The fraudulent elections currently happening worldwide are not merely subjects of political debate but serious crimes that undermine national sovereignty and state functions. Yonhap News Archive

Park Pil-gyu, Editorial Writer · Korea Military Academy Class of '84US President Donald Trump continues to assert that the 2020 US presidential election was fraudulent. Through "Truth Social," he has repeatedly called the election a "rigged election" and a "stolen election," raising issues with mail-in ballots and electronic voting machines. 

In conjunction with these claims, the Hankook Ilbo recently reported that the US Department of Justice confirmed over 260,000 deceased individuals and numerous non-citizens were registered on voter rolls, and lawsuits are underway against some states. 

The fraudulent elections currently occurring globally are not simply matters of political contention. They are grave crimes that damage national sovereignty and state functions. Yet, many citizens and the majority of politicians from both ruling and opposition parties ask, "Is election fraud possible in this day and age?" They dismiss those who raise concerns about election fraud as conspiracy theorists. 

Those in power who deny election fraud either do not understand, or deliberately choose not to understand, how election fraud can be subtly carried out within the current electoral system, how its traces are difficult to detect, prove, and resolve, or they understand it well but must conceal it to survive. 

First, here are the reasons why election fraud is not easily detected:

△ Lack of Transparency in Digital Election Systems: Most processes, from voter roll management to ballot issuance, vote counting, and result aggregation, are handled digitally. However, since servers, source code, and log records are controlled internally by the National Election Commission (NEC), digital manipulation leaves no trace or only internal records, making external verification virtually impossible. Explaining that there are "no problems" without disclosing the NEC servers is akin to saying a diseased organ is fine without an endoscopic examination. 

△ Limitations of Vote Counting and Observation Systems: While poll watchers are present at polling stations, their role is limited to observing the physical proceedings at individual polling locations. There are limitations in monitoring connections and operating systems on laptops at the site or visually identifying ballots rapidly sorted. Macro-level anomalies such as regional or temporal patterns cannot be monitored by the naked eye. In fact, in many elections, candidates who led in in-person voting have lost in early or mail-in voting, repeatedly causing the results to be overturned. 

The fact that early voting turnout rates show a similar pattern nationwide, irrespective of the characteristics of each electoral district, can only be seen as evidence of digital manipulation by an unseen hand. The observation by vote counting and poll watchers is akin to blind men touching an elephant. 

△ Gaps in the System for Monitoring and Investigating Election Fraud: While the NEC leads election management, system design, operation, and verification, there is no independent audit body to forcibly investigate and conclude when suspicions arise. The prosecution is reluctant to investigate in a way that could overturn election results, and a special prosecutor cannot be appointed without political consensus. Consequently, although suspicions of election fraud have been raised since 2002, no clear conclusion has ever been reached. 

△ Structural Issue of the NEC Chairperson Also Serving as a Judge: Even when problems arise during the election process and suspicions of fraud are raised, the NEC's internal judgment is applied first. Subsequently, the court lacks the technical means and access to information to directly verify the system designed and operated by the NEC. Ultimately, the court has no choice but to rely on the data and explanations provided by the NEC, and if there are problems, they are compelled to protect their own institution. As a result, passive rulings such as "no significant defects that could have affected the election results have been proven" are repeatedly issued. 

Second, structural improvements are needed to monitor and investigate election fraud. 

△ Transitioning Digital Election Systems to Regular Audits: Improvements are needed in the Enforcement Decree of the Public Official Election Act to allow for pre-disclosure audits of servers, source code, and log records, and for technical verification of the use of the same system. 

△ Shifting from Visual Observation to Data-Based Monitoring: The current observation system only allows for checking the physical proceedings at individual polling stations and cannot track statistical trends and anomalies of the entire election in real-time. To address this, a system for automatically detecting statistical anomalies should be introduced. 

△ Establishment of an Independent Election Audit Agency Separate from the NEC, Prosecution, and Courts: When certain conditions are met, such as election invalidation lawsuits, automatic investigations and final judgments should be possible. Institutional mechanisms for resolving suspicions, rather than just ongoing disputes, must be devised. 

△ Selection of NEC Chairperson through Public Recruitment: The practice of the NEC chairperson also serving as a judge is a contradictory structure, similar to how magistrates in the Joseon Dynasty performed both administrative and judicial duties. The NEC should be limited to its role as a purely administrative body, and subsequent judgments should be entrusted to an independent audit agency or separate judicial proceedings to separate powers. 

Third, here are the reasons why the early voting system should be abolished. 

Early voting lacks the physical verification mechanisms of in-person voting, such as the stamp record on the voter roster, the personal stamp of the election official, and the serial number of the ballot. As a result, it is difficult to post-hoc verify whether the number of voters matches the number of ballots. 

Furthermore, mail-in voting is a form of early voting, and the possibility of external intervention and manipulation exists during the delivery and return process. The core issue that President Trump has raised is also fraud in mail-in voting. Early voting, mail-in voting, and electronic counting should be abolished. If abolition is difficult, the election should be conducted over two days, and ballot counting should be performed manually at the site, as in Taiwan. A system where one loses at the computer tabulation stage despite winning the election should no longer be tolerated. 

Demanding trust while maintaining a clear structure for election fraud is an act of self-harm to democracy. Democracy is not maintained by requests to "believe us." Trust is only restored when citizens can verify it themselves. What is needed now is not politics that suppress suspicion, but reforms that institutionalize verification. 

If election fraud is perpetrated again in next year's local elections, uncontrollable chaos will ensue. To avoid political upheaval by an angry populace, both ruling and opposition parties must hold expert seminars for revising the Public Official Election Act and comprehensively overhaul the election system. 

Hankook Ilbo Editorial Writer