Thousands of Fraudulent Clinton Votes Found in Ohio Warehouse-Fiction!
Summary of eRumor:
Tens of thousands of fraudulent Clinton votes were found in a warehouse in Ohio.
The Truth:
Reports tens of thousands fraudulent Hillary Clinton were found in an Ohio warehouse appear to be false — but authorities in Ohio have launched an official investigation into the rumor.
The rumor started with a story that appeared at Christian Times Newspaper (not to be confused with the reputable Christian Times publication), under the headline, “BREAKING: ‘Tens of Thousands’ of Fraudulent Clinton Votes Found in Ohio Warehouse,” that reports:
Election officials in Franklin County, Ohio are reportedly stumped over what one maintenance worker found in a dilapidated downtown Columbus warehouse earlier this week.
According to sources, Randall Prince, a Columbus-area electrical worker, was doing a routine check of his companies wiring and electrical systems when he stumbled across approximately one dozen black, sealed ballot boxes filled with thousands of Franklin County votes for Hillary Clinton and other Democrat candidates.
“No one really goes in this building. It’s mainly used for short-term storage by a commercial plumber,” Prince said.
So when Prince, who is a Trump supporter, saw several black boxes in an otherwise empty room, he went to investigate. What he found could allegedly be evidence of a massive operation designed to deliver Clinton the crucial swing state.
Early voting does not begin in Ohio until October 12, so no votes have officially been cast in the Buckeye state. However, inside these boxes were, what one source described as, “potentially tens of thousands of votes” for Hillary Clinton.
A photo accompanying the story shows Prince posing behind a stack of the black cartons marked “ballot box” that he supposedly found in the Ohio warehouse. However, those black boxes can easily be identified as the ballot boxes used in England, not in the U.S. And the photo of the man posing behind the ballot boxes was taken from a stock photo website called Alamy. The site has additional photos of the ballot boxes and the man with the caption, “Ballot Boxes being delivered to Sheldon Heath community centre ready for voting in General Election.” So, clearly the photo used in the Christian Times Newspaper story does not show ballot boxes found in an Ohio warehouse.
Christian Times Newspaper has a knack for publishing fake news stories that appear to be real. Its name is so similar to the reputable Christian Times site, which often creates confusion among readers. We previously investigated previous false reports from the site that all 4th of July fireworks displays had been canceled due to terrorism fears, that Donald Trump had been removed from primary ballots in five states, and that Russian hacker “Guccifer” was found dead in his jail cell after hacking Clinton’s email sever.
When it comes to the Clinton election fraud story, the Christian Times Newspaper story was so believable that it sparked an investigation among elections officials in Franklin County, Ohio, an NBC affiliate reports:
The Franklin County Board of Elections says that a preliminary investigation shows that the article is fake, and the photo portrayed as the worker standing with the ballot boxes was lifted from a2015 article in the Birmingham Post, an English newspaper, and altered slightly, with some of the ballot boxes repositioned and resized, and some of the labels blurred out.
Elections officials would like to remind everyone that absentee voting in the state does not start until Oct. 12. The Board of Elections says that no ballots have been printed or mailed, except for those that were requested by members of the military and US citizens who live abroad.
The Board of Elections also has several security measures in place to help uphold the integrity of the electoral process:
-The computer system used to create the ballot and tabulate results is not connected to an outside network and thus is not vulnerable to outside intrusion.
-Each ballot storage vault is maintained under a double lock requiring a Democrat and Republican to simultaneously unlock
-A double lock system is used to secure the Vote Center and must be unlocked by a Democrat and Republican simultaneously.
-Both parties are required to sign a chain of custody for all mailed ballots delivered to or picked up from the USPS.
-Access to sensitive ballot storage areas are secured by keys that are maintained in storage containers requiring palm scan access.
-Votes are recorded in three ways (1) in a hard drive within the voting machine, (2) on the removable voting machine data card, and (3) on a paper tape inside the voting machine.
-When the vote is counted, it’s done in a public setting which can be observed by parties, any campaign, the media, and the public.
Given that Christian Times Newspaper is known for publishing false reports, that a photo used in the story actually shows an elections worker delivering ballots in England, and that Franklin County, Ohio, elections workers looked into the report, we’re calling reports that tens of thousands of fraudulent Clinton ballots were found “fiction.”