(RALEIGH, N.C.) — An operative in North Carolina’s unresolved congressional race has been charged with obstruction and illegal ballot possession related to 2016 and 2018 elections.
According to testimony and other findings detailed at an election board hearing last week, Leslie McCrae Dowless conducted an illegal “ballot harvesting” operation. He and his assistants are accused of gathering up absentee ballots from voters by offering to put them in the mail.
He was working on behalf of Republican candidate Mark Harris, who had a slim lead in the vote count before a new election was ordered.
