for ineligible voters.

Fact check: Matt doesn’t specify what a “lion’s share” is; the data reveals much of absentee ballot misfeasance or malfeasance stems from proxy voting and falsifying AB applications.

In Blumenthal’s world, any guardrail on voting outside the polling place restricts “democracy”. The Stamford representative is implicitly comfortable with any or all of the following:

• Mailing an absentee ballot to every voter in the state, even if the voter is ineligible (Matt Blumenthal may believe ineligibility is also an unfair guardrail, preventing “democracy”)
• Voting via an installed app on mobile phones or desktop
• Voting via QR code
• Printing multiple ballots for as many opportunities as possible to vote
• Proxy voting
• Voter intimidation outside the poll premises

Blumenthal favors a no-holds-barred access that invites significant chain of custody breaks, and a deeper erosion of electoral trust. This proposed amendment is in fact pandora’s box, and Matt wants you to help him—and the Democrat-controlled legislature—to open it. 

A note on security: Matt isn’t talking about chain of custody ballot security. He’s talking about the safety of poll workers and the in-person voting environment.

Voters actually turned down a “no excuse absentee” amendment in 2014, when it was clearly articulated that guardrails would be removed. The language is now deliberately vague, and Rep. Blumenthal hopes voters are too asleep to notice the serious, negative repercussions behind the vague language. It’s time once again to vote a resounding NO on Blumenthal’s proposed “Anything Goes” amendment to the State Constitution.