Paddy McGuire, who penned his article for the Shelton-Mason County Journal in 2020, also falsely claimed mail-in voting ensures unparalleled “safety and security,” while also defending the county’s decision to ban in-person election observers.
McGuire, the Auditor for Washington’s Mason County, authored over one dozen articles for the County Journal during the lead-up to the 2020 election, but never disclosed that his county received a cash grant from the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL).
CTCL in turn praised McGuire’s column – “Election Matters” – in a feature: “Mason County, Washington Builds Trust Through Local Newspaper Column.”
Launched in January 2020, the bi-weekly column was highlighted by CTCL for its efficacy in “help[ing] to present his office as a source of trusted information” and “preemptively quell[ing] misinformation.”
CTCL used hundreds of millions of dollars from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s organization — the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative — to overrule local election officials and increase turnout in almost exclusively Democratic districts through mail-in voting in 2020. Proving the partisan conflict of interest, leaders from the CTCL overpowered and overruled election authorities and, through coercion, allegedly accessed mail-in ballots ahead of the election.
Financial records from CTCL reveal that the Mason County Treasurer received a grant worth $32,904 intended to “support the safe administration of public elections during the COVID-19 pandemic.”