Metro East Sun

Illinois state Rep. Brad Halbrook (R-Shelbyville) is calling out St. Clair County for delaying the return of election results in comparison to the other 102 counties in Illinois.

Halbrook warned on the impact of slow election results.

“It is imperative we provide Illinois residents with the assurance that their votes are not being invalidated by fraudulent activity,” he told the Metro East Sun recently. “Counties like St. Clair County and Jackson in the southern part of the state have been historically slow in getting election results in a timely manner and this election was no exception.”

Halbrook, who was reelected in the recent election to represent District 102, urged for a system change. He noted the need for voter ID laws to prevent potential fraud and the "need to get rid of ballot drop boxes which make it easier for people to commit fraud.” He also wants to do away with voting machines and return to paper ballots.

“Time and time again when we see slow election results trickling in the Democratic candidates end up winning very close elections," he told the Sun. "Every time there are new ballots found or irregularities in the voting, it is found to always benefit one political party: the Democratic Party. How does that happen? The law of averages would suggest that these anomalies would benefit Republicans at least close to 50 percent of the time but that is not the case. It all adds up to distrust in the electoral process. We need to implement reforms and restore trust in our electoral process.”

In St. Clair County, the County’s Elections Department oversees the physical voting process.

“The Elections Department is responsible for the coordination and implementation of all election activity in St. Clair County from registering voters to tabulating the votes,” the County website said. “Voting is one of the most important responsibilities we have as citizens and our department works to ensure the integrity of the system.”

Halbrook's analysis follows a 2022 election that was rife with errors and oversights.

On behalf of a party, a court issued a temporary restraining order against the DuPage County clerk, the Dupage Policy Journal reported recently. In a petition, state Rep. Deanne Mazzochi (R-Elmhurst) challenged that the clerk was "improperly using Vote by Mail applications to validate a voter's signature on a Vote by Mail ballot." Mazzochi noted the court's decision that "using a Vote by Mail application to qualify signatures on the Vote by Mail ballot itself would be an obvious way to commit ballot fraud."

On other occasions, clerk's offices have failed to rise to the challenge of conducting a fair election.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kathy Salvi's name was left off the Schuyler County ballot, a report from the Chambana Sun said. Halbrook claimed that he had never come across a ballot error like that and had "never seen an error of this magnitude on a ballot." He warned that the public should be very concerned.

"It is not just the Senate race at stake here,” he said in the Chambana Sun report. "Other races could be affected. What if there is a close local election? What if these ballots are determined to be invalid because of the error? There could be all kinds of repercussions from the mistake made on these ballots. There needs to be a viable solution to correct the error.”

Finally, a week after the general election, Democrats won three countywide races in Will County when 6,400 mail-in ballots were counted. On election night, Republican challenger Jim Reilly was ahead of Democrat incumbent Will County Sheriff Mike Kelley, Republican opponent Raj Pillai was ahead of Democrat Associate Judge Jessica Colon-Sayre, and Republican Joliet Attorney Bob Bodach was ahead of Democrat incumbent Treasurer Tim Brophy. Calls for electoral reform are being fueled by such events.