Thread by @Athan_K

When it comes to ballot harvesting, Pennsylvania’s Delaware County is not only the undisputed leader in Pennsylvania but possibly the nation. Let me explain. 🧵(1/32)

Here are charts graphing each of Pennsylvania’s daily Democratic Mail-In Ballot Applications and Returns for the 2022 Midterm. You can see all 67 counties here. (2/32) drive.google.com/file/d/1N9Jygw…

This is what a Democratic Mail-In Ballot Application and Return cycle looks like for a typical Pennsylvania county. Almost every county, including Philadelphia and Allegheny, looks like this. (3/32)

Nearly 2/3’s of all Democratic Mail-In Ballot Applications happen in the Spring. That’s because counties are statutorily required to mail the prior year’s Mail-In Ballot Applicants if they wish to re-enroll for the current year. (4/32)

Essentially, Democratic campaigns “chase” those county mailers with digital ads, texts, robocalls or even their own mailer to get Democratic voters to re-enroll for a Mail-In Ballot. (5/32)

Democratic campaigns leverage taxpayer-funded mailers to do most of their ballot harvesting and save money. Smart! (6/32)

The remaining 1/3 of Democratic Mail-In Ballot Applications happen in late Fall when campaign activity is at a fever-pitch...much of it organic. (7/32)

While some Fall prospecting happens, Democratic harvesting efforts tend to pump the breaks by late September because +15% of Democrats don’t return ballots. It often becomes an uncast vote. (8/32)

One would assume that the Dobbs abortion decision, released in late June 2022, would have led to a summer surge in Democratic Mail-In Ballot Applications. (9/32)

The Democrats thought so, too. So much so that left-leaning organizations began mailing female democrats under the age of 40 across Pennsylvania who hadn’t voted in a decade, asking them to apply for a Mail-In Ballot. (10/32)

Shockingly, the Dobbs Summer Surge never came. The summer was dead for Democratic ballot harvesters, even in Pittsburgh and Philly. Make no mistake, @JohnFetterman and @JoshShapiroPA had the resources to do it. (11/32)

Likewise, the summer surge never came in Montgomery County, which home to the Democratic suburban base. (12/32)

However, the Dobbs Summer Surge did happen in one place: Delaware County. (13/32)

How anomalous was Delaware County? If you break 2022 into Pre-Dobbs, Dobbs Summer, and Fall, Delaware County Democrats got MOST of their Mail-In Applications during the summer which is when the other 66 counties got THE FEWEST. (14/32)

What did the Delaware County democrats do? Let’s start with what they didn’t do. (15/32)

Ballot harvesting in Pennsylvania is hard because the ballot harvester must have a voter’s Social Security or Driver’s License number. Here’s the application. (16/32)

County Boards of Elections are required to verify the Social Security or Driver’s License number on each application. (17/32)

Fraudulent ballot harvesting can happen at two points: the harvester illegally obtains a list of Social Security or Driver’s Licenses numbers to complete applications without a voter’s knowledge, or, Board of Elections workers conspire to not validate applications. (18/32)

There is NO evidence of either happening at-scale in Delaware County. So, how were Democratic ballots harvested in Delaware County this summer? (19/32)

Competitive State House races saw the largest surge in Mail-In Ballot applicants, meaning candidates and their volunteers/paid canvassers carried the Mail-In Ballot Applications with them while door-knocking. (20/32)

The Mail-In Ballot Summer Application Surge was spread across Delaware County. Furthermore, fewer than 10% failed to return their ballot, which is significantly better than the statewide average. Delaware County Dems chased those applicants, hard. (21/32)

Delaware County Democrats defied political gravity through elbow grease by working a plan. Republicans need to do the same. (22/32)

Republicans need to treat Mail-In Ballots just like voter registration, where the GOP has excelled in Pennsylvania for the past decade. Wherever GOP voters are registered is where they should be solicited for a Mail-In Ballot. (23/32)

In a few weeks, a little over 300,000 Republicans will receive an application from their county Board of Elections to re-enroll in Mail-In voting. That’s over a quarter million GOP voters who understand the process. (24/32)

These are the low-hanging fruit. The GOP needs a program to chase those applications via digital ads, texts and robocalls…just like the Democrats do. And, knock on doors. (25/32)

After that, the GOP targeting must expand to re-enrolling 2020 GOP Vote-By-Mail applicants. (26/32)

Then, the GOP needs an education campaign detailing to GOP voters that there is a greater chance of getting struck by lightning than having your Mail-In Ballot uncounted. (27/32)

Put it this way…over 80% of PA’s counties are GOP-run and have no interest in disenfranchising republicans. In the 20% of counties run by Dems, the Dems in-charge have no interest in bouncing GOP ballots because it imperils Dem ballots which tend to be more flawed. (28/32)

Mail-In Ballot education and enrollment must be the PA Republican project for 2023, and, build upon it for 2024. Anything else is noise. (29/32)

Before Mail-In Ballots existed, the GOP dominated Absentee Ballots. Republicans know how to do this. Just have to dust-off the old playbook. (30/32)

Truth be told, Pennsylvania’s Democrats aren’t that great at ballot harvesting. If they are good at it, the hide it really well! In Florida, Republicans absolutely crush Mail-In Ballots. (31/32) tampabay.com/news/florida-p…

Republicans can start winning again by getting back to basics. If you would like to help, follow me on Twitter and sign up here. (32/32) docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAI…