Shasta supervisor contacts MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell as county weighs hand-count voting

District 1 Supervisor Kevin Crye wants to leverage MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell’s money to help Shasta County set up a new pilot voting systems program.

Crye’s announcement that he had secured money from Lindell, who’s gained national attention for his conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election, highlighted a bizarre, sometime chaotic and marathon Board of Supervisors meeting that started Tuesday morning and dragged on until after 10 at night.

At times the meeting pitted Lindell against Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, whose foundation funds a nonprofit that has awarded Shasta County’s election office a $1.5 million grant, money that Registrar of Voters Cathy Darling Allen wants to use to purchase a new building for her office.

It was a meeting that laid bare the deep divides that have defined this county since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, a meeting where some residents continued to litigate the 2020 presidential election, pushing, without evidence, theories of a rigged election.

Supervisors voted 3-2 to pursue a pilot voting program that would implement hand counting. But whether the county can get a system certified by the Secretary of State before the March 2024 presidential primary is uncertain.

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Is this legal?

Before joining board Chairman Patrick Jones and Chris Kelstrom in voting for the pilot voting program, Crye announced that he contacted Lindell.

Crye talked of his concerns about the cost to taxpayers to implement a new voting systems program, in the wake of the county’s decision to prematurely terminate its contract with Dominion Voting Systems. Crye, Jones and Kelstrom voted to end the contract after the conclusion of next week’s special election in the city of Shasta Lake.

“I do not want to get sued. I do not want to cost the county money,” Crye said.

So Crye said he emailed Lindell, adding that he has spoken to the MyPillow CEO numerous times.

Crye said that in his email, Lindell gave him an example of how a hand-count system could work, should the county opt for that route.

“I have sent you the best hand-counting paper-ballot system that you can use. … Also, I’ve provided you the United States law that documents what you can do for the handicap without machines,” Crye said reading from Lindell’s response.

Crye continued.

“As I promised, if you have any pushback, including lawsuits against you or your county, I will provide all of the resources necessary, including financial and legal for this fight.”

Crye didn’t say how much money Lindell has agreed to commit.

Lindell has traveled the country talking to anybody who will listen about his unfounded theories on the 2020 election.

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Ed Buchanan, secretary of state for Wyoming, a deep red state, called Lindell a “peddler of pillows and promises” after he came to his state last May to speak.

Supervisors Mary Rickert and Tim Garman voted against exploring a pilot voting program because they in part have grave concerns about getting a new system up and running before the March 2024 presidential primary. And not having a state-certified voting system in place would disenfranchise local voters and open the county to lawsuits.

“I need a lot more information other than just an email. … I need something that needs to be vetted,” she said of Lindell’s offer.

“We can’t miss any election. We just can’t,” Garman said of the time crunch.

Garman suggested taking money from Lindell would set a horrible precedent and would be akin to putting Shasta County up for sale to the highest bidder.

Rickert asked County Counsel Rubin Cruse Jr. if it was legal.

Cruse said this was the first he heard of Lindell’s proposal and couldn’t answer that question right away.

“I think we need to keep (voting system) in place until we have authorization by the Secretary of State” for a new voting system, Garman said.

Garman and Rickert argued that the fiscally responsible thing to do would be to rescind terminating the Dominion contract.

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Darling Allen’s office estimates replacing Dominion with either of the two other state-certified systems, Hart InterCivic or ES&S, would cost the county at least roughly three times more than keeping Dominion for fiscal years 2023-24 and 2024-25.

Cost to keep Dominion would be $524,000. For Hart, the estimated cost is $2,171,885. The estimated cost for ES&S is $1,806,853, Darling Allen stated in a report to supervisors.

Cruse advised supervisors to contract for another state-certified voting system to replace Dominion while the county works on a new hand-counting system. This would guarantee a system in place for next March’s primary.

Paul Spencer, an attorney representing Disability Rights California, urged supervisors to reconsider ditching the Dominion machines. The federal Help America Vote Act requires machines to be in place for the disabled.

"I want to be a little more blunt. I don't think you can come up with your own system that meets HOVA requirements for 2024," Spencer said.

But while Crye and Jones suggested they liked Hart, they joined Kelstrom to put off the purchase of a new system for at least a month as the county works with Darling Allen’s office and the Secretary of State on a new system.

Supervisors also were told by Deputy Secretary of State Susan Lapsley and Peter Lichtenheld of Hart that hand counts have the potential to not be as accurate as a machine tabulation. Lichtenheld said, too, that hand counts can be expensive.

Dig deeper:Why Shasta County's vote to drop Dominion could help defamation lawsuit against Fox News

Darling Allen’s office has done tally audits of every election since 2018. One mistake was found, and that was a human error, not a machine error, Assistant County Clerk and Registrar of Voters Joanna Francescut has said.

Darling Allen also reminded supervisors that Shasta County, like the rest of the state, has been using paper ballots for years. The paper ballots are then tabulated by a machine.

“We want fiscally responsible government, not ideological decision making based on conspiracy theories,” Jeff Gorder, who retired as Shasta County’s public defender in 2018, told supervisors.

Gorder and others reminded supervisors that nearly 70% of Shasta County voters have no problem with the Dominion machines, referring to Darling Allen's election victory last June, when she beat challenger Bob Holsinger 68%-32%. Holsinger campaigned on getting rid of the Dominion machines.

County accepts election grant, with a catch

Earlier Tuesday, a divided board voted to accept a $1.5 million private grant from the Center for Tech and Civic Life, money that Registrar of Voters Darling Allen wants to use to purchase a new home for the elections office.

But there is a catch.

Supervisors want to be certain the money will only be used to purchase a building or property ― even though one of the conditions already states money can be used to buy a building ― before they accept the grant.

So now the county will go back to the Center for Tech and Civic Life to negotiate the more specific terms into the grant contract.

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Supervisors Crye, Garman and Rickert voted for the grant with that condition. Supervisors Jones and Kelstrom voted no.

The Center for Tech and Civic Life’s Alliance for Election Excellence program has drawn the ire of conservative groups, who claim that the money helped influence the 2020 presidential election. The grant money comes from a foundation funded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, and critics dub it “Zuckerbucks.”

One of the 12 conditions for accepting the grant is that the money can't be used to attempt to influence the outcome of public elections.

Shasta was one of 10 counties nationwide to be awarded the grant. Darling Allen says the program gives her department access to services at no cost for consulting to improve elections.

"We are very pleased and honored to be a part of that program," she said. "We were informed when we applied that some grant (money) was available. We didn't have any sense of the dollar amount."

Darling Allen told supervisors that the elections office in downtown Redding is antiquated. The elections department pays $190,726 a year in rent.

"In my opinion it would be irresponsible to turn this money away as a supervisor. This is $1.5 million in a county that desperately needs every penny," Rickert said.

Some counties have declined to accept the grant. Ottawa County (Michigan) Clerk Justin Roebuck turned the money down because he "felt more comfortable receiving funding for initiatives if there was a need," according to news reports.

Dan Sloan of the Shasta County Republican Central Committee urged the county to reject the grant because he didn't think it was proper to accept money from private sources that might vote on one side or the other.

"We don't want the Zuckerberg election building. We don't want the Trump election building," he said.

Later in Tuesday's meeting, during their discussions about voting systems, Crye asked Garman what the difference was with accepting money from Zuckerberg or Lindell?

Garman said it's a building versus a voting system.

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Jones told Garman that because Shasta County is a conservative county, the optics of accepting money from Lindell would go over better with local voters.

"I guarantee the optics do not look as bad," Jones said.

This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: MyPillow CEO Lindell comes up as Shasta County talks hand-count voting