The New York City Board of Elections asked prosecutors on Friday to investigate possible ballot stuffing and votes being cast by dead people in a hotly contested City Council race in South Brooklyn.
After a second day of hand recounting on Friday, George Sarantopoulos, a businessman, led Richie Barsamian, chairman of the Republican Party in Brooklyn, by a mere 16 votes in the G.O.P. primary in District 47.
Particularly troubling for election authorities was the late discovery of 22 paper ballots that officials said were not scanned by the voting machines on election night. The surprise comes on the heels of a report in The New York Post that two absentee ballots were cast by voters who are dead and another by a man who said he did not vote and has no primary voting history going back to the 1980s.
One of the dead voters would be 107 years old, the other 101, records show.
The board tossed out the 22 potentially fraudulent ballots, but under a 2021 New York state election law modification, the absentee ballots of dead people and of the man who never actually voted were included in the totals because there is no way to tell which candidates benefited. That is because the envelopes with the absentee voters’ names are separated from the actual ballots when they are counted.
After conducting an internal investigation, the board formally referred the matter to the office of Eric Gonzalez, the Brooklyn district attorney. The office declined to comment.
“While any attempt to compromise the electoral process is deeply troubling, this case underscores the strength of the Board’s existing safeguards,” the election board said in a statement posted on X. “These irregularities were identified early, investigated thoroughly, and resolved swiftly.”
Before the announcement, both campaigns had urged investigations amid reports of irregularities. On Friday, John Ciampoli, an attorney assisting Mr. Barsamian, said that the campaign would contest the results in court.
He said the campaign had reason to believe that 21 or possibly all 22 of the tossed ballots — from a single election district — were cast in favor of Mr. Barsamian.
Mr. Ciampoli acknowledged such an outcome would be “peculiar” — and said he believed the ballots would change the results of the election, were they counted.
But Aaron Foldenauer, the election lawyer representing Mr. Sarantopoulos, said a cache of late-discovered ballots all going to Mr. Barsamian would represent “compelling evidence of fraud.”
“This is a classic case of ballot stuffing, where one or more bad actors attempted to mix in 22 fake ballots with legitimate votes,” Mr. Foldenauer said. “Sadly, these 22 fraudulent ballots are just the tip of the iceberg.”
Mr. Sarantopoulis, who has already declared victory, said elections should be “decided by the people of New York City, not by party bosses or operatives who can manufacture ballots.”
The winner of the Republican primary will face Kayla Santosuosso, an aide to Councilman Justin Brannan, who holds the seat now but is term-limited. Though Mr. Brannan is a Democrat and has held the seat since 2018, the district is considered competitive.
“Dirty deeds like this only serve to erode trust in democratic institutions and the electoral process,” Mr. Brannan said. “Voter fraud is a serious crime and there is every reason to believe this crime was orchestrated by the Kings County Republican Party to benefit their boss who was on the ballot.”
Jay Root is an investigative reporter for The Times based in Albany, N.Y., covering the people and events influencing — and influenced by — state and local government.
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