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Trump Absentee Ballots Being Destroyed? Postal Worker Brags About Opening, Ripping Up Ballots With Votes For Donald Trump

By Heather Tooley
Published on: 05:22 PST, Oct 17, 2016

UPDATE: A Twitter user alleging to be a postal worker claiming to open and rip open ballots with votes for Trump in Ohio has been confirmed as false, Snopes reports.

Original Story

Are absentee ballots with votes for Donald Trump being destroyed? Someone claiming to be an Ohio post office employee is stirring up a lot of Twitter users after bragging about ripping up absentee ballots from Trump voters. His tweet even got the attention of Trump supporter and actor Scott Baio.

“[I] love working at the post office in Columbus, Ohio and ripping up absentee ballots that vote for trump,” the man wrote.

The tweet didn’t go unnoticed by Baio, who called out the guy and tagged Ohio Governor John Kasich in his response.

In messages that followed, the tweet got more attention over the possibility that Trump absentee ballots were being ripped up by an employee with the United States Postal Service. The troublemaker responded to a series of questions and comments by other users who accused him of breaking the law by destroying absentee ballots.

The supposed postal worker fueled the heated exchanges more by writing that it’s legal for the post office to open voter ballots. He claimed that he and other employees were ordered to open ballots that came into the mailing facility. One person cited 18 U.S. Code 1703, which explains that it is a federal offense for the “delay or destruction of mail or newspapers.” The individual then told the culprit to look it up.

It’s unclear if the man is an actual post office employee who’s ripping up Trump absentee ballots. It’s not something people take lightly because there’s already concern about voter fraud. There’s suspicion that the man is a troll out to fan the flames of anxiety over voter fraud.

— New York Post (@nypost) October 17, 2016

A new report on Monday, which is getting picked up by multiple media outlets, states that 41 percent of American voters fear that voter fraud will have a hand in the election. They believe the November 8 election will be stolen from Trump. The statistic was released by the Politico/Morning Consult Poll. It was conducted from among 1,999 voters and illustrated that Trump’s warnings about the election being rigged are having an impact. Seventy-three percent of Republicans think the election will be stolen from Donald Trump, while only 17 percent of Democrats feel the same way.

The poll further showed that 60 percent of voters agreed with Trump questioning the accuracy of election results because of voter fraud or a foreign government.

The co-founder and chief research officer at Morning Consult, Kyle Dropp, explains that more and more voters are losing faith that their ballots will be counted accurately.

“The results show that voters are increasingly losing confidence that votes around the country will be counted accurately on Election Day,” Dropp said. “The sentiment especially rings true among Trump’s supporters, with half expressing concern about a ‘rigged election.'”

If someone goes on social media claiming to work at the post office and destroying absentee ballots that vote for Donald Trump, it’ll be taken seriously. Suspicion has taken hold that somehow the election will be rigged. There are only 22 days until the election, and Trump is behind Hillary Clinton by five to 11 points in every recognizable national survey. Trump has blamed the Republican Party for his slip in the polls, charging they abandoned him by revoking their support after the release of a 2005 video in which he talked lewdly about women.

[Featured Image by Joe Raedle/Getty Images]

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