London voter says they received a previously marked ballot - city hall offers vague response

Social media has been buzzing this week about a claim made about the first day of advance voting in London’s municipal election.

A Londoner, who wishes to remain anonymous, tells CTV News that they attended the advance poll inside the Masonville Branch of the London Public Library with a family member on Saturday morning.

The voter says when they entered the booth they realized the ballot had already been marked for mayoral candidate Josh Morgan.

Their family member’s ballot was unmarked.

They returned the marked ballot to a poll worker who wrote void across the ballot and provided them with a new one.

The voter believes it was an unintentional mistake, and says they contacted the media to ensure election processes are being followed.

On Wednesday, mayoral candidate Khalil Ramal said the clerk was investigating.

"It was disturbing, and we clarified with the clerks office," Ramal replied to a question by the media. "I believe in our democracy and our election process."

City hall responded to an inquiry by CTV News with the following statement:

"The City Clerk’s Office has strict ballot handling and audit procedures. We take the integrity of the vote process seriously and have investigated the matter and can confirm this is an isolated complaint. Given how our ballots are printed and distributed, we have every confidence that voters will be receiving an authorized blank ballot."

On Thursday, CTV News asked for clarification.

The first statement confirmed "an isolated complaint", but did not indicate if the investigation determined if a previously marked ballot had been handed to the voter.

The response from city hall spoke only to the process.

"We have looked at our control of ballots and we take every possible precaution before issuing a ballot to a voter. We have a chain of control that will not allow ballots to be tampered with before they are provided to a voter."

Kings University College Political Scientist Dr. Jacquetta Newman explains that transparency can combat voting conspiracies perpetuated on social media, “In terms of what people have been calling ‘anger farming’, to create division, which creates distrust.”

In 2018, just under 40 per cent of eligible voters participated in London’s municipal election, casting about 98,000 ballots.

Dr. Newman says if the event happened, it should not impact trust in the electoral process, "View it in terms of, it’s good that it was caught. These events are extremely rare."

Advanced polls continue this week.

Election Day is October 24.