Committee hears how Minnesota counties, state and FBI stopped hundreds of falsified voter registrations; officials say no invalid ballots were cast

The House Prevent Fraud Prevention and State Agency Oversight Committee on June 13 heard testimony about a multi‑county scheme in which two contractors pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit voter registration fraud after submitting large batches of falsified registration forms.

Bill Glahn, a policy fellow with the Center of the American Experiment, told the committee he observed court hearings in which two defendants — Ronnie Williams (also known as Michael Gibson) and Lorraine Combs — admitted to preparing and sending hundreds of falsified voter registration forms to a foundation that then submitted applications to county election offices. “She admitted to preparing more than 500 fake voter registration forms,” Glahn said of Combs; he said the total set of identified applications was “higher than 500, but less than 600.”

The committee’s top election official, Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon, said state and local safeguards — including county review of paper forms, address verification by postal verification cards and matches through the statewide voter registration system (SVRS) — and cooperation with the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice prevented any fraudulent ballots from being cast. “This is not a case about fraudulent votes,” Simon told the committee. “This is ultimately a case of the system working to detect these applications so they could be appropriately challenged and referred to law enforcement for prosecution and conviction.”

Why it matters

Committee members said the case shows both a potential vulnerability — third parties submitting large batches of paper registrations — and the effectiveness of checks built into Minnesota’s election system. Lawmakers pressed election officials on how the forms were submitted, how many counties saw suspicious batches, and whether any applications became active voter records that could have produced ballots.

What the hearings established

- Chain of submission: According to…