on december 5, 2018, buzzfeed news detailed its independent investigative reporting of the alleged vote thefts, a practice that targeted southern rural elderly black voters in the 9th district congressional race. it termed the affair, "...the most serious federal election tampering case in years." campaign workers, who included jessica dowless, whose husband is distantly related to leslie mccrae dowless, revealed that the vote tampering went on in a pervasively chaotic atmosphere. mccrae dowless tracked votes on yellow pads and used cash to pay his employees, including some family members. some of those workers were said to be under the obvious influence of drugs while on the job. one, said jessica dowless, "...was so fucking high the other day she passed out at the fucking computer." another who picked up absentee ballots was a "pill head." she said mccrae's field workers "...would come to your house, they would get you to fill out an absentee ballot to be sent to your house. they would go back and pick it up and then seal it and then find two witnesses," to certify their validity, bringing them to the office and telling her to witness them, she said she told mccrae she didn’t want to do that but "...we had no else," to accomplish the task. such handling of ballots and completed applications by other than board and postal workers is legally prohibited. mccrae provided a car for one gatherer a week after she began working, lending a van to another. jessica dowless tabulated the number of ballots delivered to the county election board and said mccrae gave the harris campaign updates on the operation's most recent totals. the interim director of bladen county's board of elections denied her office paid jessica dowless, but a public records request revealed that to be untrue. mccrae dowless was employed by political consultants red dome, and received in excess of $428,000 from the harris campaign. jessica dowless said she dropped off completed absentee ballot applications once, and records confirmed she had delivered 185 to the board. mccrae personally delivered 592 applications before october 31st. buzzfeed contacted mccrae's stepdaughter lisa britt, who was later indicted for her alleged role in the case. she admitted to being paid in cash for her work. although she denied physically gathering votes, her account was disputed by jessica dowless who also said that mccrae gathered ballots, a prohibited practice, but only from democratic voters. britt denied that democrats were targeted, claiming they only facilitated voting by those without vehicles, though those ballots could have been returned by postal mail.