Conspiracy pushers target races for local election posts
SHELTON, Wash. (AP) — Sixteen candidates for local office circled around the atrium of the municipal building on a recent night in Shelton, a logging town near the southern crook of Puget Sound. One by one, they sat at tables of inquisitive voters for what was dubbed “candidate speed-dating.”
As Auditor Paddy McGuire, a Democrat, navigated the room, he was bombarded with questions from voters, some of whom have spent the past two years marinating in paranoia about the 2020 presidential election. Were there illegal immigrants on the county’s voting rolls? What sort of surveillance was used to make sure the drop boxes where voters can deposit mail ballots are secure? Did he illegally delete election data?
One table ahead was Steve Duenkel, a retired Boeing worker and Republican who is challenging McGuire for the office that oversees elections in Mason County, population 66,000. He told voters that mail-voting, which Washington state has used for decades, was inherently risky and that they couldn’t be certain of who actually wins the election next month until there was further verification, like an audit.
A veteran election official who put off retirement this year because of what he sees as the risk Duenkel’s challenge presents, McGuire is incredulous at the campaign against him.
https://apnews.com/article/2022-midterm-elections-puget-sound-government-and-politics-conspiracy-89014762c3f4d1e3765b87ab650b8654
