RALEIGH — North Carolina Republican Party Chairman Jason Simmons stressed election integrity and transparency during the party’s “Protect the Vote” event held on Sept. 14.
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Whatley, candidate for state attorney general and U.S. Rep. Dan Bishop, former acting U.S. Attorney General Matt Whitaker and Brad Knott, the 13th District’s Republican congressional nominee, attended the event as the party aims to prepare volunteers for Election Day.
“We set a very audacious goal of recruiting and training 100,000 volunteers around the country, 5,000 in every battleground state,” said Whatley. “So far, pretty good response. We’ve got 175,000 people as of yesterday — 6,500 of them here in North Carolina.”
“Election integrity is vital,” said Knott, a formal federal prosecutor. “Whether it’s fraudulent use of absentee ballots, whether it’s false registrations, even noncitizens who vote — that happened right here in North Carolina — It’s imperative that we remain vigilant. It is imperative that we protect the vote one citizen at a time.”
Several speakers criticized the Biden-Harris administration and Democratic leaders when it came to following the rule of law and supporting law enforcement.
Bishop referenced the 2020 “collusive settlement agreement“ current N.C. Attorney General Josh Stein, the Democrats’ candidate for governor, entered into with Democrat plaintiffs. That agreement altered absentee ballot and other election rules while voting was occurring and happened without the knowledge of the legislature, which was a party in the case in question.
“It’s time to change the way the attorney general’s office is disposed in North Carolina, to enforce all of the law without ideologically choosing laws that someone likes and someone doesn’t like,” said Bishop. “That is not only wrong, it is an attack on our constitutional system.”
Whitaker also criticized the current administration on multiple fronts, including national security and law enforcement support, saying, “This administration doesn’t have the backs of local police officers and sheriff’s deputies.”
Whitaker also made a call to action to mobilize supporters of former President Donald Trump.
“We need to do more than we’ve ever done,” Whitaker said. “This is the moment to save our country, to put us on the right track, and to make sure we have another 250 years or more of freedom and opportunity and the promises of this great country that our founding fathers and forebears gave to us in 1776.”
Whatley rounded out remarks by discussing the party’s strategy for the 2024 election.
“We’re going to do two things,” Whatley told attendees. “We are going to get out the vote and we are going to protect the ballot. That’s it.”
Whatley said to secure election integrity, the “right rules of the road (need to be) in place before voting starts,” like citizen-only voting, voter ID and cleaning up voter rolls.
Whatley underscored that having “personal conversations” is “the most effective thing” each volunteer can do to reach voters.
“Black voters, Hispanic voters, Asian American voters are coming our way by the tens of thousands in North Carolina and around the country because of the economic conditions,” Whatley said.
Whatley told reporters at the end of the event that recent legal actions have been taken to remove noncitizens from voter rolls in several states, including North Carolina.
“We’ve seen thousands of them that have come off the voter rolls in Nevada, as well as other states (like) Ohio,” Whatley said when asked if noncitizens had a “significant” impact on election results.
“When you think about North Carolina, the chief justice race back in 2020 was decided by 401 votes. Four votes per county,” Whatley later added. “So yeah, we take this very seriously.”
Noncitizens have been found on voter rolls in multiple states and have been removed. Alabama reported 3,251 noncitizens on voter rolls and “over 6,500 potential noncitizens” were found in Texas.” According to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, “approximately 1,930” of those individuals had a voter history.
“We want to make it easy to vote,” Whatley said, “hard to cheat.”
Simmons said recent lawsuits against the North Carolina State Board of Elections were necessary because, he said, it’s “the most partisan Board of Elections that we’ve seen.”
“We’ve asked the State Board of Elections repeatedly to make sure that the voter rolls are clean, and they haven’t taken that action,” said Simmons.
“I have sat in court where illegal immigrants have acknowledged full awareness of voting illegally,” Knott said. “If any vote happens illegally in North Carolina, it is a problem for all of us. Every vote is important; every vote must be protected. Our state depends on it, and our country depends on it.”
Whatley and Simmons expressed confidence in the GOP’s prospects both nationally and in the state.
“We feel very comfortable about where we are in North Carolina right now,” said Whatley. “We have had a small but durable lead, which I think kind of matches where we are historically.”
Simmons added: “What we continue to see is when voters are put forward with issues that matter just to them — law and order, public safety, the economy — Republicans have the right message. Democrats continue to fail North Carolina citizens and voters, and that’s why we’re looking forward to a great night in November.”
