Democrat election judge pleads guilty to stuffing ballot box

Democrats continue to insist that vote fraud is a Republican conspiracy theory, but it was a former Democratic judge of elections in Philadelphia who pleaded guilty Thursday to accepting $2,500 in bribes to inflate the vote totals for three Democratic candidates.

Domenick J. DeMuro, 73, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to deprive Philadelphia voters of their civil rights by fraudulently stuffing the ballot boxes for the candidates for Common Pleas Court in the 2014, 2015 and 2016 primary elections, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

Announcing the guilty plea Thursday, U.S. Attorney William M. McSwain said DeMuro also is accused of violating the Travel Act, which bars the use of a cell phone to promote illegal activity such as bribery.

"Our election system relies on the honesty and the integrity of its election officials," McSwain said. "If they are corrupt, the system is corrupt, which creates opportunities for election fraud and for the counting of fake votes."

The U.S. attorney said DeMuro "fraudulently stuffed the ballot box by literally standing in a voting booth and voting over and over, as fast as he could, while he thought the coast was clear."

"This is utterly reprehensible conduct. The charges announced today do not erase what he did, but they do ensure that he is held to account for those actions," McSwain said.

The Inquirer reported DeMuro admitted that a political consultant paid him to add votes for Democratic candidates.

According to court documents, DeMuro inflated vote totals in a May 2014 primary by adding 27 fraudulent ballots. The following May, he added 40 votes, and in May 2016 it was 46.

Prosecutors pointed out those figures were a significant percentage of the total votes cast at the polling place. In 2014, his fraudulent votes were 22% of the total of 118 ballots.

DeMuro faces up to 15 years in federal prison.

Earlier this month, a Rasmussen poll found nearly two-thirds of registered voters said moving the country to voting entirely by mail likely would increase election fraud.

Last month, when CNN White House reporter Jim Acosta challenged President Trump's concern about vote fraud at a White House briefing, the president cited a Judicial Watch lawsuit against Los Angeles County after 1.6 million ineligible voters were discovered on its roll.

Judicial Watch announced a new lawsuit, in North Carolina, where many of the state's 100 counties have a large number of ineligible voters on their rolls.

Judicial Watch's 2019 study found 378 counties nationwide that had more voter registrations than citizens old enough to vote

The 378 counties combined had about 2.5 million registrations over the 100% registered mark.

That's a drop of about 1 million from Judicial Watch's previous analysis of voter registration data in 2017.