Justice Department Warns Oregon Secretary of State on Records Retention in October 29 Letter; Read Responds, Reporting over One Million Ballots Returned
Salem, Marion County, Oregon — The U.S. Department of Justice sent a letter on October 29 to Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read reminding him of election records retention obligations, and Read responded on October 30.
According to the Statesman Journal's October 30 report, Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter advised Read in the October 29 letter that election officials must preserve records for 22 months after an election, and that failure to do so could mean up to a year in prison or a $1,000 fine. The letter was reportedly sent to all states, about two weeks after Oregon began mailing ballots to voters.
In his October 30 response, Read said Oregon's elections are "well underway": as of 8 a.m. on October 30, the Secretary of State's Office had received more than one million ballots, about a third of those sent out. "In Oregon, we take our responsibility to protect free and fair American elections seriously," Read wrote. "We follow the law, the Oregon Constitution, and the Constitution of the United States of America. The federal government should do the same."
The report noted this is not Oregon's first friction with the Trump administration over elections: the Justice Department said on October 22 it would send election monitors to Multnomah County on November 3. McCotter's letter also misspelled Read's last name several times. Election Day is November 3, and Oregon voters can still return ballots by mail or at drop sites.
Source: GSM America
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：Salem, OR - State Capitol State Park - Capitol Building (4)。来源：Wikimedia Commons（Jrozwado，CC BY-SA 4.0）
