The Secretary of the State’s office on Friday announced it has referred several possible election violations — including “suspicious activity” at drop boxes ahead of the most recent Bridgeport election on Feb. 27 — to election enforcement officials.
In a letter to the State Elections Enforcement Commission, Secretary of the State Stephanie Thomas wrote that election monitors put in place to oversee the latest election discovered “eight out of 63 voters contacted in a spot check said they had received absentee ballots even though they never requested them.”
The letter also noted another voter who told spot checkers that “someone came to his house to help him fill out and sign an absentee ballot and then took the ballot away.”
“When alerted, the Secretary of the State’s Office is required to send allegations of election malfeasance to SEEC for their review and decision to investigate if any laws were broken,” Thomas said. “Referrals are not proof of wrongdoing, but an important step to ensure that our elections are secure.”
Mayor Joe Ganim easily won his fourth election since September garnering 6,366 votes compared to his opponent, John Gomes, a Democrat who ran on the Independent Party line, with 4,138 votes. Republican David Herz came in a distant third with 357 votes, according to the Secretary of the State’s website.
The mayor’s win in the special general election closed out part of a controversial and embarrassing chapter in the city’s history, one in which several of the mayor’s political supporters were allegedly captured on camera depositing multiple absentee ballots into drop boxes ahead of last September’s Democratic primary.
After that primary was challenged in court, a state Superior Court judge determined the surveillance footage provided enough evidence to toss out the results of that primary election, a decision that pushed the mayoral contest between Ganim and Gomes into 2024.
In the months that followed, Gomes’ supporters filed dozens of complaints with the State Elections Enforcement Commission, alleging widespread absentee ballot fraud in the September primary. Ganim’s backers subsequently filed similar complaints against individuals who worked on Gomes’ campaign last summer.
All those complaints are still pending before the SEEC. Now Thomas has added new complaints to the dozens already under investigation.
The secretary of the state’s new complaint also involves similar allegations to those heard in court last year of a person dropping off multiple absentee ballots at drop boxes in the city. The complaint indicates that Bridgeport police notified election officials of four possible incidents captured on surveillance cameras monitoring the absentee ballot boxes across the city.
Three of them involved an unknown man, which the complaint states is wearing a hoodie to conceal his identity, dropping multiple ballots into drop boxes at two different locations just days before the Feb. 27 vote. There is no indication in the complaint who the man is or whether he was a Ganim or Gomes campaign worker.
Thomas said in her statement that her office has no authority to investigate complaints it receives and that one of her recommendations in election reform legislation she recently proposed — specifically SB 441 — includes forming a board to view and mitigate election administration issues that currently fall within the gap between the jurisdiction of the Office of the Secretary of the State and SEEC.
The 17-member board would be granted the authority to mandate training, the implementation of best practices and to monitor an election when necessary.
“Our office is committed to doing what we can to ensure that not just Bridgeport’s citizens trust the elections process, but all of Connecticut does. Two bills have been introduced in the General Assembly, which include our proposals to close loopholes observed by our election monitors,” she said.
Thomas also has proposed a comprehensive election security bill, HB 5498, that includes: requiring the surveillance of absentee ballot drop boxes and retention of the footage; modifications for how absentee ballot data is recorded and reported; limiting who may apply for replacement absentee ballots; and reducing the window of availability of absentee ballot applications.
The proposed legislation addresses many of the issues The Connecticut Mirror raised in an investigation into how the battle for absentee ballots took place and how Ganim’s supporters collected and delivered thousands of absentee ballot applications.
The investigation revealed that Bridgeport Democratic Town Committee Vice Chairman Wanda Geter-Pataky spent four months traversing parts of Bridgeport, helping voters fill out at least 537 absentee ballot applications ahead of the summer primary, which was decided by 251 votes.
The judge’s decision to overturn the election in September captured national and international attention. But nobody has been charged as part of any investigation to this point.
Both Geter-Pataky and Eneida Martinez, two of Ganim’s supporters who were allegedly captured on video depositing ballots into drop boxes last September, were in attendance at Ganim’s most recent election party celebration.
Geter-Pataky was recently renominated as vice chairman of the Bridgeport Democratic Town Committee and Martinez has announced she is going to run for state representative.