Burlco’s Democrat clerk screws up GOP primary ballots for 2,000+ voters

Burlington County’s Democrat clerk is consistent in her incompetency, Save Jerseyans. As a result, over 2,000 Republican voters spread across eight Burlington County municipalities need to closely read their ballots heading into June’s primary election.

This cycle’s issue began when mail-in ballots began hitting mailboxes over the weekend.

“On Monday [April 24th] at 5 pm, I discovered an error on the Republican Vote-by-Mail ballots, where the slogan for the local municipal candidates was the official Democrat slogan. The slogans all should have been listed as Burlington County Regular Republican Organization,” explained the Burlington County GOP’s Executive Director Josh Zoppina. “The ballots were mailed out Saturday and started to be delivered Monday. At that time, I emailed the County Clerk’s Office. I received a call from Deputy County Clerk Heather Cheeseman at approximately 7:00 p.m. where she confirmed the error.

Zoppina says *new* ballots went out mid-week but were unaccompanied by an explanatory letter from the Democrat-controlled Burlington County’s clerk’s office.

The problem is widespread. Republican voters in eight towns (Hainesport, Lumberton, Mansfield, Medford Township, New Hanover, Riverside, Westampton, and Wrightstown) received ballots with Democrat slogans affixed to GOP candidates; in Riverside, voters arguably discovered a bigger issue: wrong state senate and state assembly candidates. Riverside is located in LD7, a reliably blue district, but some voters there were prompted to cast ballots for battleground LD8 candidates.

 

In 2020, a similar incident (554 ballots sent to Atlantic County voters with the wrong commissioner candidates) resulted in an extensive court battle and, ultimately, a special election for county commissioner which wasn’t resolved until late 2021.

This isn’t even the first f-up perpetrated by Democrat Clerk Joanne Schwartz’s Clerk’s Office. In 2022, sample ballots were sent out for the general election with the wrong early voting location

“Mistakes like this happen every year under Schwartz’s watch, and we can’t allow it to continue,” said Deb Buzby-Cope, Mayor of Bass River Township and candidate for County Clerk. “Elections are too important to be mismanaged, and she has proven time and again not to be up for the job. That’s why I am running for Clerk. When I take control of that office, I’ll ensure we don’t make costly mistakes that waste taxpayer resources and erode faith in the election process.”

Matt Rooney
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MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com's founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of 'The Matt Rooney Show' on 1210 WPHT every Sunday evening from 7-10PM EST.