EXCLUSIVE: Oregon Dems claim GOP county commissioners who demand election security after ballot box-bombing are ‘inciting violence’ to ‘suppress voter rights’

Clackamas County is a largely populated moderate county adjacent to Portland, Oregon, one of the most progressive cities in the United States. The board of commissioners consists of four Republicans and one moderate Democrat. Ben West, a Republican commissioner, told The Post Millennial that he was "dumbfounded" by the letter, especially after a suspected terror suspect disenfranchised hundreds of voters on Monday by launching bombing attacks on ballot drop boxes, sparking further concerns about the state's election practices just one week before the US Presidential Election.

West said that it is appropriate to express such concerns because Oregon is a strictly vote-by-mail state, with citizens having few options to vote: they can either deposit their ballots in a drop box or USPS mailbox or present them to a county clerk. Since Oregon residents are forced to rely on drop boxes, the Republican commissioner told TPM that the recent bombing incidents should have spurred a bipartisan debate about election integrity, rather than elected Democrats making defamatory charges against other elected officials who don't wish to see voters be disenfranchised by similar incidents in the future.

The joint letter, obtained by The Post Millennial, which was drafted by progressive Lake Oswego Mayor Joe Buck and signed by five other mayors of Democratic-run cities in Clackamas County, urged its board of commissioners to oppose all election security resolutions offered by local voters during a recent Oct. 24 board meeting. The letter, sent on the same day as the ballot box bombings, suggested that elected officials who fail to oppose election integrity measures would be actively "interfering" in the state's county elections, undermining election staff and volunteers, and inciting acts of physical violence on election workers.

The left-wing mayors did not once mention the ballot box bombing attack, despite the incident increasing election security concerns statewide and in the neighboring state of Washington, which was also attacked by the same suspect, police said. Instead, they shamed the board and county voters for wanting stricter election policies that would instill voter trust. The letter followed an unfavorable article published in the Oregonian that painted both Republicans and Democrats on the Clackamas County Board of Commissioners as election deniers for listening to concerns and recommendations from their constituents about fair and transparent elections, which is a commonality that tens of millions of Americans share.

The concerns were predominately raised by elderly retired county residents, mostly women, who the Democrat mayors accused of being "local operatives" in a "broader nationwide election denial" scheme. The residents belonged to the United Sovereign Americans, a fringe right-wing independent election integrity group that the county commissioners were unaware of prior to the meeting. The group has filed several federal civil rights lawsuits across the nation over election discrepancies; however, none of their accusations have been proven, and all of their complaints have been dismissed.

Commissioner West stated that the group "peacefully" presented a resolution to the board following its findings from an election "citizen audit," which included tens of thousands of alleged illegal ballot registrations, duplicate ballots being sent to voters, and alleged election data result inaccuracies. The resolution was followed by several proposals, including the implementation of voter ID laws, the use of paper ballots rather than vote-by-mail or machine, and same-day voting.

"We're not claiming necessarily fraud even," Don said, a Clackamas County resident and leader of the group. "We're just saying that we don't have confidence in the system, we need to have confidence in the system, and there's some very simple measures to be put in place that are very reasonable."

Because the conservative-run board appears to have done its job and politely listened to the concerns of its constituents, with several commissioners indirectly agreeing with a few of the recommendations that have already been accepted by most GOP lawmakers across the country, the Democrat mayors claimed in the letter that the board allowing their constituents to speak freely at the meeting was "wildly irresponsible" and gave way to "false narratives that have endangered lives."

"We were astonished to see County Commissioners validating and praising these unfounded accusations," the letter read. "The very elections workers in place to safeguard the elections process have faced threats and actual acts of physical violence propelled by these same dangerous and misplaced narratives. Fellow elected officials giving way to false narratives that have endangered lives is wildly irresponsible."

Commissioner West responded to the mayors who chastised the board for allowing residents to speak, telling The Post Millennial that elected officials must uphold their constituents' First Amendment rights, and that he would never crush the civil rights of others by prohibiting constituents from speaking, which would impede the country's democratic process. West encouraged the group of mayors to do the same, saying, "This is the United States of America, not Stalin's Russia."

"For people to come and bring their redress to elected officials in a public meeting is not a threat to democracy but rather a function of a free society," West said. "It's important for people in these settings to have a free exchange of ideas without demonization."

Additionally, West expressed disappointment that the mayors did not mention the current "very real" election security threat of mail-in voting, citing the ongoing investigation into the ballot box bombing incidents. West attempted to call two of the mayors who signed the letter hoping to get a bipartisan conversation going, but none of them returned his calls, he said. While the board of commissioners did not fully embrace the group's proposal, West acknowledged that residents made an effort to convey their concerns and suggested that certain components should be considered when making future election policy decisions.

Clackamas County Chairwoman Tootie Smith, a Republican, expressed similar thoughts to West, telling The Post Millennial that she saw the letter as a planned attempt by the mayors to derail her reelection campaign. All of the mayors who signed the letter endorsed her Democratic challenger, embattled former Sheriff Craig Roberts.

Smith stated that it is her responsibility as an elected official to listen to her residents' concerns and that, like Commissioner West, she would never stifle their free speech rights, including the elected mayors who signed the letter, if they were to offer public comment at one of the county board meetings. "It's too bad that fires were set in Portland and Vancouver and some people decided to take the opportunity to come forward to Clackamas County and blame us for listening to concerns," she said.

The letter also comes after the Oregon Secretary of State's Office determined last month that over 1,500 people were illegally added to the state's voter rolls, even though they did not provide proof of US citizenship, which issued another blow to election integrity in the state. As a result, Commissioner West requested that the county clerk undertake a comprehensive forensic audit of the county's Nov. 5 election results, to restore faith and transparency in the electoral process, he said.

Since the illicit voter registrations were discovered, Oregon Democratic officials have joined Republican lawmakers in sharing concerns about increasing the state's election integrity measures. This includes Democrat Gov. Tina Kotek, who urged the DMV to cease automatic voter registrations, which were registering noncitizens to vote, and state Democratic Treasurer Tobias Read, who advocated for statewide election audits.

West mentioned the recent bipartisan push for election integrity measures and questioned why the group of mayors opted to malign the board rather than join their colleagues in working together to guarantee the state's elections are fair and secure.

Despite the recently documented election discrepancies and Monday's attack on the state's voting system, in which both Democrat and Republican lawmakers called for increased security measures, the mayors asserted in the letter that the County Clerk and her staff of volunteers "run accurate, secure, and transparent elections" suggesting that no changes are needed and that both elected officials and residents need to trust the election systems that are already in place.