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Illinois GOP Chairman Bob Grogan is calling on a Democratic Waukegan city official to resign after prosecutors said she submitted her dead mother’s vote-by-mail ballot, a case conservatives say exposes broader concerns about mail-in voting and voter-roll safeguards even though the ballot was caught before it was counted.
A Waukegan, Illinois alderman, Sylvia Sims Bolton, turned herself in on Wednesday after prosecutors said she submitted her dead mother’s vote-by-mail ballot during a March primary election, which has resulted in two charges, including one Class 4 Felony.
According to the Office of the State’s Attorney in Lake County, Illinois, a vote-by-mail ballot for Mary Sims, Bolton’s late mother, was issued in the first tranche of ballots to go out from the Lake County Clerk’s Office in February. Just days later, however, the same office processed the cancellation of Mary Sims’ voter registration after receiving notification of her passing from the Illinois Department of Public Health via the state’s Board of Elections voter registration system.
After the ballot was dropped by Bolton at an official ballot drop box, it went through the county’s established security and verification protocols, which flagged that the voter’s death record was processed prior to the ballot being submitted and ultimately spurred the sheriff’s office investigation leading to the charges against Bolton.
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A picture of the Illinois state flag is seen next to Illinois Alderman Sylvia Sims Bolton’s mugshot. (Getty Images/Lake County State’s Attorney Office)
“A dead person voting, that you’re actually aware that they’re dead, is the easiest voter fraud to find. It’s like somebody leaning over the cash register and grabbing the cash out of the till,” Grogan told Fox News Digital. “But the complicated stuff, the behind-the-scenes stuff, that’s something that is harder to find … This is a one-off incident and if fraudsters do it right, it could be many, many more votes like this.”
Election integrity advocate Jason Snead, who runs the Honest Elections Project, added that the Bolton case “plainly shows that voter fraud occurs.”
“Mail ballots are especially vulnerable, which is why they should be secured, should never be mailed without a specific request from the voter, and should always be verified before they are tabulated. This case also shows how essential it is to maintain clean voter rolls,” Snead said. “Had the list maintenance process been slower, it is possible this illegal vote would have been counted before the fraud was discovered. Unfortunately, too many states — particularly blue states — actively resist commonsense safeguards, which begs the question: how many other illegal votes have slipped through the system?”
A press release from the Lake County State’s Attorney Office indicated that “all ballot envelopes” get reviewed through automated systems designed to flag irregularities that may require additional review.
Readability issues due to barcode problems, ballots being submitted for the wrong election, ballots that were previously rejected, and ballots associated with a canceled voter registration record, are all examples of irregularities that might be flagged. Other, less obvious irregularities, include whether a ballot is overweight or underweight.
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Poll workers process ballots at an elections warehouse outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on Nov. 8, 2022. (Ed Jones AFP via Getty Images)
The investigation into Bolton, who represents Waukegan’s Ward 1, began in March, and she turned herself in on Wednesday, according to a spokesperson for Rinehart’s office. She has been charged with one count of Mutilation of Election Material, a Class 4 felony, for allegedly knowingly falsifying election material, and one count of Disregarding Election Code, a Class A misdemeanor.
If convicted on the felony count, Bolton could face one to three years in prison, though Illinois law also allows probation or conditional discharge for Class 4 felonies. The election-material charge also carries a five-year ban on public employment after completion of the sentence. A Class A misdemeanor conviction carries less than one year in jail and a possible fine.
According to the State’s Attorney’s office, the investigation by law enforcement officials “did not uncover any facts linking these allegations to her city duties,” adding that she “is not charged with official misconduct.”
A vote-by-mail ballot drop box is shown alongside Waukegan Alderperson Sylvia Sims Bolton, who was charged after authorities alleged she submitted a ballot in her deceased mother’s name during Illinois’ 2026 primary election. (Getty Images and City of Waukegan)
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Officials in the State’s Attorney’s office also noted that they were not aware of any previous investigations related to individuals trying to use the vote-by-mail system to cast a ballot on behalf of deceased individuals.
Fox News Digital reached out to Bolton and her attorney, who declined to comment.
“This case shows the importance of having a well-funded, independent Clerk’s office that also has state-of-the-art technology,” State’s Attorney Eric Rinehart said in a statement to Fox News Digital. “Clerk Vega and his team followed national best practices in order to detect and report this crime. We must say loudly to people that if you improperly vote for others, you will be caught, investigated, and prosecuted.”
