In 2016 two employees who worked for the operative, McCrae Dowless, told state investigators he paid them to help people request absentee ballots and then collect the ballots and deliver them to him. It is illegal in North Carolina for anyone other than a close family member to collect an absentee ballot. In October and November of 2016, state investigators interviewed Caitlyn Croom and Matthew Matthis after three voters filed complaints about their handling of absentee ballots. According to Matthis, Dowless told them not to tell anyone they were being paid based on the number of ballots they gave him. Multiple people have come forward in recent weeks to say Dowless paid them to collect absentee ballots this year, and several voters have reported that people arrived at their homes and took their absentee ballots.

Source: Huffington Post December 20, 2018 01:07 UTC