Leading Republican House candidate Mark Harris, to the surprise of attendees in the hearing room, said that North Carolina should have another election due to ballot tampering allegations.
“I believe a new election should be called,” Harris said. “It’s become clear to me that public confidence in the 9th District has been undermined to an extent that a new election is warranted.”
Harris said he wasn’t aware of any illegal activity occurring during his campaign.
Harris was winning North Carolina’s 9th Congressional District three months prior by 905 votes, according to The Washington Post. Harris competed against Democrat Dan McCready during the election. McCready responded to the situation in a Tweet.
From the moment the first vote was stolen in North Carolina, from the moment the first voice was silenced by election fraud, the people have deserved justice. Today was a great step forward for democracy in North Carolina. #nc09 #ncpol
— Dan McCready for NC (@McCreadyForNC) February 21, 2019
“State investigators established on Monday their theory of the case,” Vox wrote. “That a Republican-hired local operative, Leslie McCrae Dowless, directed a coordinated scheme to unlawfully collect, falsely witness, and otherwise tamper with absentee ballots — and workers who say they had assisted him in the scheme delivered damning testimony.”
Dowless refused to testify to the state board of elections, but on Thursday the board said that Harris’s campaign provided evidence containing, “previously undisclosed contacts between the candidate and Dowless.” State officials blamed Harris’ campaign attorney, John Branch, for withholding relevant evidence, but the attorney said that it wasn’t intentional.