Walczyk introduces bill to increase penalties for those who pretend to be elections staff
Sep. 26—ALBANY — State Sen. Mark C. Walczyk has introduced a bill that would make criminal penalties harsher for people who pretend to be elections workers and approach voters with claims of potential fraud.
Reports of people falsely claiming to be local Board of Elections workers have come from Onondaga and Steuben counties, prompting officials there to warn residents.
The Onondaga County Board of Elections in late August shared a message on X, formerly Twitter, that it had received reports of individuals across multiple counties pretending to be Board of Elections staff, confronting voters at their homes and accusing them of a crime because their names allegedly appear more than once in a New York state voter database.
In Steuben County, broadcast station WETM reported that the county sheriff's office had received a report of a possible scam during which a person who identified herself as a member of the Board of Elections visited a person in the town of Urbana, asked to enter the home and asked multiple personal identification questions on Aug. 23. When the woman asked the visitor for identification, the visitor left immediately.
Home visits are not conducted by any Board of Elections staffers in New York.
Walczyk, R-Watertown, is the senior Republican on the Senate Elections Committee, and said he is especially troubled by these reports. His legislation, Senate Bill 7661, would establish the crime of impersonating a Board of Elections worker or commissioner, by adding those titles to the list of titles included in the crime of criminal impersonation in the first degree, a class E felony.
Introduced on Sept. 20, the bill would amend the current law, which applies to police and federal law enforcement, and would go into effect on Nov. 1 after being enacted.
Sen. Walczyk is joined by six other Republican state Senators on the bill, and Assemblyman Michael J. Norris, R-Lockport, introduced the companion bill in the lower house.
"Regardless of one's political affiliation, intimidation of this kind cannot be tolerated," Walczyk said. "In a time when faith in our electoral system is diminished, these impostors actively undermine voter confidence."
The Republican election commissioners for Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties lauded Walczyk's bill in statements sent with the senator's announcement.
"The Jefferson County Board of Elections is committed to fair elections free from interference from bad actors," said Jude R. Seymour, Republican election commissioner for Jefferson County. "There are plenty of trusted ways to communicate with us, including phone, email, social media and stopping by our office. We will happily identify ourselves or allow you to call back our trusted numbers if you are ever uncertain that you are talking to someone legitimate. We will never stop at your door to question your voter registration."
Seymour said his office had received a report of someone approaching a local voter over a mistake in the voting record database and questioning them, but was not sure that they had misrepresented their identity in that conversation.
The voting record error had been corrected and did not lead to any double votes, he said, but it appears that there are people attempting to audit Jefferson County's voter records, which are publicly accessible.
While asking such questions is not illegal, Seymour said he wants voters to know that the county Board of Elections will not make unannounced home visits in any situation, and if they did require a home visit for any reason would come with warning and identification.
Thomas Nichols, Republican election commissioner for St. Lawrence County, said he is happy to see efforts made to hold people accountable for trying to influence elections.
"We should be doing everything we can to protect election integrity," Nichols said. "Some election laws are watered down, too many examples of penalties that are too lenient, the consequences for breaking the law should be deterring people from even attempting to break the law."
