While in the coliseum Roberto Clemente the municipal count of Culebra is carried out, where the challenger of the New Progressive Party (PNP) to win preliminary by just two votes, the electoral commissioner of the Democratic People’s Party (PPD), Gerardo “Toñito” Creu, Denounced in a press conference that investigations by his community show that on the island of the municipality were committed at least four types of fraud with advanced and absent voting.
The first of the cases mentioned by Creu corresponds to four approved applications for advanced voting by mail in which the same section in Culebra was included as a postal address. According to the PPD commissioner, although the four voters whose applications were approved are registered on the island municipality, “the person who appears as the owner, handler or has control of this section has no connection with these four voters “.
The four voters whose applications were approved submitted affidavits stating that they were unaware that they had been processed this voting modality, the election commissioner said.
Creu also denounced the case of a voter who, despite living in the United States, requested early voting by mail, when according to the new Electoral code it would have been appropriate for him to request an absent vote to be outside Puerto Rico.
“The voter lives and posts on social media who has lived in the United States for years. He may have asked for an absentee vote (because) today you don’t have to justify why he orders you to ask for the ballot to get to Florida or Texas. This voter requests the advanced vote mail version so that the ballot paper arrives at this post office box (in Culebra) where the ballots are also received by his mother and sister … They were already received by advanced ballot mail, and these ballots to the commission and they were mixed with all the numbers, ”Cross lamented.
The Cross also noted that at least four cases of voters who were approved for an early voting application by mail were identified despite being registered in some other U.S. jurisdiction. The commissioner recalled that in the summer, after the PPD filed a lawsuit, the State Election Commission (EEC) He “promised” to exclude from its register more than 5,500 voters who appeared registered in other states and territories, but the agency failed to do so.
“The EEC never removed them from the register. Instead, it sent them the ballots from Puerto Rico, including Culebra, and they were able to exercise their right to vote,” Creu said.
Finally, Creu provided a list of seven voters who “have not been domiciled in Culebra for years”, but who, under the new electoral law, which does not require justification to approve the absent vote, received their ballots under this category.
The commissioner assured that Culebra, with these 16 instances of potential fraud, presented the best example of the risks involved in the creation of the new Electoral Code.
“Culebra is the best example of the approval of an Electoral Code designed to allow a fraudulent vote. Now a voter can request the advance vote in its absent mode, without any explanation. In the same way it allows voters to they are not domiciled in the precinct they can request and exercise the vote and that these ballots can be received in any direction “, he affirmed.
The mayor of Culebria, William Iván SolísHe assured that he will seek to bring these instances of possible fraud to the last consequences, regardless of the election result.
“We will make democracy enforceable,” said the city executive, who lamented that requests for advanced voting modalities were mostly approved after the deadline imposed by the Electoral Code to file voter recusals.
According to Cruz, Solís made the references to the EEC for the body to investigate the allegations.
According to the commissioner, the apparent irregularities with the early vote could have cost the elections to the incumbent. The summaries of the events of the night of the event show that Solís won in the regular schools and the face-to-face advance vote by 28 votes, but was delayed by 30 votes against Edilberto Romero, From the PNP, to unit 77, which counts the absent vote, advanced by mail, at home and confined.