As Election Day 2022 comes closer, ensuring election integrity becomes even more critical. Here at RedState, we’ve had stories about Pennsylvania officials trying to cram through every mail-in ballot possible, even those violating state law regarding eligibility. Now, we’re already seeing an example of either gross negligence or deliberate tomfoolery regarding early voting. Unsurprisingly, it’s in California.

Voter in Woodland Hills finds both keys to ballot drop box in the locks when dropping off ballot. The voter did the right thing and called it in, an hour + later the keys were still in the same spot. pic.twitter.com/qA2jIYiS1P

— STREET PEOPLE OF LOS ANGELES (@streetpeopleLA) November 1, 2022

Since Twitter, even after the Elon Musk purchase, is flagging the content, the video might not play correctly outside of Twitter. However, the video shows the ballot drop box with a key hanging out of it on the side on which voters would approach. The narrator says:

“I went to go vote, but this is looking a little suspicious. Why is there a key in there?”

The voter then contacted the LA County Registrar-Recorder’s office and received this reply an hour later, asking them to just put the keys in the library dropbox since the librarian wouldn’t be there until noon:

As the story unfolds, it grows evident that librarians are now voting safety and security gatekeepers. Probably to their surprise.

The registrar office asked the voter to take the keys out and bring them into the library. “Safe and secure” while “saving democracy” is how we do it here in Los Angeles

— STREET PEOPLE OF LOS ANGELES (@streetpeopleLA) November 1, 2022

Let us review. For reasons unknown, whoever was responsible for taking the ballots from the dropbox managed to walk away, presumably with the ballots contained therein … yet left the keys in the lock. A good citizen saw the keys and contacted the Los Angeles Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk office. “Oh wow, thanks, we’re on it.” An hour went by, and the keys were still there. The citizen again contacted the Los Angeles Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk office. “Just leave them with the librarian.” (The box was outside a library.) Uh, sure.

Should this have been either the last or the only dropbox serviced that day, it’s possible whoever was picking up the ballots got distracted or simply forgot to bring the keys with them. Most of us have left keys in a lock. Or at least I have. Quite annoying and embarrassing once you discover where you left them. It happens.

That said, what are the chances this was the only, or last, dropbox serviced that day? Even if whoever serviced the dropbox accidentally left the keys, how could they not have noticed they didn’t have them after returning to the office? Granted, we are talking about a county government employee here; therefore, one must make certain allowances. But come on.

Incidents like this fuel speculation elections are not on the up and up. The Democrats have gone out of their way in recent years to make voting “easier” with measures such as sending everyone a ballot, the aforementioned dropboxes, and so on. It all sounds so lovely. It also creates numerous new opportunities for cheating.

When a populace no longer trusts the government to tally votes accurately and accept legally cast votes only, you’ve got a problem. This has long since passed the level of crackpot conspiracy theorists and entered the mainstream conversation. It didn’t help when the same people who screamed “Russia Russia Russia” in 2016 screamed even louder, “Everything is on the up and up” in 2020. But enough about the Lincoln Perverts … er, Project.

As our Mike Miller recently pointed out:

As we reported in October 2021, it was Hillary who did the colluding in 2016, hiring a former British spy named Christopher Steele to compile a mostly-debunked dossier full of salacious allegations against Trump — with the help of members of Russia’s government.

Plenty more examples abound, but let’s move on.

While the “right” to vote has long been a privilege of American citizens, left-wing activists continue their demand to let non-citizens vote. In one example, as reported by Daily Caller, the Washington, D.C. City Council advanced a bill to let virtually anyone vote in local elections — regardless of citizenship or immigration status — as long as they’ve lived in the city for just 30 days.

The bill is so extreme that even the “left-leaning” Washington Post editorial board called it “radical.”

Maybe the keys were an honest mistake. Maybe. However, there is no maybe in how such incidents give cause for casting an even warier eye on the government. A shame it’s come to this, but they’ve done it to themselves.