A DuPage County judge has ordered DuPage County Clerk Jean Kaczmarek to change the way her office counts mail-in ballots, issuing a temporary restraining order requiring DuPage County election judges to exclusively rely on voter registration records on file when verifying signatures on the ballot are from the actual voter.
“The Election Code does not permit the use of a signature from a mail in ballot application to validate any mail-in ballot signature,” DuPage County Judge James D. Orel wrote in his order.
“Use of the Vote by Mail ballot application to qualify signatures on the Vote by Mail ballot itself would be an obvious way to commit ballot fraud,” the judge said.
Judge Orel issued the order following an early afternoon emergency hearing on Tuesday, Nov. 15, in the lawsuit brought against Kaczmarek the evening prior by State Rep. Deanne Mazzochi, R-Elmhurst.
In that action, Mazzochi sought a temporary restraining order, shutting down the counting of mail-in ballots in a tight election contest, until the DuPage County Clerk can demonstrate she is following the law in how mail-in ballots are being counted.
Specifically, Mazzochi claims she and other members of her team who are monitoring the counting of mail-in ballots have witnessed multiple instances in which DuPage County election judges, often with the assistance of Kaczmarek’s staff, have failed to follow the law in how they verify the signatures on the ballot match official voter registration records.
According to the lawsuit, election judges counting the ballots have repeatedly refused to reject ballots for which the signature of the voter on the ballot does not match the voter’s signatured in the county’s official voter registration books.
Rather, Mazzochi asserts the clerk’s office often is choosing to compare the signatures on the ballot to the signature used on the mail-in ballot application or other electronic records.
Mazzochi argues the law makes no allowance for such verification, as the law requires the signatures on the ballot to be compared to voter registration records.
Mazzochi is locked in a tight election contest with her Democratic challenger, Jenn Ladisch Douglass, also of Elmhurst, for a seat in the Illinois House of Representatives from the 45th District. According to unofficial vote totals updated midday Tuesday, Nov. 15, Mazzochi trailed Douglass by 246 votes. More than 42,000 ballots had been counted thus far in the contest.
Under Illinois law, election officials are required to count all mail-in ballots received in the two weeks following Election Day. Those ballots do not need a postmark or any other independent verification that they were legally mailed on or before Election Day, only a self-certification by the voter that the ballot was legally mailed on time to be counted.
Republicans and others have argued in court and elsewhere that this lack of independent verification opens wide the possibilities for untraceable election fraud.
Democrats have claimed any kind of additional verification requirement would amount to voter suppression and disenfranchisement.
Attorneys for Kaczmarek argued during the hearing that the lawsuit should be dismissed.
The motion to dismiss doesn’t address Mazzochi’s claims that Kaczmarek’s election judges and her office staff are not properly verifying that a mail-in ballot is legal.
Instead, the DuPage County Clerk said Mazzochi’s lawsuit should not be allowed, because it represents a premature challenge to an election in which votes are still being counted.
The Clerk characterized Mazzochi’s lawsuit as an extra-legal attempt to persuade a court to step into the process of counting ballots in an ongoing election.
The Clerk’s motion asserted the court would be the first court in Illinois history to take such action.
Judge Orel denied the motion to dismiss.
In a statement following the judge’s order, Mazzochi said she was pleased by the judge’s decision.
Mazzochi noted the verification procedures being practiced by Kaczmarek’s office “provided literally no security check of integral value.”
“The Court rightly recognized that using a Vote by Mail application to qualify signatures on the Vote by Mail ballot itself ‘would be an obvious way to commit ballot fraud,’ and that restraining the Clerk from following this process immediately will protect the integrity of the election process to the benefit of both candidates,” Mazzochi said.
“While the Clerk’s improper procedures have already damaged the process, I will continue to fight for ensuring it is one conducted with integrity. Voting by mail cannot work without stringent protections and secure procedures to ensure that a voter’s identity is not stolen.
“The court’s order will now protect voters for the remainder of this election and tabulation process. It is our hope that the DuPage County Clerk will agree to follow the Court’s standards for future elections, as well.”
Kaczmarek is represented in the action by attorneys Sean Conway and Patrick K. Bond, of the firm of Bond, Dickson & Conway, of Wheaton.
Mazzochi is represented by attorneys Christopher Esbrook and Michael Kozlowski, of Esbrook P.C., of Chicago.