NEW: Fake Democratic sample ballots distributed at Alexandria polling location

Men claiming to be volunteers for Republican 8th District candidate Jerry Torres distributed fake sample ballots with the Arlington County Democratic Committee logo at at least one Alexandria polling location today.

The sample ballots — distributed outside of John Adams Elementary School — have all Democratic candidates marked except for Torres in the 8th District race, though Torres said the ballots did not come from his campaign.

After some time, the men claiming to be Torres campaign volunteers said that Valeria Torres, the candidate’s daughter, came by and picked up the samples marked with the Arlington Democrats logo, replacing them with another marked “The People’s Choice Sample Ballot.”

As with the earlier ballots, “The People’s Choice” sample ballot had every Democrat on the ballot marked except for Jerry Torres in the 8th District. The men were also handing out Republican sample ballots.

In an email to ALXnow, Torres insisted that what the self-identified campaign volunteers claimed was not true.

The information is not accurate. Valeria is one of our contacts for legitimate volunteers and the person that provided that information about Valeria said that he only knew her as a contact. He did not say he received any ballots from her.

Valeria did not give any ballots to anyone for distribution this morning so your story would be incorrect.

I understand that there are several people, groups and organizations that have volunteered many of which I do not know and have not met. Please do your research.

“I think you are reaching for a story,” Torres later added. “It smells like the time that people put Torres campaign signs at the McLean police station and blamed the campaign. As I understand the signs were taken from legitimate locations by opponents outside the campaign.”

The men had stopped distributing the sample ballots with the Arlington Democrats logo by the time ALXnow spoke with them and were passing out Republican sample ballots, but they confirmed that they had been distributing both the sample ballot marked Arlington Democrats and The People’s Choice earlier that day.

Arlington Democrats Chair Steve Baker said the sample ballots with the local party’s logo are fraudulent.

“The sample ballot in question is not an official Arlington Democrat sample ballot and being passed out to mislead Democratic voters,” Baker said. “Arlington Democrats firmly support our congressman, Don Beyer and the rest of our Democratic candidates. All voters can find our official democratic sample ballot at our website, arlingtondemocrats.org.”

Arlington County Republican Committee Chair Matthew Hurtt, who has been outspoken about campaign sign theft and other issues ahead of the election, denounced the fake ballots.

“It is abhorrent that any campaign or political operation would mislead voters with a sample ballot like this,” Hurtt said. “I have been at polling locations across Arlington all morning, and I haven’t seen this sample ballot — but it is NOT the way the Arlington GOP operates. Arlington Republicans are working hard to build a brand in our community, and this is disheartening and infuriating to see.”

Chris Howell, chair of the Alexandria GOP, said the fake sample ballots did not come from the party.

“I don’t know who was giving out fake Arlington Democratic sample ballots in Alexandria but I think it’s outrageous,” Howell said. “They’re not part of the Alexandria GOP. We would never hand out fake sample ballots.”

Dan Egitto contributed to this report