These days, a lot of people consider their pets as humans or even alternatives to children. One old woman from Costa Mesa, California, however, might have taken things a little too far after she registered her pet dog as a voter and even proudly flaunted that the canine voted. Turns out she just cast two ballots, leading to felony charges for voter fraud.
62-year-old Laura Lee Yourex of Costa Mesa, California, is the senior citizen in question. The Orange County District Attorney’s Office recently discovered that Laura’s dog, named Maya Jean Yourex, had a ballot under the dog’s name back in the 2021 gubernatorial recall election. Laura and Maya also repeated this in 2022. Funnily enough, Maya Jean’s vote actually worked and got accepted.
“The dog’s vote was successfully counted in the 2021 gubernatorial recall election but was rejected in the 2022 primary,” according to DOJ’s office
Surprisingly, it was Laura Lee herself who self-reported the crime to the Orange County Registrar of Voters for unknown reasons, and an investigation was launched to see just how many times Maya Jean voted. Thankfully, the damage wasn’t that extensive since the 2021 gubernatorial election, in which Maya Jean’s vote was counted, was supposedly unsuccessful.
Still, Laura Lee was charged with perjury, offering a forged document, casting a ballot when not entitled to vote, and registering a non-existent person to vote for a total of five felony charges, according to KTLA. She is now awaiting a court trial. It also wasn’t clear just how exactly Maya Jean managed to vote, as Laura only later posted pictures of the dog online with a sticker saying “I voted.”
People online are trying to guess who the dog voted for
Given how easy it was for a pet owner to register a dog and even get their vote counted, a lot of people online have wondered just how many voters out there are fraudulent. The even more concerning question was who these fraudulent voters are actually voting for on their ballots. Some have argued that Maya Jean and her parent, Laura Lee, were Republicans, though that’s not exactly certain.
“Why they didn’t say she was a republican?” asks a Reddit user
“Repuplican”
“Our systems work”
Some have questioned just how ridiculous it is what governments consider people these days and complained that “Corporations are people but not dogs,” though corporations can’t exactly vote either. Of course, there are more lighthearted takes on the matter, and the good news is that Maya Jean didn’t affect the election turnouts too much because she was discovered as a fraudulent bad girl.
“Guess we’re gonna have to sniff out voter fraud now huh”
“You sure we aren’t barking up the wrong tree?”
