Trump reportedly backs Republican at centre of electoral fraud claims in North Carolina

A Republican at the centre of a voter fraud scandal has reportedly been told to “stand and fight” for his disputed seat by Donald Trump.

Mark Harris, who was thought to have won North Carolina’s ninth congressional district with a razor-thin 905 majority in November, now faces questions over his campaign’s connections to Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr, a local political operative and convicted felon.

Democratic leaders in the US House say they will not allow Mr Harris to take office while an investigation into discrepancies in an absentee ballot operation he paid McCrae to conduct is ongoing.

Mr Harris, who denies any knowledge of wrongdoing, caused controversy earlier this week by using an alarmed fire escape to exit a government building in Charlotte in an attempt to avoid questions about the scandal from reporters.

Speaking to local news station WSOC on Tuesday, he apologised for the incident, before claiming the president had told Republican congressman Jim Jordan to pass on his backing in a phone conversation.

“The president had asked him to call Mark Harris and let Mark Harris know that he was thinking about me, and for me to stand and fight, and we were not going to let this seat be taken from us,” he told the channel.

Investigators are trying to determine whether Dowless ran a sophisticated operation over multiple election cycles to collect absentee ballots from voters, potentially altering the selections or not turning them in to be counted.

Under state law, it is illegal for anyone other than a voter or their immediate family to handle an absentee ballot before it is sealed and mailed.

Also at issue is whether Dowless was working as part of a larger local political machine, including whether he could have had improper help from current or former Bladen County officials.

Marshall Tutor, a retired investigator for the North Carolina Board of Elections, said his office first looked into allegations nearly a decade ago when Dowless was involved in giving voters cash to fill out ballots the way he requested.

“Dowless was throwing a lot of money around,” Mr Tutor said, recalling the probe he conducted in 2010.

“There was no paper trail. Witnesses refused to give sworn statements or testify in court. No one was going to admit they were paid $5 to vote. But where there's that much smoke, there was fire.”

Dowless’s attorney issued a statement last month asserting he had not broken any campaign laws.

Nevertheless, questions have been raised over whether such an operation could have affected the outcome of last November’s election, particularly given the narrow margin of victory.

But Mr Harris, who filed a lawsuit last week asking a state judge to order his certification as the winner of the vote, claims the number of ballots that could be thrown out by the investigation would not overturn the election outcome.

“Very rarely is there an election anywhere in this state or anywhere in this country where somebody doesn’t raise a complaint,” he told WSOC.

“I do think the number of ballots involved and I do think the number of difference in the victory is still a very major important part and I think by law, reason tells you why that’s where the Board [of Elections] has tended to operate.”

Additional reporting by AP