A woman in Iowa was arrested this week on suspicion of voting twice in the general election, court and police records show.
Terri Lynn Rote, a 55-year-old Des Moines resident, was booked Thursday on a first-degree charge of election misconduct, according to Polk County Jail records. The charge is considered a Class D felony under Iowa state law.
Rote was released Friday after posting $5,000 bond. A preliminary hearing is scheduled for Nov. 7.
The Des Moines Register reported that Rote is a registered Republican who cast two ballots in the general election: an early-voting ballot at the Polk County Election Office and another at a county satellite voting location, according to police records.
Rote hadn’t planned on voting twice but said it was “a spur-of-the-moment thing” when she walked by the satellite voting location, she told The Washington Post in a phone interview Saturday.
“I don’t know what came over me,” Rote said.
She added she has been a supporter of Donald Trump since early in his campaign, after Republican candidate Mike Huckabee dropped out of the primary race.
Rote told Iowa Public Radio that she cast her first ballot for Trump but feared it would be changed to a vote for Hillary Clinton.
“The polls are rigged,” Rote told the radio station.
In addition to Rote, the Polk County Auditor’s Office reported two other people to police last Wednesday on suspicions of voter fraud, the Des Moines Register reported. In the other two cases, those people cast mail-in ballots and also voted in person at one of the state’s early-voting locations, according to the paper.
No arrests were made in the two other cases, the paper reported.
Polk County Auditor Jamie Fitzgerald told the Register that it was the first time in 12 years he could remember having to report possible voter fraud.
Culled: Washington Post
